Related post: SMOKING HOT! Don’t Miss Out The Credit Card Deal Of The Decade! Earn 100,000 Points With The Highest Signup Bonus Ever!
Update, 8/10: Chase has confirmed with me that the details in the original post below are correct and will go into effect on 8/16!
You may want to wait until 8/16 to apply for a new Sapphire Preferred card as that way the $50 hotel credit will be available right away, otherwise it won’t be available until after your card anniversary. Chase confirms that the incredible 100K signup bonus offer will still be available on 8/16.
Chase also confirms that the annual fee on the Sapphire Preferred will remain $95 and the annual fee on the Sapphire Reserve will remain $550.
Sapphire Preferred will get a new card design that will be available to new and existing cardholders as of 8/16:
Originally posted on 7/7:
Chase has updated the Rewards Program Agreement that can be found when logged in on Chase.com for Sapphire Preferred, Sapphire Reserve, and JPMorgan Reserve.
The new agreement appears to go into effect on 8/16/21. I’ve reached out to Chase for comment on these new changes.
- Updated Sapphire Preferred Agreement:
- Get a 10% anniversary points bonus on all spending starting on 8/16/21. For example if you spend $20K on your card in a cardmembership year, you’ll get a 2,000 point bonus. The bonus does not apply to the signup bonus or bonus point categories. It has been 7 years since this card last offered an anniversary point bonus and it’s great to see it return!
- Get a $50 annual hotel credit as a statement credit when you book a hotel through the Ultimate Rewards portal starting with your account open date anniversary after 8/15/21. New Sapphire Preferred cardholders as of 8/16 can use this credit immediately!
- Earn 5 points per dollar on all travel booked through the Ultimate Rewards portal. (Effectively 5.1 points with anniversary bonus) Other travel will remain at 2 points per dollar.
- Earn 3 points per dollar on select streaming. This should include Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+, Netflix, Sling, Vudu, Fubo TV, Apple Music, SiriusXM, Pandora, Spotify and YouTube TV. (Effectively 3.1 points with anniversary bonus). Currently the card earns 1x for streaming.
- Earn 3 points per dollar on dining (Effectively 3.1 points with anniversary bonus). Currently the card earns 2x for dining.
- Earn 3 points per dollar on online grocery shopping, excluding Target, Walmart, and wholesale clubs. (Effectively 3.1 points with anniversary bonus). Currently the card earns 1x for online groceries.
- Updated Sapphire Reserve Agreement and JPMorgan Reserve Agreement.
- Earn 10 points per dollar on hotels and car rentals booked through the Ultimate Rewards portal.
- Earn 5 points per dollar on airfare booked through the Ultimate Rewards portal. Other travel will remain at 3 points per dollar.
- Earn 10 points per dollar on Chase Dining purchases booked through the Ultimate Rewards portal. Other dining will remain at 3 points per dollar.
Assuming that these changes are correct, they seem like some awesome improvements to Sapphire Preferred and some marginal improvements to Sapphire Reserve.
Coming on the heels of the Sapphire Preferred 100,000 point signup offer, that’s pretty amazing!
Until now, there haven’t really been any benefits of Sapphire Preferred over Sapphire Reserve except for the signup bonus. Now dining purchases (3.1x vs 3x), streaming purchases (3.1x vs 1x), online grocery purchases (3.1x vs 1x), airfare booked via the Ultimate Rewards portal (5.1x vs 5x), and everyday purchases (1.1x vs 1x) will be more rewarding on Sapphire Preferred over Sapphire Reserve. Plus Sapphire Preferred gains a $50 annual hotel credit while Sapphire Reserve keeps its previous $300 travel credit.
On the other hand, Sapphire Reserve still wins over Sapphire Preferred on hotels and car rentals booked via the Ultimate Rewards portal (10x vs 5.1x), travel not booked via the Ultimate Rewards portal (3x vs 2.1x), and Chase Dining purchases booked through the Ultimate Rewards portal (10x vs 2.1x).
