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Apparently, Chase is currently teasing some upcoming changes to its most premium consumer credit card – the Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card – but as with just about all internet teases, there’s not a lot of substance being shared by the bank, so speculation as to what’s on the way has been growing.
Now, however, we may have better idea of what changes will be made to the Sapphire Reserve’s earning rates courtesy of an accidental site update spotted by a Reddit user.
For a while, a page on the Chase website showed the Sapphire Reserve Card with the following earning rates:
- Travel booked through Chase Travel – 8 points/dollar
- Flights and hotels booked direct – 4 points/dollar
- Dining – 3 points/dollar
- All other eligible purchases – 1 point/dollar
Currently, this is what the card offers:
- Hotels and car rentals booked through Chase Travel – 10 points/dollar
- Flights booked through Chase Travel – 5 points/dollar
- All other travel spending – 3 points/dollar
- Dining – 3 points/dollar
- All other eligible purchases – 1 point/dollar
Link to the Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card page.
Quick thoughts
Assuming the image shared on Reddit is legitimate (it’s always best to be sceptical until solid evidence is provided), these earning rates will probably change the value proposition of the Sapphire Reserve card for quite a few people.
Ignoring any changes we may see to the annual fee or changes to the benefits that the card offers (things we are likely to see when the card is refreshed), this is how I see things.
I can imagine that a lot of people will be annoyed if the card no longer offers bonus points for general travel spending (rideshare, transit, tolls, etc …).
The considerably cheaper Chase Sapphire Preferred® card offers 2 points/dollar on most travel spending and the American Express® Green Card offers 3 points/dollar on most travel spending, so there are other options out there.
I doubt that the decrease in earnings from hotel bookings made through Chase Travel (8x instead of 10x) will be seen as a big hit by most cardholders as (a) booking hotels through Chase Travel is often more expensive than booking with a hotel/chain directly and (b) hotel bookings made through Chase travel don’t, generally, qualify to earn hotel loyalty points or allow guests to enjoy their hotel loyalty elite status, so most card holders probably book direct.
The decrease in earnings from car rental bookings made through Chase Travel (8x instead of 10x), however, will probably be a bigger deal as, I suspect, a lot of card holders haven’t minded missing out on Avis/Hertz/National benefits while they’ve been earning 10 points/dollar.
Going forward, the 8 points/dollar that they’ll now earn for rental car bookings made through Chase will probably still be enough to keep these card holders from booking direct when prices are comparable (what Chase is banking on – no pun intended!), but I doubt that they’ll be happy about it.
The improved earnings for flights booked through Chase Travel (8x instead of 5x) may be welcomed by some (as Chase Travel doesn’t seem to charge significantly more for flights than the individual airlines), but if you have an aversion to booking through a 3rd party site rather than with an airline directly (because dealing with 3rd parties when things go wrong can be a living nightmare), this probably won’t move the needle much for you.
The improved earnings from flights booked directly (4x instead of 3x) will be nice and given that the Sapphire Reserve Card comes with excellent travel protections (I’m assuming these won’t be changed), this increase will make the card considerably more attractive when it comes to deciding how to pay for airfare spending.
The improved earnings from hotels booked directly (4x instead of 3x) also looks nice, but given that these improved earnings come at the expense of being able to book accommodation through 3rd party sites (Expedia, Priceline, Airbnb, etc…) while earning 3 points/dollar, I don’t think that this will be celebrated as widely as Chase may hope.
Given the choice of 4x on hotels booked directly + 1x on all other accommodation spending or 3x on all accommodation spending, I suspect that most cardholders would probably choose the latter.
Finally, I guess we should be pleased to see that the card will, apparently, continue to offer 3 points/dollar on worldwide dining, but given that there are now quite a few cards on the market that can match or beat that return on spending, it’s not a surprise to see Chase deciding not to mess with this particular benefit.
Bottom line
Chase may have inadvertently let the cat out of the bag and given us a look at what the spending rates on the Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card will look like following the refresh that’s expected to be announced any day now.
Overall, we can’t really say how the refresh will be received until we have details surrounding the card’s annual fee and the other benefits that the card offers, but purely from an earnings standpoint (and assuming the information on Reddit is accurate), I would expect the changes to be, on balance, unpopular.
What do you think?
[HT: Doctor of Credit]
FM lists a plethora of coupons that make for a lot of hoops to jump through to make the new version worthwhile IMO.
If the rumors turn out to be correct, it looks like Chase is heading down the same path as Amex (i.e. encouraging breakage).
Since we retired 8 years ago, we spend on average $60,000 annually on travel. Most of that is for cruises to explore new destinations. If 3X for cruises is out then so are we.
The card will become much less valuable if in addition to these changes, they raise the annual fee. I also wonder if they will follow capital one and start charging guests for priority pass lounge access. I will probably downgrade to the sapphire and find priority pass access elsewhere. I live in Mexico and my wife has a card through Scotiabank that even still has priority pass restaurants included.
Rumors say the annual fee is going up to $795 (they also say that there will be a variety of coupon-style rebates on offer that may help bring down the net cost of holding the card)