Here is the new list of the Pay Yourself Back categories on the Chase Sapphire Reserve card for April, May, and June 2025:
- Grocery stores (excluding Walmart & Target) 1.25 cents per point
- Gas stations 1.25 cents per point
- Pet supply stores and veterinary services 1.25 cents per point
- Annual Fee 1.25 cents per point
- Select Charities 1.5 cents per point
You can see the previous categories (expired) in this post. We did a separate post with the Pay Yourself Back categories on all other Chase cards.
These random PYB categories on a travel card. What? Who is using a 1%-back-on-groceries travel card on… Groceries? And gas?
If redeeming in the travel portals and airlines aren’t your thing then I suppose the pet categories and charities harder to top? Not that I’m looking for veterinarian cards.
As of recently, mostly a waste unless you have that niche category where no other card does a higher return.
Or buy GCs at a grocery store
Sorry if I am a bit confused. I get that there is a 25% boost on groceries. The CSR normally gets 1 point per dollar, so now it is 1.25 points per dollar. The CFU gets 1.5% automatically. What is so special about getting 1.25 points?
I get that some people buy groceries using the Chase Freedom Flex card to get 5% on groceries (on some quarters) and move it to the CSR. But once you move it to the CSR, it still redeems at 1 point per dollar, thus still making it 5% and not getting this 25% point boost. What am I missing?
The purpose is to cash out Ultimate Rewards, not to increase the earn rate from 1 to 1.25
You aren’t looking it correctly. Let’s say that you have 1K points earned on $200 of spend at the 5X rate using a linked CFF card.
If you spend $1250 at the grocery store using your CSR, you will now be able to apply those 1K UR points toward the $1250 of grocery purchases.
So in a way, your $200 of CFF spend got you 6.25X of points. It’s technically less because you “lost” points by using your CSR on the grocery purchase, rather than using a better earning card.
Make sense?
Makes total sense now. I do appreciate your reply with a good example.
[Does it more sense to buy MC/VS gift cards with an Ink for 5x points, use said gift cards to buy groceries with them, and then use those 5x points to reimburse yourself for other charges at 1 cent per point] vs [Buying groceries with the CSR at 1x points and then reimbursing yourself for them at 1.25 cents per point]?
I may be missing something, but aren’t you getting to keep more points overall by just buying the gift cards vs putting grocery spend on the CSR, and you have more flexibility in reimbursing yourself for anything you want at 1 cent per point.
What do you mean? AFAIK, it has been by cardmember year for a long time.
It’s been calendar year for me. Seems like I missed this post (and didn’t get an email from Chase).
https://www.doctorofcredit.com/chase-changing-timing-of-chase-sapphire-reserve-travel-credit-for-some-cardholers/
Bummer they took away in the insurance category.
I spend more on groceries and gas than on insurance so I’m good. Adding the pet category is icing on the cask for me.
what is the limit?
Late last year I closed all my Chase Accounts .. will revisit after 48 months
That will show em!
Not to show them.. Was not able to extract much out of them.. USB and Amex helps me cover all types of purchases.. Don’t need anything else
Why does this card still exist now that it is so nerfed compared to the sapphire preferred?
I’ve cashed out a lot of points at 1.25X in the close to a year that I’ve had the CSR so I couldn’t disagree more with your comment!
Just book several thousand dollars worth of cruises or other travel through the portal at 1.5x using some of your millions of UR pts and it makes more sense in that use case. Not too hard to offset the annual fee. Yeah I know “transfer partners are worth more than 1.5cpp” but if you’re already drowning in UR’s then 1.5cpp is pretty nice on redemptions without great alternatives to book for significantly less.
that’s really great news for me I’m sitting on 1.1m points I need to cash out
I bet that a lot of people will be happy that Chase brought Grocery back as a PYB category. I miss the 1.5X days!
+1