| by Mr Credit Card |
The Chase Sapphire® Card is the latest “revamped” rewards card line up from Chase. From what I can see in the reward program, I think Chase has a winner here. Check out this long review below.
How to Earn Points – The Chase Sapphire® Card allows you to earn one point for every dollar that you spend on the card. Reward points do not expire and you can earn unlimited points. As a sign up bonus, you will get 25,000 bonus points after you spend $3,000 within the first three months. The Ultimate Rewards program also allows you to book travel tickets through their online travel system and if you choose to use that, you will earn 2 points for every dollar that you spend on the card. You will also earn double points from dining (from fast food to fine dining as Chase puts it). They also have a shopping portal where they have many online merchant partners. Using your card and shopping through their portal could earn up to 10 points for every dollar that you spend.
Rewards – The reward program for the Chase Sapphire® Card is the Ultimate Rewards. It is a rewards program that offers travel rewards, merchandise, gift cards and other rewards. We’ll now go through the rewards.
Travel Rewards – There are a few ways to redeem travel rewards for the Chase Sapphire program. You can use their online travel site and book your flights, hotel stays, car rentals, cruises etc (just like you would with Expedia.com or Travelocity.com). Their travel site should be the same as these online sites with access to most flights and hotels. If you do it this way, you can get earn 2 points for every dollar you spend. By doing it this way, you could also either pay by points or pay by points and cash (from your credit card off course). 100 points is worth $1 (which is pretty standard).
You could also book your travel with other online sites or even off line travel agents. After you have done the bookings, you will just have to inform Chase and you will get a statement credit.
You can also use your points to exchange for gift cards. You can exchange points for Continental OnePass, United Mileage Plus, SouthWest and British Airways gift cards as well as other hotel gift cards. Below is a screen shot of some of their partners.
Gift Cards – The Ultimate Rewards also allows you to exchange points for gift cards as well. Below is a screen shot of their merchant partners.
Online Merchant Partners – The Ultimate Rewards Program for the Sapphire Card allows you to earn extra points (up to 10 points) for every dollar that you spend with their online merchant partners. Below is a screen shot of their partners. I got this from my Freedom Card which gives you rebate (or discount) rather points. But the partners are the same.
Merchandise and other stuff – The Ultimate Rewards program also has tons of merchandise and you can also donate your points to charities. But there are just too many rewards to list them all here.
Fees – The Chase Sapphire® Card has no annual fee.
Verdict – There are a few things I like about this card. Firstly, as far as travel goes, there are a variety of ways to redeem points for travel. You can book through their site and earn double points (just like Amex charge cards – but without the annual fee). You can also book your travel with any travel agent (online or offline) like the Discover Miles and Escape Card. So this card is pretty flexible in the way it allows you to redeem points for travel. You could also exchange points for gift cards of United, Continental, SouthWest and British Airways.
Their other rewards like gift cards and shopping partners is pretty comprehensive as well. I would recommend the Chase Sapphire® Card to folks to want to use their cards for travel and also other rewards but are not hardcore frequent fliers. It has great flexibility in the way you can redeem points for travel. On top of that, there is no annual fee, you can earn unlimited points which do not expire.
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November 14th, 2009 at 14:42
Chase is certainly marketing the Sapphire card heavily! It seems that every time I turn on the TV there is that commercial with the husband on the couch and the wife walks into the room with the new dress that she bought with her reward points.
November 14th, 2009 at 22:43
not just chase, but I’ve noticed Discover is upping their ads too..and did you notice Amex in the world series baseball with TBS?
November 15th, 2009 at 03:25
I think I saw the Chase Sapphire commercial about 10 times throughout the day today. I’ve also seen commercials for the Ink Business Card around although I haven’t seen anything for Slate or Freedom recently at least.
October 11th, 2010 at 23:11
I just got my letter telling me my Chase MasterCard is AUTOMATICALLY being upgraded to the Chase Sapphire card, I have no choice.
I called their credit card customer service to tell them I want to keep my Chase MasterCard and was told all Chase cardholders are being automatically upgraded to the Chase Sapphire card. There has to be a reason benifitial to Chase that they are pushing this card on thier existing cardholders without a choice.
I think I’ve found it. Notice there is no VISA or MasterCard logo on the front of the card? Chase is keeping your account number the same so it appears to all credit card terminals as a VISA or MasterCard account number. I’ll bet they are intercepting these Sapphire card authorizations and not passing them to the VISA or MasterCard network, approving them at Chase. This has the effect of saving them millions in credit card network fees. I believe that is the hidden benefit to Chase that they refuse to disclose to their cardholders, even when asked what the benefit is to Chase.
Remember, no business does anything if it does not benefit them. Otherwise how will they stay in business?
What is not clear to me what happens to my consumer protection from VISA and MasterCard on this private credit card?
Chase did tell me if I did not like their Sapphire card, I could call back and they would see what they could do to get me into another card. After 33 years with this bank (all good up until now), I may be done with them. I’m writing a letter to their President of the Credit Card division to see if I can get a straight answer to my questions and possibly stop the automatic upgrade to the Sapphire card.
It is poor customer service to force your customers into a product without a choice. Oh, I do have a choice, as the customer service representative told me, I can close my Chase MasterCard and go somewhere else.
February 10th, 2012 at 20:00
[...] can afford the annual fees and perhaps benefit from carrying an American Express Platinum or a Chase Sapphire credit card, while other folks may simply choose not to carry one at all because it might lead to [...]