DEV Community 4h ago

Building a Free Open-Source Tracker for Credit Card Benefits

I built Perks Reminder, a free open-source app for tracking credit card benefits, recurring credits, welcome bonus deadlines, annual fee ROI, and loyalty expirations.

The product problem is simple: recurring benefits are calendar problems. A monthly dining credit, an annual hotel credit, a signup bonus deadline, and a points expiration date all need different reminder behavior. They are not hard to track individually, but they become annoying once you have enough of them.

Live app: https://www.perks-reminder.com
GitHub: https://github.com/lifan-builds/perks-reminder

Design Constraints

I wanted the app to be useful without becoming a full personal-finance system. That led to a few constraints:

no bank account scraping
user-controlled card and benefit data
clear recurring due dates
email reminders before expiration
import / export
mobile-first UI
self-hostable source

The goal is not to infer every transaction. The goal is to make the benefits visible enough that users stop missing expiring credits.

What It Tracks

Perks Reminder tracks:

recurring card benefits
welcome bonus deadlines
annual fee ROI
complete / partial-complete status
notes
custom reminders
loyalty points and miles expiration
import / export

The loyalty tracker is split into a separate subsite: https://loyalty.perks-reminder.com/

Card benefits and loyalty expiration dates behave differently, so I kept the workflows separate while sharing the login system.

The 2.1 Update

The latest update focused on mobile UX and practical benefit usage notes. Most users check benefit status from a phone, not from a desktop. So the mobile UI now makes expiring benefits more prominent, makes completion actions faster, and supports views by card, category, and due date.

The more interesting feature is Benefit usage manuals. For a lot of card credits, the useful information is not only "this card has this benefit." Users also want to know:

how the credit usually triggers
which merchants count
whether gift cards work
when credits tend to post
what common traps exist
whether recent data points changed the answer

That turns the app from a checklist into a practical operating manual.

Tech Stack

The current stack:

Next.js
React
Tailwind CSS
Prisma
PostgreSQL
NextAuth
Resend for email reminders
Vercel cron jobs

The source is open, and self-hosting is supported for people who want complete control over their data.

The Hard Part Is Data Freshness

The hard engineering/product problem is not only reminders. It is maintaining real-world benefit data. Card benefits change. Redemption paths change. Merchant coding changes. Community data points become stale.

That is why the launch asks users to report missing cards, outdated rules, and wrong usage notes. I launched the update first on USCardForum/Nitan because the users there know the edge cases:

https://www.uscardforum.com/t/topic/388701

Feedback Wanted

I would appreciate feedback on:

missing card data
recurring-benefit modeling
reminder timing
self-hosting setup
import/export workflow
whether usage manuals are a useful format