Update 11/18/20: Chase has reached out to state that legacy cardholders will automatically be converted on January 11, 2021. They also point out that existing cardholders have the opportunity to earn another free night certificate by December 31, 2020 but this was previously announced. The increased annual fee will start to be charged in August 2021, so if your renewal is before then you’ll pay the lower annual fee for that cardmember year.
Original post: Waller’s Wallet (very reliable Chase news and info) legacy Chase Hyatt cardholders will have their cards automatically converted to the new World of Hyatt card in November. You can see all of the differences between these two cards in the table below:
| World Of Hyatt | Hyatt | |
|---|---|---|
| Annual Fee | $95 | $75 |
| Elite status | Discoverist + 5 five elite night credits | Discoverist |
| Elite status with spend | Two qualifying night credits per $5,000 (no cap) | Explorist after $50,000 spend |
| Free night certificates | One on card anniversay, another if you spend $15,000 in the previous cardmember year | One on card anniversary |
| Hyatt earning rate | 4x | 3x |
| Local transit/commuting earning rate | 2x | 1x |
| Restaurants/cafes/coffee shops earning rate | 2x | 2x (restaurants only) |
| Airline tickets purchased directly & car rentals earning rate | 2x | 2x |
| Fitness clubs & gym memberships earning rate | 2x | 1x |
| Earning rate on all other purchases | 1x | 1x |
The biggest difference is that the legacy card has a $75 annual fee compared to $95 on the World of Hyatt. A lot of cardholders keep these cards long term due to annual free night certificate. We’ve seen some upgrade bonuses for moving from the legacy card to the World of Hyatt card before, so it’ll be interesting to see if something similar is offered at conversion or not.
View Comments (49)
@will
Chase sent a letter saying that the changes won't go into effect until 08/30/2021 and spells out exactly when the higher fee will be charged. Since the fee is charged on the 1st of the month, anybody who is charged before September will have the $75 fee until 2022.
For those of us who had the card PC’d for us, is our 2021 $15,000 spend based on cardmember year or calendar year?
for completion's sake, I posted the letter I received from Chase/Hyatt on this here: https://www.doctorofcredit.com/world-of-hyatt-annual-free-night-certificate-to-move-to-calendar-year-spend-rather-than-anniversary/#comment-1147628
TLDR: You can earn 2 free nights in 2021 as a converted legacy Hyatt cardmember by spending $15k from now until your original anniversary date and $15k from the anniversary date until Dec 31 2021.
My card is now a World of Hyatt card. But for some reason I have a negative balance (-$37.50) in it now. I wonder if they were supposed to charge me the balance of the pro-rated annual fee ($95-$75) even though my annual fee is not due until August. If they charge me I will cancel the card.
Just logged in and saw the same $37.50 negative balance for an annual fee refund (paid in August- wife's account). I am seeing $6.25 refund for my card (paid in March) so it looks to be some sort of pro rated adjustment.
Does anyone know if the product change counts as an upgrade and counts against 5/24? Or is it still based on the date the original Hyatt card was opened?
If I close the account of the old card, do I also lose the unused annual free night credit?
Don't think so. 2-3 days after it posts to your Hyatt account you can close it any time. I think I did this once in 2017 actually. Just spoke to Chase Hyatt last night and they said this will not completely roll-out until 2022. Most people don't realize this, but you've already prepaid $75 for the certificate to be issued the following year, so you might as well keep it until that following year's cert get posted, cancel the card and request a refund of the annual fee within 30 days. Last night, I also asked Chase about this upgrade email I keep getting if they would grandfather my old anniversary date from the classic card into the upgraded cards. They said they believe it would, meaning that I would not have to wait an additional 12 months to get the annual cert (particularly since we already prepaid the annual fee to get the next year's cert).
I'm getting mail today from Chase with this info, fyi
Also, this is likely why only the OLD Hyatt card have the opportunity to earn a free night when spending $4k, to ease the pain.
Was reading that some people have both cards - how?
I'm assuming this will change the terms the card is under. This is one of the last chase cards with price protection (price rewind) still on the legacy cards.
The mailer I received explicitly notes that Price protection is not on WOH
Along with return protection, Explorist after 50k spend, and Car rentals as a bonus category.
Saw this coming, so I cancelled the legacy Hyatt card back in September. Since I'm below 5/24, I will just apply for the new World of Hyatt card to take advantage of the welcome bonus. Question: how long do I have to wait to apply for the new WOH card? I got my legacy Hyatt card welcome bonus back in 2016.