Chase Sapphire Preferred Card New Bonus: 50,000 Points = $500 Cash or 2x $312 Plane Tickets!
The credit card bonus wars are on, so grab your good credit score and cash in. The Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is a rewards credit card that has upped their sign-up bonus to new cardholders to 50,000 bonus points after you spend $3,000 in purchases within the first 3 months.
This is quite a good deal, as 50,000 points can be redeemed for $500 cash (real money, via statement credit or check) or two airplane tickets worth up to $312.50 each ($625 total value). You can buy a more expensive ticket and simply pay the difference. No annual fee for the first year, $95 in future years.
Rewards Program Summary
Points under the Chase Sapphire program are pretty flexible. There are also no earning caps or expiration dates. You also earn a 7% “dividend” on your earned points each year, even if you already redeemed them. I guess this is their way of encouraging you to keep your card, so you don’t waste the “interest”.
Simple cash back. As a rewards card, the Sapphire offers 1 point for every dollar in purchases (100 points = $1, or the usual 1% back). Earn 2 points per dollar spent on dining! Cash redemptions are easy – you can redeem in $1 increments as long as above $20, so you could cash out $27 or $253 without anything left over.
Points redeemed towards travel are worth 25% more. As noted above, hotel room or airplane ticket redemptions can also be maximized because you can book wherever you want and simply pay the difference. For example, 25,000 points can be used for any ticket up to $312.50, but if say you wanted a $325 ticket you could just pay the $12.50 difference. You can buy your travel from any vendor or website (Expedia, Orbitz, etc.), not just theirs. On other cards, you would have to go up another tier and spend an extra 10,000 points or similar.
Transfer to certain airlines. If you prefer, you can also transfer to British Airways, Continental Airlines (United), Hyatt Hotels, Marriott Hotels, and Amtrak. 1 Sapphire point = 1 mile/hotel point for these transfers.
More Details
In addition, this card has no foreign transaction fees, making it handy for travel. Sapphire cards also promote a “premium, dedicated service line that gives you access to a live person anytime, 24/7.” I tested this out and it really works! A real person picks up after a couple rings, no phone trees or typing those darn 16 digits over and over. You can use this feature to redeem cash rewards over the phone for free, although booking rewards tickets over the phone costs $20 (doing so online is free).
If you have any issues with approval, call the Chase credit reconsideration line at 1-888-245-0625. Ask them politely for the exact reason why you were denied, and offer to cancel and/or lower your existing credit lines in order to get the new card you want. You should be offered some way to get approved, I have heard many success stories. They want your business.
Find more in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 5/16/11, 6:03am | Trackback
May 16th, 2011 at 6:24 am
WOW. Very good deal. I’ve done this one several times before for 25K … 50K makes this double sweet.
Thanks dude!
May 16th, 2011 at 7:12 am
Hello Jonathon
I have read many of your articles about credit card sign-up bonuses. I was wondering if one should limit themselves on the number of credits cards they open in a year. What do you do with those credit cards after you have earned the bonus?
I have the same question regarding bank accounts. How long do you keep your bank account open before closing it.
Thanks
Rizwan
May 16th, 2011 at 12:07 pm
@Rizwan – I don’t think there is a single correct answer. Personally, I try to limit myself to 3 cards per rolling six-month period. Each credit inquiry will drop your credit score about 5-10 points for a temporary amount of time, depending on how long your credit history is, how many cards you have already, and how much of the credit line you use. The effect wears off after 6-months to a year.
I have had so many cards, that as long as I keep the old ones, I am fine cancelling whatever cards I no longer use. It doesn’t really affect my score, the canceling of cards. I definitely wouldn’t pay an annual fee unless you think the card is worth it on its own merits. Read more:
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/tip.....tably.html
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/can.....score.html
As for banks, if I decide I don’t like the bank, then I just close it
after I satisfy the requirements for the bonus. If the bank has no fees, then I might wait a while to see if I change my mind. Closing a bank account doesn’t affect your credit score. Opening a bank sometimes affects your score since a few of them check your credit score when you open (annoyingly).
May 16th, 2011 at 12:19 pm
Can you sign up for this if you have had a Sapphire card in the past? I noticed a previous poster said he had, but the terms seems to state that you cannot.
