Note: In light of the current situation, some cardmembers are being offered a $100 credit upon renewal.
Yesterday I wrote about the rumored changes being made to the Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card, and these have now been confirmed. So, what’s changing?
Sapphire Reserve annual fee increasing to $550
As expected, the Chase Sapphire Reserve annual fee has increased from $450 per cardmember year to $550 per cardmember year:
- This applies for new accounts opened as of January 12, 2020
- This applies for account renewals on April 1, 2020, and later
Sapphire Reserve free Lyft Pink membership
The Sapphire Reserve will offer a free Lyft Pink membership, but only for one year. This ordinarily costs $19.99 per month, and offers the following perks:
- 15% off unlimited car rides
- Priority airport pickups
- Relaxed cancellations (they’ll cover three cancel fees per month)
- Surprise offers (“seasonal discounts and exclusive savings”)
- Waived lost and found fees
- Bikes and scooters (three 30 minute bike or scooter rides per month, in select markets)
That’s potentially a big value for anyone who uses Lyft with any frequency… but only for a year.
Sapphire Reserve 10x points with Lyft
The Sapphire Reserve will offer 10x points on all Lyft rides, when you pay with your card.
I value those points at 1.7 cents each, so that’s like a 17% return on Lyft spending.
Between Lyft Pink and 10x points, you’re looking at a sizable return on your Lyft spending. That’s certainly enough to get me to switch from Uber to Lyft.
Sapphire Reserve DoorDash credits
The Sapphire Reserve will offer a total of $120 in DoorDash credits, which comes in the form of a $60 DoorDash credit in 2020, and a $60 DoorDash credit in 2021.
We don’t yet know if benefits will extend beyond 2021.
This is all in addition to Chase having just added a DoorDash DashPlus membership for a year as a benefit on this card.
My take on these changes
In the short term, I think these are actually pretty compelling benefits for many, at least for those who live in big cities.
The annual fee goes up by $100, but you’re getting a $60 DoorDash credit, 10x points with Lyft, and you’re getting Lyft Pink. The Lyft benefits would be enough to get me to switch from Uber to Lyft.
The problem with these changes is that the new benefits seem to largely be temporary. I get that maybe long term they’ll add more perks or have more partnerships, but it’s hard to view something as being part of the core value proposition of a card when it’s only advertised as a benefit for a year or two.
This is especially true when you consider that these changes are being made at the same time that some other cards have become more compelling.
For example, the American Express® Green Card has a $150 annual fee (Rates & Fees), and offers the same 3x points on dining and travel as the Sapphire Reserve. Furthermore, the card offers a $100 annual CLEAR credit and $100 annual LoungeBuddy credit.
See this post for everything you need to know about the Sapphire Reserve.
If you already have the Sapphire Reserve, or other Ultimate Rewards-earning cards, be sure to review our guide for answers to questions on moving points, adding/closing accounts, and more:
What do you make of these Sapphire Reserve changes?
The following links will direct you to the rates and fees for mentioned American Express Cards. These include: American Express® Green Card (Rates & Fees).
The DoorDash DashPass and Lyft Pink benefits are available for up to 2 years, but no less than 1 year (i.e. if you sign up for either today, you get them for free through the end of 2021). But if a customer signs up on December 31, 2021, they would still get it for a MINIMUM of 1 year (i.e through December 31, 2022). Furthermore, the DoorDash credit is $60 a year through end of 2021.
Chase needs to bring more to the table then the Lyft and DoorDash things that will be limited in scope for many. They need to expand the spending category multipliers and offer transfer bonuses to their UR partners to offset the devaluations Ultimate Rewards has had the last couple of years (losing Korean, United and soon Hyatt going to dynamic award pricing).
This seems like a pure cash grab for Chase to make an extra $100 off each card in the 4th year of the card, coincidentally the folks who got in on this in 2016 will be eligible to churn it finally…
I’ve had this card since it was introduced in 2016. The Lyft and Doordash perks give me zero value. I do not use them Will be bailing on this card when the AF comes due next year and researching a replacement. It’s too bad. I really like this card if they just left it alone.
When can current cardmembers start using the new benefits?
Annual Fee increase aside, I feel like this is a trend in the wrong direction. Part of the appeal for the CSR(at least to me), is its simplicity. You get 3x points on all dining and travel with broad definitions of both and you get a $300 credit that can be used on anything remotely travel related. Now they’re starting to pigeonhole themselves into more super specific benefits. Which leads to these benefits being under face value for most people. The $300 travel credit is worth $300 to everyone. The doordash credit forces you to use the specific service, which from what I can tell isn’t as great as grubhub/seamless and uber eats. The Lyft benefits similarly direct you to a specific service, although I find them more compelling.
