Will Chase Improve The Earning Rates Of The Chase Sapphire Preferred/Reserve? (Maybe)

Earlier today it was announced that Chase would be launching the Chase Freedom Flex card and that the Chase Freedom Unlimited would start earning 3% cash back on dining & drug stores and 5% on travel bookings. Currently the Chase Sapphire Preferred earns 2x on dining and travel purchases and the Chase Sapphire Reserve earns 3x on dining & travel which means the Freedom Unlimited would outearn the Preferred and be on par with the Reserve.

The advantage of the Preferred & Reserve is that holding these cards lets you transfer the points to travel partners, whereas if you only held the Freedom Unlimited this wouldn’t be possible. It’s also not that unusual for Premium cards with benefits such as the Chase Sapphire Reserve to have a lower earning rate than other cards. This is a tactic that American Express employs for example with the American Express Platinum card only earning 1x on all purchases (excluding flights booked directly with airlines and prepaid hotels on amextravel.com).

Despite that I do expect we will see the Preferred revamped at some stage as Chase has been doing a major overhaul of most cards in its credit card line up.

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    William Charles
  • On August 31, 2020, 19:20
Tags: chase

View Comments (83)

  • So, please explain to me, what is the benefit of the CSR over having the Freedom Unlimited/Flex at this point? I have both, and am thinking of cancelling my CSR because I'm not seeing the benefit of the annual fee. The article says that you cannot transfer the UR points earned on the Freedom to airline points, is that correct? is that the only perk of CSR over the Freedom?

    Also, I actually just got charged my annual fee yesterday....do you think they will allow me to cancel the card and remove the fee one day after it was charged?

    • You can downgrade your CSR within 30 days for a full refund. If you are thinking of downgrading, I would advise downgrading to the Freedom card now.

      I know everyone talks about the Freedom going away but I think it's going to be that mystery card like the Sapphire Card where it's not listed for you to sign up. I bet it's likely that the Freedom Flex will generate a different card number not allowing you to product change in the future.

  • Even if they don't improve rates, it's still worth carrying a CSR just for the PYB feature if you redeem more than 50,900 URs in that way per year. Here's the math:

    $550 - $300 = $250 net fee but 900 lost URs.

    $250 worth of $0.005 bonus redemption value = 50,000 points.

    If you aren't hitting that, you should downgrade your CSR unless you use Lyft, Doordash, and Priority Pass quite often.

  • I downgraded from CSR to Freedom Unlimited when my annual fee came due to this year. This is a very welcome update. I plan to reapply for the CSR sometime next year when I am eligible for the bonus again. I hope we can still combine UR points.

  • Chase needs a long term Grocery option or provide an upgrade if you are a Sapphire Banking or Investment customer.

    Bank of America is quite compelling as the everyday card if you have Premium Rewards (2.65% all the way up to 5.25%). Pair that with Amex Gold for groceries and that is a winning combination with many benefits.

    Chase needs CSP or CSR to compete with Amex Gold on Groceries, or up Chase Freedom to 2% or 2.5% if you are a Sapphire Banking or Investment customer.

    Chase used to be the leader a few years ago and everyone else has started to run circles around them. I'm probably downgrading my CSR to Freedom Flex in December just to keep the credit history.

  • I almost downgraded CSR to CSP. But, if the fee is only $450, with the $300 credit and $60 doordash, that's the same price right there with CSP $95 fee. Plus the other CSR benefits.

    • The CSR is really $550 now. $450 this year only w/ credit because of COVID. At $550 it's quite a bit more but of course, there are more benefits too

  • I’m still waiting for a long term AMEX Gold competitor. These one year 5x grocery things on the Freedoms mean nothing to me in the long term.

    Maybe one of the Sapphires becomes that card now? The AMEX Gold is a beast when it comes to points however my local airport is a United hub so I wouldn’t mind Chase having a permanent grocery/dining card to compete with AMEX Gold hehe

  • I’m still waiting for a long term AMEX Gold competitor. These one year 5x grocery things on the Freedoms mean nothing to me.

    Maybe one of the Sapphires turn into that now?

  • I would be very happy if Chase added to the Reserve card: Gas and kept the Pay Yourself Back feature!

  • I want Chase to do something about Sapphire Checking and CSR. Don't understand why they're both "sapphire" products but have zero reciprocal benefits. Citi at least awards thank you points for having other accounts in the portfolio even if they took away the Prestige annual fee discount for Citigold.

    • I had a post earlier today that didn't show (perhaps due to an external link to Citi?). Anyway, the question is that Citi still shows on its site a $145 discount for Citigold clients to get Prestige (or the other premium AA card). Are you saying that has changed because their site doesn't reflect that?

    • I don’t disagree, though sapphire banking is not the same as Citigold.. it would be more comparable to priority checking. Account minimum of 75k versus 250k...

  • I think for the Chase Sapphire Reserve to compete with the Citi Prestige and Amex Gold/Platinum cards, they should at least up the restaurant and travel earning from 3x to 4x to help justify the $550 fee. In addition they need to make the Lyft and Doordash changes permanent and not just a 2 year trial that goes away after 2021 as part of the justification for the annual fee.

    • They'll have to do more than make Lyft and Doordash changes permanent to justify the $550 fee - they aren't of any value to a lot of customers.

      One benefit of Reserve over Freedom is the travel insurance.

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