May 16th, 2011 at 2:25 pm
@nikki: Good catch. I just read the terms & conditions again, and it looks like they’ve added a clause to monitor “promotion junkies”
I know I’ve personally taken advantage of a 25K offer multiple times for this same card. Hopefully this isn’t the end!
Snippet attached below from terms & conditions:
Replying to this offer: If you omit any information on the form, we may deny your request for an account. If applicable, Chase cardmembers who currently have or have had a Chase credit card in any Rewards Program associated with this offer or have received a similar bonus offer, may not be eligible for a second Chase credit card in the same Rewards Program, or for any bonus offer. Chase cardmembers currently receiving promotional pricing, or Chase cardmembers with a history of only using their current or prior Chase card for promotional pricing offers, are not eligible for a second Chase credit card with promotional pricing. You must have a valid permanent home address within the 50 United States or the District of Columbia. The information about the costs of the card described in this form is accurate as of 2/22/2010. This information may have changed after that date. To find out what may have changed, write to us at Cardmember Service, P.O. Box 15043, Wilmington, DE 19850-5043.
May 16th, 2011 at 7:14 pm
Besides the obvious credit score impact of opening and closing an account rather quickly, are there any negative impacts to obtaining the $500 statement credit and then canceling before the year is up? I want the rewards, but don’t feel like the card is worth $95/year, especially when my other Chase rewards card (non-sapphire) is doing me just fine.
I didn’t see anything in the fine print about cancelling after the first year to avoid the yearly charge, but am I missing something?
The 7% bonus is a nice perk, especially since I put most expenses on my card and then pay it off in full each month. In a year if I charged, for example, $10k, a 7% bonus would seem to equal $70. It’s not quite making up the yearly fee, but would surely be close.
May 16th, 2011 at 7:23 pm
D’OH. I just got the Sapphire card a couple months ago when the bonus was only $250. Guess I’ll get the Mrs. to sign up for this one!
Thanks again for the awesome tip, Jonathan!
May 16th, 2011 at 10:41 pm
Great offer! Don’t know too much about it except for the commercials but do you get to pick Visa or MasterCard or are they their own thing?
May 17th, 2011 at 6:36 am
So, is this a Visa or Master Card? Or is it a totally different breed of card called “Saphire”?? Is “Saphire” accepted everywhere like Visa or Master Card?
May 17th, 2011 at 8:55 am
WOW!
I’ve already applied.
May 17th, 2011 at 9:56 am
My personal favorite is still my citi forward card. 5% from restaurants and amazon is HUGE. I recently changed jobs to a place with a cafeteria that takes credit cards, so the 3-4 bucks I spend on lunch each day is a nice little bump in points. It seems like I’ve been getting a $100 gift card every month or two for the last 6 months (I’ve had a few big amazon purchases on there, not all restaurant spending). The CVS gift cards are pretty much as good as cash for me, since I do a lot of random grocery shopping there on a regular basis.
May 17th, 2011 at 10:50 am
Does anybody know about getting the plane tickets? If I have $312 to spend towards tickets, do I need to buy them from THEIR vendor at an inflated price or can I pay priceline prices?
May 17th, 2011 at 11:22 am
I applied for this credit card online and I got the response from Chase that I will receive the approval decision by mail within next 10 days.
Did you guys get an instant approval or were you notified the decision through mail?
I already have a chase freedom credit card and I pay all my balances every month, wondering why I was not approved instantly on this one by Chase?
May 17th, 2011 at 5:11 pm
@Mike Z – You can buy your tickets anywhere – Expedia, Orbitz, direct from the airline, etc. You just go back to the website, pick the travel purchase (they can tell if it’s travel) and redeem your points. Your statement will then be credited. The benefit of booking a flight through their specific booking tool is that you get double points for the purchase.
Correction: On another part of the website, it states that the 25% travel bonus is only for when you book hotel or airfare through Ultimate Rewards. So it looks like I was wrong about this. I don’t know if the Ultimate Rewards site is more expensive than what is available on Orbitz, etc.
@Srikks – I think most people get the delayed response, even if they already have Chase cards.