I agree with you about the temporary nature of these new benefits. It makes me think we won’t be getting anything in the future and these are just ways to “trick” people into paying the higher fee and just leaving the card open.
-DoorDash DashPass: Effective yesterday
-DoorDash $60 Statement Credit: Starting Monday, 1/13
-Lyft Benefits: Starting Monday, 1/13
This is such a bad move by Chase. Why not leverage their partners to make it more compelling? If they wanted to copy Amex, that would have been the way to go.
– Give IHG Platinum, which IHG appears to give little value too
– Cardholder access to United clubs
– Lower level status with Marriott and/or Hyatt
– Possible free upgraded boarding on Southwest a couple of times per year
– 4x points on Travel and Dining
Not only would most users pay for that, probably even up to $595 per year, but for me personally, that would have been enough to likely pull me away from Amex completely. Instead, they’ve now had the opposite affect and I’ll be an Amex/Citi user moving forward.
Lame- with the Lyft benefits *maybe* I will be able to break even on the extra $100 but it’s hardly a deal.
In NYC nearly all restaurants already offer free delivery so the delivery fee waiver has no value. Could be worth something in smaller cities I guess.
Blech! .. Ridiculously to hike the fee. They must be drinking from the Citibank water fountain
Amex Platinum is the same price and it’s so much better.
Glad I have until Sept renewal to see what good benefits show up. If it stays with the current benefits and these newly added ones then I’ll downgrade to CSP or Business Ink Preferred.
I use Lyft a lot, but it’s all reimbursed by work. I wish the 15% came in the form of a credit that I could use on personal rides. Otherwise, I’m just helping out my company.
Other than that, I was mostly hoping for a bumping earnings rates. I would have taken that, with no other benefits, for the $100 increase.
Is there anyone at Chase I can email to let them know how unhappy I am with this price increase? I know it is very unlikely for them to roll back the increase, but maybe if enough people write in they might consider adding more points for each dollar spent in food and/or travel categories.
There is little value as least to me with the additional “benefits” to me. To me the best current benefit is the PP restaurant for me at least. As an aging BB phasing out of 100K +_ business travel now mostly personal international which puts people like me in a difficult position do we continue with these cards with massive annual many times duplicating benefits fees or do we “downsize” our cards, that’s a question I think many of us out there are going to be making in the coming year. For I am not sure of that answer. I remember my PP got us into a club room at Mt Kilimanjaro airport the only air conditioned space there and it had a shower so coming out of the bush it felt pretty good.
@Rick….I wonder how much additional spend in those categories you would have to do to break even for that $100 increase.
This is really awful. I’m gutted and cannot believe that they thought this would be a compelling offering. I live in NYC, so I will most definitely take advantage of the Lyft partnership but I would much prefer keep the lower fee and not having the Lyft thing. The other issue is that there is very little transparency with Lyft pricing, and for all we know they could slightly hike prices for people with a membership. Also 15% off is really not that great at all when most of my rides fall within $10-20.
I use Amex Plat for airfare and Amex Gold for dining, and the CSR for any other travel expense. So I’m REALLY hoping that Chase will add better, more useful benefits and/or bump up points earning on useful categories. They can’t be that stupid. If they don’t, I will downgrade to CSP when my next annual fee is due in December so I still have a decent way to generate UR points.
Amex 3x is nothing like Visa 3x. It feels like Visa is twice widely accepted as Amex, so saying that “Amex Green is as good as CSR” is ridiculous. If you use Amex, you have to accept that about 50% of your transaction will be in cash. Visa, it’s more like 10-15%.
Doordash (and all its competitors like Grubhub, Uber Eats etc) have very little to no value to me.
Lyft has some value, but I probably won’t utilize it enough to offset costs (I use ridesharing a handful of times a year at most). I would get more value out of AmEX Platinum’s Uber credit setup, to be honest.
These are just bad changes for me.
But no, I still won’t dump it over AmEX Platinum, because:
-the 1.5x UR travel redemption is still so much more valuable to Economy flyers like me (yes, you can get 3+ cents/point award redemption in J on some random airline to a random route, but for the most part, who cares?)
-$300 travel credit is still easier to use than $200 airline incidental on 1 airline+$200 on Uber+$100 on Saks
But, yes, this is a negative change.
CSP still sucks btw. Need to be a true AmEX green/gold competitor.
LAXJeff says: “coincidentally the folks who got in on this in 2016 will be eligible to churn it finally…”
Perfect timing for me 🙂
Albeit not sure if I’ll be under 5/24 by August come renewal time.