Will you get both cards to take advantage of the higher earnings and redemptions that each card offers?
I thought you won’t get approved for one if you already have a sapphire?
You can have both, see the FAQ:
https://www.dansdeals.com/credit-cards/faqs-becoming-eligible-chase-sapphire-preferreds-deal-year-late/
Confused. From the FAQ you can not have both. (But there are ways to apply for more but still can not have both)
That’s not what it says.
This is what I see on the FAQ –
You can’t currently hold any primary Sapphire card (Doesn’t this mean if you have a sapphire reserve you can not get a sapphire reserve unless you change your original sapphire reserve)
Also I see this on FAQ –
I currently have Sapphire, Sapphire Preferred, or Sapphire Reserve card open. Can I still get the bonus if I open a Sapphire Preferred?
You won’t be approved if you have any of those cards currently open.
“If I change my Sapphire Reserve card to a Freedom card, will I be able to change it back to Sapphire Reserve?”
Looks like chase wants me more customers applying for the preferred
Aside from the hotel credit, I’d still probably not book cash travel through the UR portal, even with the bonus points. IMHO, not worth it.
Even so, the other Sapphire Preferred improvements are impressive.
How can you get both cards? I thought you can only have one sapphire card
You can have both, see the FAQ:
https://www.dansdeals.com/credit-cards/faqs-becoming-eligible-chase-sapphire-preferreds-deal-year-late/
Thanks for posting Dan.
I must say I’m not very impressed as a lot of this stuff requires to go through the UR portal, hence not always finding the best price.
Also, the Reserve benefits compared to the platinum are not up to par. If chase wants to compete for the higher end product game, they need to do something as a game changer.
Not impressed
They compete as the CSR has an effective $250 annual fee (thanks to its easy $300 credit) vs a now $695 annual fee for Platinum.
They don’t have to compete on other benefits.
It’s not as big of a difference as that… the $200 Platinum airline credit is still easy to max out if you know what you’re doing, and in the first year is available twice- which is not true for the CSR. So it’s more like a $495 ($395 first year) to $250 comparison, with the Platinum having way more benefits. All depends on how much value one gets out of the Platinum benefits of course.
They would rather customers that keep the card open for more than one year (not those that calculate the AF just for the first year)
Sapphire Preferred is competing with AmEx Gold (not Sapphire Reserve) and the AmEx Gold still wins with 4x on dining/grocery + Uber & grubhub credits
AMEX Gold has $250 annual fee versus $95 for Sapphire Preferred. Those aren’t competing cards.
And that’s besides for Chase points being more valuable and versatile than AMEX.
$250 – $240 (Uber & grubhub credits) – there is no competition
If they were real $240 annual credits, I’d agree.
At $10/month each they’re not worth anything near face value.
what!? then neither is the $300 Reserve credit; credits are as real as they come and very easy to use $10/mon on Uber & grubhub
Admit it, you like Chase better for personal reasons.. United transfer
Um, no.
The Chase $300 is one lump sum and is easy to use in one shot anywhere on travel, even if it’s refundable travel.
The AMEX $240 requires 24 transactions which is a pain.
Like I said, if it was an annual lump sum, then I’d value it closer to face value. As it is now, it’s a book of 24 coupons.
24 coupons is a bit much, with uberEats and grubhub everyone should easily be able to takeout 2x/month and realize the $20 face value
If you do that anyway, sure.
Otherwise, food generally costs much more via the apps and having to make 2 monthly purchases is a nuisance.
I don’t think many people would trade $240 or even $120 cash for that benefit.
This isn’t true, because the food is WAY more expensive using the apps then just getting it straight at the restaurant. There’s a 30% markup at most restaurants (kosher ones anyway) and that’s not including the delivery fees etc. Sure, I definitely make sure to use them up, since it’s free, but they’re only worth about 50% of the face value. This isn’t true for the CSR credit- it works on any travel purchase that you’d anyways be making, you don’t need to go through a third party that marks things up, and you don’t need to use it every month to maximize, you can use it up once a year and that’s it.