May 17th, 2011 at 5:14 pm
The Sapphire card can be either a Visa or Mastercard. It is not its own card, Chase is just trying to make it look sleek and sophisticated.
I believe you can pick which one you want.
May 17th, 2011 at 9:24 pm
I had taken the Sapphire card sign on promotion in the past (such as the $250). Can I still qualify for this promotion? Thank you.
May 17th, 2011 at 9:35 pm
I just signed up and received an Amex Preferred card this week – are my chances or being approved/denied significantly worse if i go for this deal at this time? Would waiting 7, 10, or 30 days make a difference?
I need to find out if I have had this card in the past sadly I do not even know anymore.
May 17th, 2011 at 10:41 pm
Is any better way to spend $3000 in 3-month (buy coins?)? Thanks!
May 17th, 2011 at 10:42 pm
Is any a better way to spend $3000 in 3-month (buy coins)? Thanks!
May 18th, 2011 at 12:10 am
You can buy coins from the US Mint and deposit them in your bank account, purchase gift certificates from places you will shop at eventually through PlasticJungle at a discount (Home Depot, Target, etc.), buy American Express gift cards that don’t expire and then spend them gradually, prepay your auto insurance bills, prepay some utilities or cable bill in advance, but grocery store gift cards (Safeway cards at Safeway)…
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/pra.....cards.html
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/sel.....rison.html
May 18th, 2011 at 9:45 am
i called the reconsideration line, but they rejected me even though i tried to be polite. they cited that the balance on my chase amazon card was low, so they had to refuse my request to close the chase amazon so that they might approve my rejected application for the worldplus mastercard or whatever it was called.
May 18th, 2011 at 10:27 am
@Srikks – I got the same reply. But I Always do – there is a fraud alert on my credit bureau account. So they will verify my identity (with a phone call and weird questions) before I am approved.
May 18th, 2011 at 1:40 pm
Can you explain this?
You can buy coins from the US Mint and deposit them in your bank account
Does this cost you any extra money? I don’t want to spend 3000 on gift cards.
Thanks!
May 19th, 2011 at 4:58 am
Nice deal! Unfortunately I applied before noticing the new clause excluding current Chase cardholders. I thought it was strange that I didn’t get an email confirmation right away after applying, Chase used to do this. I only know because I’m one of those promotion junkies that you speak of. Anyway, thanks Jonathan for another great deal a lot of people will benefit by it!
May 19th, 2011 at 5:45 am
Re: the clause in the T&C’s about existing Chase cardholders and history of taking advantage of promotional offers.
I currently have 2 active Chase cards (Freedom and Southwest), and have taken advantage of the many Chase card promotions .. including numerous 25k promotions for this Sapphire card (thanks to Jonathan).
I submitted the application for this Sapphire 50k promotion. I received the notice that my app would need further review. I logged into my Chase online acct 2 days later, and saw the Sapphire card appear in my acct … which I am pretty sure means that I qualified. Still waiting for the letter to come in the mail, but I’m 99% sure I qualified.
So .. for anyone hesitant to apply for this card given the new T&C’s .. there is still chance you can qualify.
May 19th, 2011 at 11:29 am
The “new” cardholder reference is definitely just for Sapphire cardholders, it does not exclude everyone with any Chase card. I can verify that, because I got approved for a Sapphire and I have lots of other Chase cards.
In addition, I have read reports that it’s only specific to a type of Sapphire card. A regular Sapphire card means you can’t have another Sapphire card. A Sapphire *Preferred* card means you can’t have another Sapphire *Preferred* card. I can’t verify this, but it makes sense only because they seem to treat these cards separately and won’t let you downgrade from Preferred to Regular.
Finally, if you closed your last Sapphire card at least 6 months ago, people have reported being able to sign up again as “new” cardholders. I can’t verify this except it worked on other Chase non-Sapphire cards before.
Finally finally, if you applied for a Sapphire card and got the 25k bonus earlier in the year, then try logging into your online account and sending a message to customer service asking for the additional 25k. You may get some sort of courtesy bonus.
