Bank of America is running their Museums on Us program again for 2017, which offers cardholders free admissions to 150 museums, science centers, and botanical gardens nationwide on the first full weekend of every month (Saturday and Sunday). Simply present any valid Bank of America® or Merrill Lynch® credit or debit card and photo ID for free admission.

Note: Each cardholder gets one free general admission, so be sure everyone with their own cards bring them. I really need to add my 4-year-old as an authorized user…

2017 Calendar Dates (Check specific museum for actual hours)

• January 7th & 8th
• February 4th & 5th
• March 4th & 5th
• April 1st & 2nd
• May 6th & 7th
• June 3rd & 4th
• July 1st & 2nd
• August 5th & 6th
• September 2nd & 3rd
• October 7th & 8th
• November 4th & 5th
• December 2nd & 3rd

Here’s an excerpt from their press release with newly added museums in 2017:

New members of the Museums on Us program in 2017 include:

· American Museum of Natural History (New York City)
· Clyfford Still Museum (Denver)
· The Haggin Museum (Stockton, Calif.)
· Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum (New York City)
· Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston)
· National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force (Pooler, Ga.)
· New York Botanical Garden (New York City)
· San Bernardino County Museum (Redlands, Calif.)

These partners join a list of preeminent institutions (in more than 100 major cities) that continue to offer free general admission for Bank of America, Merrill Lynch and U.S. Trust cardholders throughout the first full weekend of each month. A small sampling includes the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), Shedd Aquarium (Chicago), the National Center for Civil and Human Rights (Atlanta), the Denver Zoo, LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) and the Miami Children’s Museum.

Here is the full list (PDF) of participating locations. One of the available museums is the Thinkery in Austin, Texas. We found it to be a fun and interactive children’s science center. The admission was $9 per person (23 month and under free). That means taking advantage of this offer would have saved us $18 (or $27 if the little one had a BofA card in theory). I’ve seen other museums on their list with $20 admission prices.

While I wouldn’t open a new bank or credit card account for this feature, it is a nice perk if you already have such accounts. You can also sign-up for a free text reminder before each free weekend. I signed up and haven’t gotten any spam texts from BofA, just the reminders. Here are the Bank of America credit cards that offer competitive features that I have reviewed in the past.

• BankAmericard Travel Rewards Credit Card Review
• BankAmericard Cash Rewards Credit Card Review

You probably know about online shopping portals that offer cash back or airline miles if you buy stuff through them. Some people even manage to earn miles by ordering things online and then picking it up in-person (to save any shipping charges). However, eBates actually has a limited In-Store Cash Back Program for traditional brick & mortar stores. You can get between 2% and 10% back at participating stores like Petco, Old Navy, Macy’s, GNC, and Ann Taylor. (There are also Double Cash Back promotions from time to time.)

Here’s an overview of the process:

• Link your debit or credit card and provide eBates with your credit card information. At this time, it only works with Visa and American Express.
• Manually link a store on their website. You can use their smartphone app (iOS/Android) for convenience. Be aware of some exclusions like gift card purchases.
• Shop at the store with that specific credit card. Debit cards must be run as “credit” purchases where you sign (no PIN). It’s very discreet. You don’t need to say anything, show a membership card, provide a coupon, etc.
• After you shop, the store will be unlinked automatically. If you want to shop at that store again, you must remember to manually re-link the offer to your card.
• You may not get instant confirmation. Ebates will e-mail you regarding your in-store cash back after up to 6 days.

This seems like an easy way to get a little bit extra without changing your shopping patterns. I went ahead and linked up my credit card and added a few stores. I’ll probably use it just like Rewards Dining where I also link up my credit cards and then promptly forget about it. If I happen to dine at a participating store, I’ll get some frequent flier miles. (Occasionally, I will target my dining if I am trying to generate activity to prevent miles expiration. I have a go-to local sandwich shop for this purpose.)

If you don’t have an eBates account yet, you can use my eBates referral link and get a $10 cash bonus by making at least $25 in total qualifying purchases with 90 days of joining. Simply look for an online merchant like eBay, Proflowers, Groupon, or LivingSocial where you’d spend $25 anyway.

Here’s another website that searches public databases to collect your personal information… but instead of being scary it should work solely for your benefit! ClaimDog.com is a free service that simplifies the process of finding “unclaimed property” in your name. Just type in your first and last name along with your state(s) of residence.

Unclaimed property is created when a business owes you money or property but is unable get it to you for some reason. It could be a rebate check or a forgotten safe deposit box. You’ll need to verify your identity before they’ll send out the money. For example, apparently I was owed some money from DSL litigation in California several years ago, but moved before I could get the money. I was able to search through the public database and later get a check for about $75:

If your state makes it easy for ClaimDog to access their database, then the site will help direct you to your unclaimed property. Otherwise, it will just point you towards your state-specific website. (I also ran into some errors.) It’s still free and hopefully saves you some time.

