Verizon is launching a co-brand credit card today with Synchrony Bank.
The marketing push is that you’ll get a signup bonus up to $1,000 in Verizon Dollars if you apply by 6/25 at 9pm ET, but that’s not entirely true. There will be a $1,000,000 pot that will be split among all people approved for the card. That means if there are only 1,000 approvals that everyone would get $1,000, but with 10,000 approvals everyone would get $100, with 100,000 approvals everyone would get just $10, and with 1,000,000 approvals everyone would get a buck. The pot size seems pretty stingy to me.
Verizon has over 150MM users, so I wouldn’t apply expecting much of a signup bonus.
But the card will also waive the penalty that you pay for using a credit card instead of using autopay from a checking account on select unlimited plans. Those fees vary based on the plan you have.
The card offers 4% back in Verizon dollars on gas and groceries, 3% back on dining, and 2% back on Verizon spending.
That’s a pretty low reward for Verizon spending and there are other cards that offer more valuable rewards for other categories.
Plus these rewards are issued as Verizon dollars, which means you’ll lose out on earning bonuses for wireless spending for the amount of the rewards.
So the question is if the autopay monthly fee waiver makes it worth getting the card.
If you have a $200 monthly wireless bill on a Verizon Plan Unlimited family plan and you use a Chase Ink Cash card you’ll earn 1,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points. If you value those points at 1.6 cents each, that’s a value of $16 back or 8% back.
If you pay the bill on the Verizon card you’ll save $10 on your monthly bill and get back $4 in Verizon Rewards, so that’s less valuable than using an Ink Cash card.
However if your monthly Verizon Plan Unlimited family plan is $100 the math changes, the Chase points would be worth $8 or you would save $10 and get back $2 with the Verizon card.
However the Verizon card doesn’t come with cell phone insurance. If you pay your bill with a card like Chase Ink Preferred you get 3 Chase Ultimate Rewards per dollar, worth about 5% back, plus you get free phone insurance on all of your lines. That can be worth much more than the cash back.
The Chase Ink Cash or Ink Preferred are also strong add-ons onto the Freedom Unlimited+Sapphire Reserve killer card combo.
In short, there are probably better options to pay your bill than with a Verizon card, but if you do pay your bill from a checking account now then it may be worth opening a Verizon card so that you’ll earn rewards for your Verizon spending.
Then again, applying for a new card means that you use up a 5/24 slot that could be better utilized to apply for a more rewarding card, so you’ll have to decide if that’s worthwhile.
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Thanks for sharing that good information.
Just wanted to give people an FYI. I just checked my Verizon account now, and see that I got $411.35. So I guess only 2,431 people applied to the card. Not a bad sign up bonus considering you don’t need to spend any money to get the reward.
Wow, that’s much more than I expected!
July 5 now. Still no idea about how much the bonus will end up being. I got the card and so did my wife. My card came in a big nice case, with both having different numbers on the outside envelope (both in 6100 range), so I am going to assume there are around 7000 people who applied. Would be about $140
I have 5 lines on my account and Verizon charges $10 more per line because i don’t use a debit card. If I understand this correctly, this would save me another $50 per month plus I would have some verizon bucks to apply to my bill (even if I use the card to only pay my bill). Only bummer is– I use the chase business ink for the insurance. What ya think?
Would you replace the insurance with an option from Verizon? What would that cost on your plan? What is the value of the Chase points you earn?
And if you choose to use vzw insurance instead, their 6.85/m/line insurance plan covers everything the more expensive plans do, with a slightly slower turnaround time for claims, but then you also get loss protection, which chase is missing. Pay the 6.85/m/line and im guessing you could use chase to cover your vzw/ins deductible minus the $100 chase deductible, if not a loss claim. Also, sreen replacements are $29 with vzw vs $100 dedictible with chase.
Dan, the answer is, sign up for autopay and paperless billing for $10 off (my start unlimited plan gets $10/ line, as i believe all newer unlimited plans get) then do a manual payment with chase ink for free insurance.