Lucky,
Can you please ask whether they’ll be increasing the earning potential of the card? It doesn’t seem that difficult to increase the dining and travel earn to 4x (hopefully, with the inclusion of gas stations going forward). Considering the Prestige is 5x on restaurants and air travel, it doesn’t seem like asking a lot for Chase to increase the earning potential relative to increasing the fee.
Thanks
@ Ben — Too bad Lyft lies constantly. They should be avoided.
It’s slightly more front-end effort, but given Uber gift cards are often 10% off on various platforms + the point value of buying via CC, you can achieve ~12-13% ad hoc.
For anyone using car service, this could be a meaningful benefit – the 15% discount plus 7x extra points offers breakeven at ~$400 in spending. As long as rates are equal, I would move all my business from Uber over to Lyft.
Is the Sapphire Preferred also changing?
Is there a limit on the Lyft spend? As a regular Lyft rider, this is a huge, huge benefit.
I have both CSR and AmEx Plat. This makes things more complicated to me:
– Need a ride? First see if AmEx monthly Uber credit is used up. If yes, use Lyft and CSR. If no, then Uber.
– Hungry? First see if AmEx monthly Uber credit is used up. If yes, then Doordash and CSR. If no, then UberEats.
Since AmEx credits are monthly, this is annoying to keep track of.
I give these “benefits” a $10 value per year, at best.
Worthless changes. Never use DoorDash at home, and have never used it while traveling. And even if I did use it when traveling, work reimburses me so who cares about the discount? Same with Lyft – I’d only use it when traveling and don’t have a rental car, but even then, work covers the cost.
@Rick – I wrote a secure message to them politely telling them as much and I go the response I expected which was basically, sorry, not sorry. “We’ve made a change to the annual fee on your credit card account to ensure you receive all the benefits of your card…We hope you can understand our position.” Much like the airline miles devaluation “giving customers more options”.
I’m going to be booking some travel at 1.5 cents/point before my AF comes due, then I’m downgrading or changing completely. Maybe time to look at Amex Green?
Everyone tweet to Chase how unsatisfied you are and that you will most likely drop the card when your annual fee comes due since these benefits are mostly meaningless to you. I tweeted to Chase and if many people do hopefully it will make them reconsider or at least start offering regular retention offers on the account. These new “benefits” suck!!!!!
As an urban millennial who uses Lyft to commute everyday and frequently orders out with DoorDash, etc this is a huge improvement. I expect about $850 in cash credit and an additional 90k UR points over two years for $200 cost.
If my annual renewal (I’ve had the card for 3 years) is in March does that mean I will still only be charged $450 for this year?
after paying essentially $150 a year for this card since inception, jumping to $250 makes it much less compelling to me. They need to be adding partners to UR. When I come up for renewal at the end of the summer I expect to downgrade to the Preferred if that’s still an option. I find the food delivery companies to mainly be terrible where I live. The food’s always late and cold. And they’re a bad deal for the restaurants too. I use Lyft or other ride services very infrequently, so those new “perks” don’t do a whole lot for me.
I’ve been putting most of my spend on the Amex Gold and Citi TYP for quite a while now anyway since I find their points more valuable and flexible.
Chase had a chance to really drive home loyalty with the brand and they blew it. I will pay up to $600 for this card if they just: add a mid tier loyalty with a hotel or airline, add transfer bonuses or add more airline transfer partners. The new offering is respectable but I may think about downgrading to the preferred when my anniversary comes due in December. I already have to think in order to get all of credits from the Amex Gold to maximize my value, now this is just another thing that I have to think about using ie Lyft instead of Uber or Via in NYC and then the Doordash credits (which annual is way better than monthly). Also, Lyft is not available outside of the US, so doesn’t fall in line with people who like to travel internationally which are also folks who have the Reserve.
@Gardner – Amex still harder to use internationally than a Chase Visa, Priority Pass still better than Green card lounge credits. If those do not matter to you then Green card sounds like a better option
Bunch of not-compelling “perks” and hiked annual fee make no sense. Bad move. If not raising the earning multiplier, close the card for sure.
@Steve L. I calculate ~$370 of Lyft spend per year would get you to a $100 value based on 15% off and an incremental 7x UR points based on 1.7cpp value.
That doesn’t include any benefit from Doordash. If you can get the full value from the $60 Doordash credit, then ~$150 of Lyft spend is your breakeven for the remaining $60 based on same math as above.
People don’t seem to realize that Chase isn’t trying to improve the cards value proposition with these moves (at least for the majority of users). They are trying to make the card more profitable for them.