Here are more places to check to see if you’ve got any money waiting for you:

• USA.gov – Listing of US government-related items, including bank FDIC insurance failures, mortgage insurance refunds, and more.
• Unclaimed.org – State-by-state unclaimed property listings
• MissingMoney.com
• TreasuryHunt.gov
• PBGC.gov – Unclaimed pension plan benefits

If you bought any dairy products between 2003 and the present, and live (or have lived) in any one of the following states:

Arizona, California, the District of Columbia, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, Oregon, South Dakota, Tennessee, Vermont, West Virginia, or Wisconsin.

You may be eligible for a cash settlement of roughly $5 to $15 due to the Fresh Milk Products Price-Fixing Class Action Lawsuit. Fill out your claim at BoughtMilk.com by January 31, 2017. For now, all they need is your name and e-mail. It takes literally seconds. You do not need to submit proof of purchase, although as usual you are under penalty of perjury. Found via Lazy Man.

If you are worried about the legitimacy of this website, check out this HuffPost article. If you are interested in the (sad) background, read this Bloomberg article.

Update. In case you were waiting, there will be no special TurboTax discount for State Farm bank and mutual fund customers for tax year 2016. Taken from the TurboTax FAQ. It was nice while it lasted. Thanks to Eric and Michael for the heads up.

For many years, State Farm has offered TurboTax for free, or at a greatly reduced price, as a special benefit to their bank and mutual fund customers. State Farm insurance customers have also received special discounts. State Farm has made the decision to discontinue this program for Tax Year 2016.

Original, Expired post from last year:

State Farm is has historically offered significant TurboTax discounts, but only for select bank and mutual fund customers. The promotional prices for 2015 were: TurboTax Federal Deluxe Online free, Premier $20, and Home & Business $30. A free state return is also included with free e-File for all online versions. Details:

• You must have at least one State Farm Bank or Mutual Fund account linked to your StateFarm.com online profile. This includes checking, savings, IRA, and credit card accounts. However, if you only have insurance with them, you will NOT get this discount.
• You must register through their special promotion link.
• Offer limited to the first 25,000 qualified customers who register through State Farm to use TurboTax Online. I don’t recall how fast this ran out, but last year I believe it did run out before April 15th.

Some history… According to my notes, from 2006-2009 State Farm offered TurboTax Deluxe for free to all customers including insurance policyholders. In 2010 or 2011, they started restricting it only to bank and credit card customers.

The easiest way to gain access to this promotion is their regular “Checking” bank account with requires a $25 minimum initial deposit and no minimum balance fee. You must link your bank account number to your online State Farm profile, after which the website will recognize you as a State Farm Bank customer and you’ll be given access to the offer. Here is what you should see:

State Farm® customers can save on TurboTax 2015 by taking advantage of special offers. To receive your special TurboTax offer, you must access and complete your return through the link below. If you access your return directly from Intuit’s site, special offers will not be applied.

As Virgin America and Alaska Airlines have closed on their merger/acquisition, they are moving towards merging the two frequent flier programs.

If you were a Virgin America Elevate member as of December 5, 2016 and they haven’t found a matching Alaska Airlines profile for you, they should send you an e-mail offering you a welcome bonus of either 10,000 Alaska Airlines miles or a $100 off discount any Alaska-operated flight when you activate your new Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan account. You will automatically be assigned a new Alaska account number.

If you are a Virgin America Elevate member and they didn’t find the matching profile even though you do have an existing Alaska Airline account, you can link the two accounts together at this link. They should then deposit 10,000 Alaska miles in there shortly.

If they did find a matching profile, you should log into your Alaska Airlines account and hopefully find your bonus 10,000 miles already sitting there. You may want to contact Alaska in a few days if you think you qualify but didn’t receive any communication yet.

You can also convert your existing Virgin America Elevate points to Alaska Mileage Plan miles at this link, currently at a 1:1.3 ratio (i.e. 100 Virgin Elevate points = 130 Alaska miles). Keep in mind that the transfers are one way – you can’t undo the transfers and you can’t move existing Alaska miles to Virgin America. The Virgin Elevate program is still operating separately for the time being with their own partners.

Update: If you have an American Express Business card, look in the Amex Offers section of your online account page for 20% off a single in-store Sam’s Club purchase of $100+ (limit of to $250 back). You could use this offer a variety of ways, but one of them is to stack with the Disney Gift Card discount below. Thanks also to commenter Jamie. Here’s a screenshot (click to enlarge):

I bought 9 of the $150 face value packs at $142.98 each, for a total cost of $1286.82. (The $500 cards were not available in my store, and there were no transaction limits posted.) That would reach the max discount of $250 (20% of $1,250). Therefore, I will have gotten $1,350 of Disney credit and paid $1036.82, a 23% combined discount. (I’ll also get credit card rewards from the purchase.) If you were going to spend that much money on a Disney vacation or cruise anyway, that’s a $313.18 savings.