Where I live in a small rural area in Western NY we don’t have anywhere that grub hub or delivers from and no Uber here either so it’s only of value when I’m traveling. So it’s basically useless for us except when we are on vacation.
We use the Amex credits on UberEATS and it’s a pain in the butt because prices are often times higher than if you ordered directly. On top of that, there’s all kinds of fees added to the order. So not worth it.
Wait for UberEats promos. 30-40% off can get your food purchase to break even with in-store prices, even with delivery. I wouldn’t buy any Uber stock seeing the amounts of money the throw out on promos. Grubhub doesn’t have as many, but the prices may be cheaper sometimes even compared to the same store on UberEats.
Most of us are definitely busy enough a few times a month where we’d order Uber/Grubhub regardless of added fees (plus AmEx gets free Eats Pass so no fees)
Dan, can you do a survey to see the sweet spot of upcharge when people would rather order in vs take time to pick-up…10%, 20% etc?
Let me guess, you’re under 30 years age. Food delivery is something for the wealthy IMO. And foolish.
I was expressing this to someone the other day. He was frustrated with not being able to use his Chase points every time he needs to, die to unavailability or cost being significantly higher than a 3rd party instead of booking through chase rewards.
Do you mind posting out any specifics that make CSR a significantly better choice than Amex platinum for a customer that spends though chase for 80%+ of all spending?
So use Chase Pay Yourself Back to cash out at 1.5 cents. AMEX has nothing like that.
Chase transfer partners are also stronger (Hyatt, United, etc).
And the Chase ecosystem means you can earn more bonus points on no annual fee cards.
Does that work on the preferred card too – I can chase pay myself to use up the bonus at >1 cent/point? (I’m not good at the whole points game so would take cash). I didn’t see this in the “22 awesome ways” thread. Anything I should know about this?
Yes, it’s in there.
https://www.dansdeals.com/credit-cards/22-awesome-ways-redeem-100000-chase-ultimate-rewards-points-can-earn-opening-just-one-credit-card/
@Dan, I’m sorry I looked and just don’t see where it talks about chase pay in the 22 awesome ways post. Can someone point me to where? Sounds like this might be the easiest way to cash out the 100K+ points but I don’t know if there is any more info than just “use chase pay” (which I don’t have but assume I can sign up for).
https://www.dansdeals.com/credit-cards/22-awesome-ways-redeem-100000-chase-ultimate-rewards-points-can-earn-opening-just-one-credit-card/#You_can_use_104K_points_with_Pay_Yourself_Back_to_reimburse_yourself_for_at_least_1300_or_1560_of_restaurant_grocery_or_home_improvement_purchases
“And the Chase ecosystem means you can earn more bonus points on no annual fee cards.”
The AMEX system has a bit of that too- Blue Business Plus is awesome at 2 points everywhere, which is better than any Chase card on non-bonused spend.
True, though I meant more along the lines of buying GCs with Ink Cash or Freedom categories for 5x.
But BBP is great. Just a shame there’s no pay yourself back option.
Amex also has a feature similar to pay yourself back but it’s geared towards dumb people because its like .6 vs Chase’s 1.5
“And that’s besides for Chase points being more valuable and versatile than AMEX.”… Not so. Amex has roughly double the transfer partners and blows Chase away with regard to airline transfer bonuses. Amex transfer bonuses have been as high as 40% across multiple airlines, while Chase, AFAIK, has only had one instance of a transfer bonus to British Airways. Amex also offers lucrative bonus opportunities subsequent to the SUB. For example, Amex is currently giving 20k MRs for turning on Amex pay-over-time (and I’ve received this bonus multiple times). Amex PRG also offered 30k referral bonuses this year, again surpassing Chase. Another valuable Amex earning opportunity is Rakuten where I’ve earned over 70k MRs in the past two years.
