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One of the benefits that comes as part of the package offered by the Chase Sapphire Preferred® credit card is a $50 credit that is automatically applied to a cardholder’s account once a year when they use their card to make a hotel booking through the Chase Travel℠ portal, and up until now, I thought I understood the terms and conditions that come attached to this benefit.
Reading the card’s terms and conditions, however, I could be forgiven for not being so sure.
I have to confess that as I have never got around to using the $50 credit that the Chase Sapphire Preferred offers me, I’ve never paid particularly close attention to how the credit works, but I’ve always assumed that the following was true:
- I won’t earn any bonus points that the Sapphire Preferred card offers for travel spending on the first $50 of a Chase Travel℠ hotel booking that triggers the hotel credit.
- I’ll earn points as normal on the rest of the booking.
I’ve made these assumptions based on past experiences with the $300 travel credit that comes as a benefit of the more premium Chase Sapphire Reserve® card, but two areas of the terms and conditions associated with the Preferred Card suggest that my assumptions are wrong while one suggests that I’m right, and that can make things confusing.
Thanks to the targeted 10,000/20,000 Chase Travel℠ bonus points offer and the targeted $100 statement credit Chase Travel℠ offer that we’ve written about in the past couple of days, I’ve been forced to pay closer attention to what the terms and conditions of the Sapphire Preferred card’s $50 credit look like, and I’m a little surprised at what they appear to say and I’m a little surprise that they appear to be contradictory.
First, a fact.
Leaving statement credits to one side for a moment, these are the earning rates offered by the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card for spending made in the travel category.
- 5 points/dollar for spending made through Chase Travel℠.
- 2 points/dollar on most other travel spending.
Ok, so with those two things in mind and assuming my assumptions about how the $50 statement credit works are correct, I should earn 5 points/dollar on all hotel bookings made through Chase Travel℠ in a year except on the first $50.
That, however, is not what two sections of the terms and conditions say.
When it comes to the 5x earnings with Chase Travel℠, this is the exact wording that Chase uses (bolding is mine):
5 points (“5X points”) on Chase Travel purchases: You’ll earn 5 points total for each $1 spent on purchases made using your card through Chase Travel (3 additional points on top of the 2 points earned on each purchase in the travel category). Any hotel accommodation purchases made using your card through Chase Travel that qualify for the $50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit, won’t earn points. “$50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit” means the statement credit that is automatically applied to your account annually on hotel accommodation purchases made using your card through Chase Travel, up to an annual maximum accumulation of $50. “Annually” means the year beginning with your account open date through the first statement date after your account open date anniversary, and the 12 monthly billing cycles after that each year.
And here’s a screenshot of the terms showing the wording (click or tap to enlarge):
In comparison, if you take a look at how the terms and conditions of the Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card treat that card’s 5x and 10x earnings on Chase Travel℠ spending, this is what they say (bolding is mine):
5 points (“5X points”) on Chase Travel airline ticket purchases: You’ll earn 5 points total for each $1 spent on airline ticket purchases made using your card through Chase Travel after the $300 Annual Travel Credit is earned in the travel category (2 additional points on top of the 3 points earned on each purchase in the travel category). 10 points (“10X points”) on Chase Travel hotel accommodation and car rental purchases: You’ll earn 10 points total for each $1 spent on qualifying hotel accommodation and car rental purchases made using your card through Chase Travel after the $300 Annual Travel Credit is earned in the travel category (7 additional points on top of the 3 points earned on each purchase in the travel category).
Terms for the Sapphire Preferred appear to say that any booking that triggers the hotel credit will not earn any points at all, while the terms for the Sapphire Reserve clearly say that only the portion of a travel booking that’s covered by the card’s $300 credit will not earn any points.
This different treatment seemed odd, but as the two cards are different products, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that Chase may treat their statement credits differently … but no points at all for a hotel booking simply because it earns a $50 statement credit seems overly harsh.
I then took a look at the section in the terms that discusses the Sapphire Preferred card’s general points earning to see if there was anything pertinent there. This is what that section says (bolding is mine):
How you can earn points: You’ll earn points on purchases of products and services, minus returns or refunds, made with a Chase Sapphire Preferred credit card by you or an authorized user of the account. Buying products and services with your card, in most cases, will count as a purchase; however, the following types of transactions won’t count and won’t earn points: hotel accommodation purchases through Chase Travel that qualify for the $50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit, balance transfers, cash advances and other cash-like transactions, lottery tickets, casino gaming chips, race track wagers or similar betting transactions, any checks that access your account, interest, unauthorized or fraudulent charges, and fees of any kind, including an annual fee, if applicable.
And here’s a screenshot of the terms showing the wording (click or tap to enlarge):
The section I’ve put in bold doesn’t leave much to interpretation, does it? It appears to be unambiguous in saying that a purchase that triggers the $50 hotel credit will not earn any points, period.
However, that’s not where things end.
In the section dedicated to the $50 hotel statement credit, this is what the terms say (bolding is mine):
$50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit: A statement credit will automatically be applied to your account when your card is used for hotel accommodation purchases made through Chase Travel, up to an annual maximum accumulation of $50. Annual means the year beginning with your account open date through the first statement date after your account anniversary, and the 12 monthly billing cycles after that each year. Annually, the first $50 in Chase Travel hotel purchases will not earn rewards points. Statement credit(s) will appear on your monthly credit card billing statement within 1-2 billing cycles after your purchase posts to your account.
And here’s a screenshot of that section:
And there’s the contradiction.
The first two sections of the terms that I’ve discussed seem to say (very clearly and with no ambiguity) that any booking that triggers the $50 hotel credit will not earn any points at all, while this third section appears to suggest that only the part of a booking covered by the statement credit will not earn points while the rest of the booking will.
It’s this last section that makes most sense and is what I think Chase intends, but the first two sections can really confuse the issue.
Bottom line
On the balance of probabilities, I’m going to go ahead and say that Chase has made a mistake in the way that it has worded the first two section of the terms and conditions discussed in this article and it’s the third section that’s correct (I’m pretty sure that’s the case), but anyone new to the miles and points game and new to the Sapphire Preferred card could be forgiven for being very confused about what points they’ll earn when booking a hotel through Chase Travel℠ and triggering the $50 statement credit.
Given how much I assume Chase pays its lawyers to write these terms, perhaps the bank is due a rebate of its own? 🙂