If you do opt to manually pay with a vzw gc (by loading tobyour account) or a diff cc, you will not lose the autopay discount, as long as autopay is still setup with debit, checking or this vzw cc.
Any way to get around the $10 non compliance fee for paying with a credit card? I had read if you use a Verizon gift card to apply a payment that will not remove the $10 auto pay discount. Therefore, If you use a credit card to buy Verizon gift cards you will still keep the discount whilst paying with a credit card. Is this true ?
Interesting, certainly sounds worth a try.
“If you pay the bill on the Verizon card you’ll save $10 on your monthly bill“
I believe you will save $40-$50. I think the autopay give $10 discount per line…
Like I said, varies by plan. On the VZW Plan Unlimited it’s $10/plan.
On another plan the math will be different.
For a no annual fee card and you’re on Verizon, isn’t this card solid? It’s not a flashy card at all but I feel like it’s solid if you get GCs at grocery stores..
How many GCs are you buying?
Don’t forget that your Verizon dollars are only valid if you have Verizon. If you leave Verizon or if you card is closed, you forfeit them.
Buying a lot of Visa/MC GCs at Vons/Pavilions (Safeway company in SoCal) to cover every day expenses + Arco gas GCs since they don’t accept CC. Figured I’d spend all my Verizon dollars per month and if in the rare case I were to cancel service, stop spending on the card and make sure all rewards are used
Why not buy them on an Ink Cash card at an office supply store for ~5-8% back?
Didn’t Chase tighten restrictions for Ink Cash? I was thinking about applying this year but I guess I waited for too long
They did. But this too shall pass.
4% Verizon dollars on Grocery should be good, correct? so if i spend $5K in Walmart neighborhood each month on this card, I will rake up $ 200 in Verizon $$ for say $40 in visa gift card fees. Looks good option to me
How does Verizon $200=$40 in gift cards fees?
Or get a card that gives 6% cash back on groceries?
Which card gives back unlimited 6% cash back on groceries? This card gives only 4% but it is unlimited.
Nothing is going to give “unlimited.” Sure, this doesn’t have a hard limit, but people that game it hard will find their cards shutdown.
You can have multiple Blue Cash Preferred/Everyday Preferred if you want multiple $6K/card.
Ye, but you have to pay a $95 af for each card, doesn’t really make too much sense to do that
$6,000 x .06 = $360 in cash back-$95 annual fee=$265 cash back.
That’s 4.42% effective cash back, even if you don’t take advantage of lucrative return protection, 6% back on streaming (including Amazon gift cards via my hack), etc.
Makes sense… let me just ask did you make that calculation on the spot or did you have that figured out before
On the spot.
Nice!
but that is limited to first 6K in a year. This one I guess is unlimited. So if I already pay $200 Verizon bill assuming a family plan , then each month the bill is now actually only $40 with our manufactured spend. Am I missing something?
Do tell?
“The card offers 4% back in Verizon dollars on gas and groceries, 3% back on dining, and 2% back on Verizon spending.”
4% and 3% verizon cash back is considered low?
There are cards that offer more rewards in those categories and rewards that aren’t locked in to Verizon dollars so that you won’t be rewarded on that future spend.
Not a fan of Verizon AT ALL. Very poor customer service and high prices among my biggest complaints and therefore I will not be looking to give them any credit card Or otherwise extra business…
What issues are you having? They have the best Cell service Out there
Not anymore…
currently, i find Atts service to be the best…what did u have in mind?
I was just on a flight and it seemed about ten people signed up for a spirit card so there you go
You can actually get 15 OW NYC-FLL with spirit sign up bonus… pretty valuable for those willing to endure spirit
I’ve seen people apply for a credit card for a case of water or a bottle of soda. Doesn’t mean that makes sense to do 🙂
What other credit cards cover cell phone insurance?
Most World Mastercards have cell phone insurance.
For example, the Chase IHG card has it:
https://www.dansdeals.com/credit-cards/highest-offer-ever-signup-chase-ihg-premier-card-get-140000-points-plus-can-use-anniversary-nights/
Does the Sapphire Reserve or Preferred come with it?
No.