Chase has the upper hand on hotel transfers, but otherwise, MRs are more valuable and easier to earn from my experience. Ironically, I have received the greatest redemption value out of Citi’s ThankYou points, but they are harder to earn consistently. I have significant balances in each of the programs, but if I had to stick with just one, it would be Amex.
AMEX has no answer for Pay Yourself Back, which creates a high floor on the value of your points.
AMEX has no great hotel redemption or transfer options.
And I prefer United to AMEX airline transfer options, especially now that awards are fully refundable, but to each their own.
Personally, I’m more interested in the ceiling of the point values, not the floor. Values I’ve obtained by transferring points exceed Pay Yourself Back by over double. And for what it’s worth, Amex’s Schwab redemption gives you straight up cash without the asterisk of “Dining, grocery stores…” albeit at a slightly lower exchange rate.
My home airport is DEN, so I fly United regularly; however, I don’t recall the last time I transferred URs to my United account. I have, however, transferred thousands of points to Avianca where I’ve been able to book United flights for less points than using MileagePlus. For example, I checked a round trip economy fare from DEN to IAH next week, and the cheapest redemptions for United and Avianca were 25.6k and 20k respectively. In addition, if I were to use my LifeMiles, I would be using points that I transferred from Amex with a 30% bonus for an effective fare of under 16k MRs.
Ceiling and floor are both important.
Schwab is going down to 1.1 cents.
Avianca is good, but no free changes there and award space is very poor compared to United cardholder award space. Also Air Canada is coming to Chase and their CS is superior to Avianca and also offers good rates on United.
I suppose it depends on routes, but I’m a United cardholder, and it has only been the rare occasion where the additional award space would warrant using MileagePlus miles… Yes, Air Canada (and Singapore) are already Star Alliance transfer partners of Amex, but haven’t given me the same value as LifeMiles.
Hey. Great post!!
Just Not sure why it’s 3.1x
Isn’t it 10% back making it 3.3x???
Thanks. Read the section about the 10% bonus for that answer.
“The bonus does not apply to the signup bonus or bonus point categories.” Got it. Ty!
#1 fan!!!
New reserve benefits are very meh.
Agreed, but I guess Chase felt that card was strong enough as is.
I surmise that as the $100 refund on the $550 AF is phased out, they’ll lose a lot of CSR customers. An effective AF of $150 for the CSR is much more palatable than an effective AF of $250.
They Work for me I can keep my Aspire card for status and get the points through Chase at 10x
I’d say these changes for the preferred cannibalize the reserve. I wouldn’t be surprised to see something more from the reserve.
My take is that the Reserve benefits are costly to administer and Chase is trying to push people to Preferred.
What is so costly about the reserve?
Aside from the $300 credit and Priority Pass that still works for non lounge credits, offering a 1.5 cent cash out option while also offering 1.5-5 points per dollar earnings on Chase cards has to be expensive.
Is there a list of places that offer non-lounge credits, do they work in all airports?
Just search on the Priority Pass site.
I love being able to grab and go from Bar Symon in CLE! They’ll even give you bottles of kosher wine if you know who to ask 😀
Who do you ask?
Search Priority Pass sure for “non lounge credits”….. Maybe I’m just not doing right. Any ideas?
They are bars, restaurants, massage services, etc. that are accessible with free credits with non-AMEX Priority Pass.
What’s non lounge credits?
I mean, there’s a much more direct way to push people to the Preferred… axe or neuter it. Even so, I don’t think at $550/yr it’s that ridiculous considering the Plat’s offering (before the recent shift).
Seems like they want to encourage people to shift from Reserve to Preferred, but not lose them as customers altogether.
Also the preferred has a $50.00 grocery credit.
Do you think this will come with a CSP annual fee increase in the near future?
CSR was already a victim to a fee increase.
I am thinking of getting rid of the Sapphire Reserve, the new renewal cost doesn’t seem to be worth it, I keep trying in my head to justify it, but I plan to go for the Preferred
Hi! Will you get 10X on the luxury hotels feature? Is that considered through ultimate rewards or do they push you out of the portal for that?
