Chase Bank announces the most expensive travel card and increases benefits
New York-based banking company Chase Bank announced changes to its Sapphire Reserve credit card. The card's annual fee will jump from $550 to a staggering $795.This now marks the most expensive card in travel. While the annual fee is a huge difference, let me show you how it is worth the new difference. For point earning through card spending, the only difference is in travel. It was previously 10 points a dollar on hotels and rental cars booked through Chase's portal, 5 points a dollar on flights booked through the Chase travel portal, and 3 points a dollar on all other purchases. It will now change to 8 points a dollar on all travel booked through Chase, 4 points a dollar on hotels and flights booked directly, and 1 point a dollar on all other travel purchases. Chase just announced a program called Points Boost, and passengers will be able to redeem points at 2 cents each toward select hotels and flights, and those not eligible, 1 cent each. *Note it will take a bit for the program to update. This is better than Chase’s previous 1.5 each. Additionally, if you would rather spend your points alternatively, Chase still has 14 companies you can transfer your points to at a 1:1 ratio. These include Aer Lingus, Air Canada, Air France/KLM, British Airways, Iberia, Emirates, JetBlue, Singapore, Southwest, United, Virgin Atlantic, IHG, Marriott, and Hyatt. The active benefits still include a $300 travel expenses credit, Nexus/PreCheck/Global Entry Credit (up to $120), a DashPass with DoorDash, up to $25 a month in credits, $10 a month in Lyft credits in addition to 5x points a dollar on Lyft spending, and travel insurance.
Added Benefits
The new benefits include two $250 credits a year toward Chase's hotel portal (given as one January-June and another July-December), two $150 credits toward Chase's Sapphire Reserve Exclusive Tables program (given once at each half of the year), two StubHub $150 credits, up to $250 toward Apple Music and Apple TV+, $10 a month in credits in Peloton in addition to 10 points a dollar earned on Peloton purchases, complimentary IHG Platinum status, and after $75,000 credit card spend, getting $500 Southwest credit, Southwest A-List status when booking through Chase, IHG Diamond status, and $250 to Chase’s shopping program.
Thoughts
This card has a lot of benefits and is definitely worth the increase for these added benefits. It offers over $1000 in added benefits. Making an extra $245 is definitely worth it! I think it shows a huge improvement from Chase and that they want to be at the top tier like American Express, and they are setting themself up to see growth in members.