Original post:

If you are planning a Disney-related vacation, especially a package deal or Disney Cruise, I wanted to point out a current way to get 10%+ off of Disney gift cards. Act quickly though, as part of this deal will stop at the end of the 2016.

First 5% off. Right now, Sam’s Club is selling Disney gift cards at roughly a 5% discount to face value. There are two options:

• 4.68% off: $150 face value (3 x $50 gift cards) for $142.98.
• 5.004% off: $500 face value (1 single gift card) for $474.98.

Sometime they’re in stock online and sometimes they are only available in-store. The $500 gift card may be seasonal. There may be posted limits per transaction in the stores, but I’ve read several reports that you can buy more if you make separate purchases spaced apart (wait until the previous order is shipped and received). Alternatively, you can have a friend or family member buy them and pay them back.

Disney Gift Cards are valid at many places:

• Walt Disney World® Resort (including hotels, restaurants, gift shops, etc.)
• Disneyland® Resort
• Disney Cruise Line
• Disney Store locations in the U.S.
• DisneyStore.com
• Disney PhotoPass™
• Disney Vacation Club®
• Adventures by Disney®
• Aulani, A Disney Resort & Spa in Ko Olina, Hawaii
• Disney’s Hilton Head Island and Vero Beach resorts

Second 5% off. In addition, both Chase Freedom and Discover have Sam’s Club as one of their quarterly 5% cash back categories until December 31st, 2016. That means you could theoretically get 5% back on $1,500 of Disney gift cards per card account. Discover also has Sam’s Club in Q1 2017, but not Chase Freedom. (If you and a partner both had a Chase Freedom and a Discover, that would cover up to $6,000 in total purchases in Q4 2016 and another $3,000 in Q1 2017.)

Finally, up to another 2% off? You can technically get another 2% discount on your Disney vacation package with the Disney Vacation Account. For every $1,000 you load into the account and spend on qualified vacation purchases, they will give you a $20 Disney gift card. Qualified purchases include:

• Walt Disney World® Resort in Florida
• Disneyland® Resort in California
• Disney Cruise Line®
• Aulani, A Disney Resort & Spa in Ko Olina, Hawaii
• Adventures by Disney®

You can load your Disney Gift Cards into this account, although only up to $500 will count towards the DVA bonus.

You’ll be eligible for a $20 Disney Gift Card for every $1000 you spend on qualified vacation purchases with your Disney Vacation Account prior to December 31, 2017 (date subject to extension), up to a total $500 in Disney Gift Card(s) per household.

If you have a big package deal like a Disney Cruise, it’s not that much hassle to buy these gift cards and directly apply them to your balance. On a $3,000 cruise or vacation package, getting 10% off is a $300 savings.

Here’s a throwback to when free razor samples were everywhere – Gillette is running a Welcome Back promotion where if you share your story about how you tried Harry’s, Dollar Share Club, or another razor brand and want to come back to Gillette, they’ll send you a free razor. You just need to tell them a quick blurb of why you didn’t like their competitors and upload any photo of yourself. Took me under a minute. Valid while supplies last.

I actually did the Harry’s free trial and wasn’t overly-impressed, although they did offer “no hassle” experience. By the way, anyone can use these free razors, whether it is colored blue or pink. 🙂

I just saw that Netflix now allows an offline download option for many of their shows and videos (and not just Netflix-only shows). You will need iOS 8.0 or later, Android 4.4.2 or later, and the latest version of the Netflix iOS or Netflix Android app. This can save you money on cellular data and alleviates the pain of using slow WiFi. From the press release:

Many of your favorite streaming series and movies are already available for download, with more on the way, so there is plenty of content available for those times when you are offline. For example, Orange is The New Black, Narcos and The Crown are available for download today.

From The Verge:

… selection includes stuff made by Netflix (Stranger Things, The Crown, Narcos, Orange is the New Black, etc) but also a lot of other random choices. You’ve got Breaking Bad. You’ve got Mad Men. You’ve got… Paddington and Minions and Kung Fu Panda 3. This is going to be a huge deal for parents. Movies include Boyhood, Pulp Fiction, Nightcrawler, Good Will Hunting, Hot Fuzz, and more.

I agree, I’ve only started downloading tons of offline content after having kids. Here is a link to the Netflix Help Page on Downloading.

Not all titles are available for download. If you have a particular title in mind, you can search for that title and look for the download icon download.png. If you are interested in browsing downloadable titles, select Available for Download from the Netflix menu.

Amazon Prime Video also allows downloads for offline viewing.