May 23rd, 2011 at 4:54 am
I just had canceled the Sapphire Preferred card a few months ago before the annual fee for the second year was due and opened a Chase Freedom account.
After seeing this offer I signed up for the Sapphire Preferred card again and, to my surprise, was accepted! I didn’t receive any confirmation emails, the new account information just showed up when I logged onto my Chase account. The card should arrive in the mail soon.
Thanks for the information on the offer!
May 25th, 2011 at 5:36 pm
Can I book a single ticket worth $625 with rewards points from this offer? or does it have to be $312.5 each?
May 27th, 2011 at 2:17 pm
Glad I got on here today. I was getting antsy to find out if I’d been approved. After seeing other’s experiences I just logged into my Chase account and saw a shiny new account posted there for me that I hadn’t noticed previously. Decent credit limit too. Thanks for the tip on this offer Jonathan. This will be the single best sign up bonus I’ve personally taken advantage of. I love cash back.
May 31st, 2011 at 5:05 am
I closed a CHASE Sapphire Preferred card 3 weeks ago (promo from last year). I applied again for this offer and was approved just like Eric…)
June 4th, 2011 at 10:56 am
Can someone comment on whether or not Chase Ultimate Rewards ups the number of points required to purchase tickets as compared to Orbitz/Expedia, etc. If so, is this really a good deal or just worthless?
June 20th, 2011 at 8:42 pm
Hey Jonathan this may be useful to your readers. You may have gotten wind of this already at the FWF forums but people seem to be getting Chase to successfully add another 50,000 points to the original offer. The OP posted the offer code, S6V, of his targeted 100,000 offer.
I was just able to successfully get 50K applied to mine and my wife’s accounts (just applied this past Sat. night in fact) and it was really painless, took 5 minutes. 200,000 total!
Here’s the link to the thread:
http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/finance/1105825/
This is the message I sent to Chase:
Dear Chase Representative,
I just this past weekend applied for my new Chase Sapphire Preferred card with a 50,000 sign up bonus of 50,000 points after spending $3,000.
Today, I learned of a new offer S6V which promises 100,000 bonus points. I would be very grateful if you would extend the 100,000 bonus point offer S6V to me as well since I just applied for the Chase Sapphire card.
I have been a long time customer of Chase, and have had my primary checking and credit card accounts with Chase for many years and hope to maintain them for many more years to come!
Kind Regards,
Paolo
June 22nd, 2011 at 8:57 pm
so, I don’t know if every store does this but Home Depot in my area allows you to buy gift cards with a credit card! I could buy a $3000 gift card, sell it on plastic jungle for the 90%, take the $100 hit and still come out with $400 and no money is tied up in any gift cards or nonsense. Win!
June 30th, 2011 at 3:32 pm
I tried to get upgraded to the S6V offer but I was shot down. I talked to somebody on the phone and they forwarded another request to marketing, so we will see but I think that horse is dead.
August 3rd, 2011 at 8:54 am
I called twice and they said it is definitely a Visa card. I had read a lot of different things saying it’s Mastercard, but it looks like it’s Visa. I’m so bummed because we were going to pay my husband’s tuition with it but his school doesn’t accept Visa! So disappointed…
August 3rd, 2011 at 1:14 pm
What kind of school doesn’t take visa? Amex/discover I could understand, because there fees are notoriously higher. Sounds like a personal issue between the school and the cardholder, they probably had a bad charge back filed against them and now they just blacklisted visa out of spite.
August 10th, 2011 at 7:31 am
I tried to get the upgrade both with a telephone & e-mail requests but was rejected both times despite my excellent credit history & current relationship with Chase. It’s just not fair!
August 26th, 2011 at 12:02 pm
“You can buy coins from the US Mint and deposit them in your bank account, purchase gift certificates from places you will shop at eventually through PlasticJungle at a discount (Home Depot, Target, etc.), buy American Express gift cards that don’t expire and then spend them gradually, prepay your auto insurance bills, prepay some utilities or cable bill in advance, but grocery store gift cards (Safeway cards at Safeway)…”
Can you explain how this is done? I do not want to buy the coins as an investment, just simply to hit the 3k spending requirement in a simple way. Thanks so much in advance for your help, time, and effort.