If you upgrade a freedom to a sapphire will you get the 10% on all spend for previous year or only effective from PC ?
About time! Citi premier/amex gold have really been my go to lately. Looking forward to getting back to chase
The dining benefit will discourage the Freedom Unlimited Downgrades. The dining credit was what I most liked about it.
Or get both cards?
Do you expect an annual fee increase to go along with the additional benefits?
Hard to say, but it wouldn’t shock me.
Chase isn’t allowing me to upgrade back to the reserve I downgraded to apply for the preferred. Any reason why that would be?
HUCA?
I did that already. The first agent simply said they can’t do it. The second agent said she “put in a request” and I’ll get a letter with their decision. I’m pretty sure this means no.
I wouldn’t say that means no, but keep us posted.
Update, letter hasn’t arrived yet, but I waited until today and called back again (3rd time) and it did the trick.
Nice!
Dan,
I have the CSR and the new 2x on travel vs 10x booking via Chase Travel Portal is not a benefit. I normally book a car rental with a corporate code. Under the current policy when using the CSR, I get car insurance and 3x points. I cannot book using a corporate code via the Chase Travel Portal so the price is most likely higher. In essence, with these new changes, I am missing 1x in points that I would normally receive. I think I will need to find a 3x (or greater) card that comes with car rental (primary) insurance based upon these changes. Any recommendations on that card within the Chase family?
CSR will still earn 3x on other travel.
CSP will earn 2.1x on other travel.
@Dan You forgot to mention the anticipated Annual Fee Increase coming soon
Source?
Get a $50 annual hotel credit as a statement credit when you book a hotel through the Ultimate Rewards portal starting with your account open date anniversary after 8/15/21.
Is that even if you book with UR points?
I’d assume you need to pay at least $50 cash, but you should be able to use points for the cost above $50.
Dan,
Are prices competitive when booking through the Ultimate Rewards portal?
Typically, yes. Always have to compare of course.
I believe British Air gives a better price on their website than you can get using any OTA, including Chase/Expedia. Also, I’ve noticed that at least one other bank’s OTA has more available flights.
Dan, if I am an authorized user on my wife’s card, and i use my card for a car rental, do i get the auto insurance benefit ?
Yes
10% anniversary points bonus
Is this for reserve card as well?
What is this .1 for preferred card?
Appears to be just for Preferred.
Can you still get the 450 annual fee for the reserve?
No
Too bad $50 hotel credit only starts after 8/15. Will be signing up for 100k offer in next few days and doubt SUB will wait another month.
it almost doesn’t make sense to keep the CSR card now esp. now with the $250 fee (after travel credits) when you can get all of these amazing benefits with the preferred for a much lower annual fee. How much would you see them raising it to? Would it be on par with the Amex Gold around $250 annually? Thanks for this post Dan!
Hi do I have to open the card after 8/15 to get these bonuses or will it apply to my sapphire card that I have already?
It will apply to existing cards.
the link by the reserve is actually the same as preferred
When looking between the two cards,
If you earn more than 62,000 UR a year on all your UR cards, it’s already worth to have the CSR (besides all other benefits of course).
I think that this data point can clarify people if it’s worth to keep CSR over CSP.
Please correct me if I’m wrong…
If you use your points for Pay Yourself Back or Travel directly from Chase, that is correct. (The 62,000 points will give $155 dollars more = the difference between 250 and 95). If you use points to transfer to airline or hotel miles CSR won’t give you more miles than CSP
that’s not a reason to pay a $550 annual fee every year you can just stack up points over a few years on the preferred and others, and before redeeming them upgrade to a reserve and transfer your point to your new reserve and get 50% more on all your old points!!!