August 26th, 2011 at 1:08 pm
The US Mint has recently stopped accepting credit cards for coin purchases after a big NPR article about them. Please see this post about another credit card for tips on meeting higher spending requirements.
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/fre.....-open.html
August 26th, 2011 at 10:28 pm
Thanks Jonathan. I read the other article.
“use the personal version of Amazon Webpay to send money to your spouse, and I’ve even bought some Forever postage stamps to put me over the top.”
I think this is the best option out of what I read. From what I see there are no fees for doing this, either. Contacted customer service to confirm and am awaiting reply.
There does seem to be a $500/month limit for sending and receiving:
“Personal Accounts may receive up to $500 per month. The receiving limit may be raised or removed entirely once a credit card and verified bank account have been registered in the account.
Personal Accounts may send up to $500 per month once a credit card or verified bank account is registered in the account. Once both are registered, the sending limit may be raised or removed entirely.”
Has anyone had the sending/receiving limit removed after verifying a bank account and credit card?
I had the idea to do this 1x per month for 3 months and hit $1500 of the $3000. I have 93 days on the Sapphire Preferred, I assume.
Also, does anyone have any other ideas for hitting the spending limit?
I am going to switch all my auto-bill pays over to the Credit Card and use it for all my purchases over the next 3 months, however, this is more than I normally spend.
Thanks again for any help.
August 30th, 2011 at 6:12 pm
Hi Jonathan,
I had another question upon reading the terms that were mailed with my sapphire preferred card…the terms state:
“Term: Cash-like Transactions
What It Means: The following transactions will be treated as cash advances: ….making a payment using a third party service”
Does this mean that if I use amazon webpay that I am going to incur the fees:
“Cash Advances: Either $10 or 5% of the the amount of each transaction, whichever is greater” ?
Has anyone used Amazon Webpay with their Sapphire Preferred? If so, were you charged as per the terms above?
Thanks so much in advance for your time, effort, and assistance. It is so greatly appreciated.
August 30th, 2011 at 6:40 pm
@JP – It tends to be hit and miss on these types of things. Webpay is normally used to buy items, so it should not be counted as a cash advance. I have not heard of any cases where it has been, but that’s just me.
What you can try to do is to call up Chase and have them set your cash advance limit to zero. That means if something does count as a cash advance, the transaction will be automatically denied.
August 30th, 2011 at 6:41 pm
“What you can try to do is to call up Chase and have them set your cash advance limit to zero. That means if something does count as a cash advance, the transaction will be automatically denied.”
Brilliant. Thank you.
August 30th, 2011 at 7:03 pm
Hi, just called – they won’t set the cash advance limit to zero but if you are not issued a PIN for the card then any cash advance other than one done at a branch will be denied.
September 23rd, 2011 at 11:06 am
I just called Chase and tried to get my bonus points increased from 25,000 (which was the bonus in April when I applied) to 50,000 like they’re offering now. No go, the rep wouldn’t budge on this. First he tried to tell me the 50k was an “invitation only” deal, but I told him no, this was on your online application web page, which he finally agreed about. Still, he would not give me the extra points. Is anyone getting extra points now, or has Chase just decided to say no to everyone?
November 10th, 2011 at 6:48 pm
I just applied and got that “we’ll contact you within 10 days” thing… I’ve recently improved my credit to a 750 mid score with everything paid… makes me nervous that they’re going to say no.
Is this standard for them… there is a discrepancy about my mailing address since I live without mail service, my credit reports all say the PO Box… which is not acceptable to apply.
The other think is I just paid off 2 old medical bills over a month ago… those were the only bad things… what do you think they’re usual attitude is on credit?
I just qualified to buy a house, so I would think I should be good… that response just really worried me though…
Thanks for any advise or past experience you may know regarding this.
November 10th, 2011 at 10:16 pm
I got the “we’ll contact you within 10 days” as well and was approved with no additional information requested or anything. I wouldn’t worry about it at this point.
December 3rd, 2011 at 1:37 pm
@Christina
I applied and received the same message “we will notify you etc.”
I called them after 2 days and got approved for $12k!
Call chase be nice and polite and play dumb
You will make it! Good luck!