1 If you travel even once or twice a year you would want to use the points then
2 if you use Pay Yourself back it would be a lot of spending and nearly impossible to do it once in a few years
3 These benefits of 50% more or Pay Yourself Back can change in a few years
4 Annual fee can increase either CSP or CSR or both (for example i will start to pay $550 only in March 2022)
What is so major about the changes to the preferred when most of those benefits the freedom unlimited have already?
Has anyone successfully avoided the annual fee increase on the CSR? If so, what strategy did you use?
I called them and requested it it be kept at $450 but no luck..
Once you’ve experienced a shutdown with them, when can you apply for a new card?
Do you set the credits when you book with points on the ur portal?
My preferred anniversary is on August 7th, I’ll have to wait until August 7th 2022 to use the $50 credit?
Correct.
I totally forgot about these pending changes, and I just downgraded my Sapphire Preferred to Sapphire No Fee 2 days ago. Oh well.
Can always upgrade back.
When did you get your last Sapphire bonus?
Your match is a little fuzzy on the 10% anniversary bonus… Should be 5.5 and 3.3 not 5.1 and 3.1
You didn’t read the post. That’s your problem.
Re anniversary bonus, I’m an idiot, ur math is good. Keel calm carryon.
Seems like a major relative downgrade for the Reserve. Preferred now earns more points on dining, which is pretty shocking. The only thing holding me back from cancelling my Reserve is the 800k points I’ve got saved up for whenever travel becomes appealing again – based on this change, I’m not sure the Reserve will still be available for sign up when I’m ready to use the points.
Dan,
For the 10% anniversary points, does it apply to existing card holding starting 8/16.
And if it does, if I pay est. tax I get to earn 10%-1.87%fee which is a pretty good return wouldn’t you say? And is there a max amount you can earn?
Yes.
No, this would earn only 1.1 points per dollar on taxes, there are much better cards out there.
Appreciate the reply, Dan. Thot I run it by you since I wasn’t sure. Thanks for clarifying it.
Thank you!
Dan- any information on the pay back categories? Will they change them in October?
TBD
10% on top of 3x categories is 3.3 and NOT 3.1!
Umm… Try actually reading the whole post. It’ll come to you…
Dan,
I got an email from Chase indicating:
“Take your points 50% further with Marriott Bonvoy™
Now through Aug. 31, 2021: Transfer your Chase Ultimate Rewards® points to Marriott Bonvoy for 50% more value.”
Your thoughts?
What is included in the online grocery purchases bonus? I’m assuming Instacart is part of it?
Yes.
Does it include groceries purchased online from my local supermarket? Or is it just from instacart and the like?
Try it out and let us know 🙂
On the Chase media page announcing this, the hotel option is worded as “$50 Annual Credit on hotel stays purchased through Ultimate Rewards. New cardmembers will start earning towards the credit immediately and existing cardmembers will start earning after their next account anniversary.”
What does “earning towards the credit” mean??
You earn $50 towards the credit when you spend $50 on a hotel 🙂
Any good hotels for $50 a night?
Probably something decent in Vegas.
I have a chase sapphire preferred I got a sign up bonus for 50k points 2 years ago, if I downgrade this card to a chase freedom and I will apply for this card again will I get the.
Bonus
No, there’s a 4 year waiting period.
If application was denied a month ago then income changed can one reapply
Yes.
Is there any cap on the amount of bonus point for these categories? Specifically groceries?
No cap.
The Chase/Expedia portal is an absolute dumpster fire!
I changed my sapphire reserve today, Friday, to a freedom flex. The operator said that I would have to wait 3 business days before I could open up a sapphire preferred and be eligible for the bonus. Do you think that the sign up bonus will still be available after 8/16?
3 business days from today would be after 8/16.
You should be able to get approved on 8/16.
Hi, when will the new features and perks be posted on the chase website when applying for the card?
I was wondering the same thing.
It’s ON – the new benefits
Where do you see the 50$ hotel credit?
I don’t see any new benefits actually
I booked flights thru UR portal after 8/16 still only 3 points on the dollar not 5 – anything I need to do to get the update active?