Also, someone above asked about increased earning rates. From a Q&A they did at TPG (tldr is no chance):
Q: Are there any other changes to the earning rates for both Sapphire cards?
A: In addition to the 3x earn with Reserve and 2x earn with [the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card] on a broad definition of travel purchases, Sapphire Reserve cardmembers will now automatically earn 10x total points every time they use their card for a Lyft ride through March 2022 and Sapphire Preferred will earn 5x total points.
Ultimate Rewards points have been recognized as some of the most valuable in the industry and Sapphire Reserve points are worth 50% more when redeemed for travel through Ultimate Rewards.
@Jan – true re: amex use overseas. Maybe I’ll look at Citi – I’ve been tied into the Chase ecosystem for many years now (and still have a couple cards even if I do ditch the CSR).
I’d love to take advantage of Priority Pass but I fly out of a regional airport usually that has no lounge, or PHL is my next option and the only one there is a Minute Suites. I’ve used the PP access a couple times elsewhere, but it’s not consistent enough to justify for that reason.
Lyft upsold me on New year’s. Ride from the airport going for 2x and 12 minute wait. A pop-up said I could pay an extra $15 to get a more comfortable ride 4 minutes sooner. Why not I’m 6’3″?
I click yes, wait becomes 20 minutes and the ride is a compact Jeep. Miserable, cramped 45 minute ride.
Most of my rides have been in ABQ recently. Lyft gives me Kias with body damage and broken windows. Uber does that too sometimes but at least I can cancel and rebook.
Anyway, will be dumping the card. These types of benefits are fringe and annoying to use. A perfect excuse to simplify wallet and life. Way more valuable.
I think this does sting for a lot of people but if you use lyft/uber a lot (which the younger reserve demo does) then this is easily worth it imo. As other commentators have noted it would be close to ~$400 in Lyft spend per year to get to $100. I personally spent $2,700 on ubers/lyfts last year. A 15% discount on $2,700 is a savings of $405 and with the increased 7x UR points that’s a $160 savings on that discounted spend ($2,295). If you primarily redeem your UR points for travel (which I do) then that $160 savings goes up to $241 since you’re effectively getting back 15 points per ride instead of 4.5. That’s an annual estimated increase of value of $646 for me. Most of my spend is with Uber since I use the loyalty program and find it more reliable (prices are typically the same in my city) but will definitely be switching to Lyft now. Will only use Uber when it’s cheaper or to use my plat credit.
On top of that I suspect most of the younger demo will take advantage of the $60 doordash credit. I know the sticker price sucks but this can be a game change for some people.
Regardless of cost of annual fee the benefits of the CSR are not worth it to me anymore. I’ve been scratching my head on why I still keep the card for several months now other than points are worth 25% more vs. CSP.
The way I look at it I can either burn my UR which I have not been accruing much of since AMEX has been much more attractive, or churn a CSP for 60k more UR points (current CSP offer) at 25% less value.
Chase was making money off of me since I paid the AF but barely put any spend on the card. Sure no swipe fees but also no benefits absent the $300 credit. This was a very short sighted move on their part. A better plan would be to add in a new category for 2x spend that make the AMEX cards great (e.g. supermarkets). AMEX has done a great job creating an echo system of cards that capture the wallet spend (Travel, Restaurants, Supermarkets, Entertainment). They are doing it across multiple cards to drive revenue. That’s one way to go; however, Chase could have created the single card to rule them all – but they didn’t. Simply increasing a very relevant category by an additional point would have made this worthwhile vs. adding two temporary features that deliver no value to the masses.
My first time using door dash is the last time I’ll use them. Took them over two hours to deliver sushi!!! Had to call restaurant multiple times and they were also wondering why door dash had not come to pick up the food.
I guess I can give Lyft a try.
I think Chase is just trying to make this card more profitable. They are looking for clients who are not interested in maximize points for every single purchase.
I have to look at their transfer partner airline list again when AF is due. Hopefully they will have added better partners than current ones by then or add Korean Air back.
Looks like I will be ditching CSR and completing the transition to Amex. Already started with the revamped Gold and Green being very compelling for me but CSR better than Amex Plat. That is no longer going to be the case with Amex adding decent trip insurance.
Lyft, Doordash, Uber, and related credits are all worthless trash to me. These changes make the effective AF for CSR and Plat equal for me so I will take the 5x on airfare, better benefits and lounge access.
I live in a major city and don’t find this compelling at all. I won’t be renewing when the time comes.
New benefits have ZERO VALUE for me. I was also surprised to learn that the Preferred card has a better primary insurance car coverage than the Reserve. I guess this one will be gone from my wallet soon.
So I’m in a confused state right now. I got my CSP May 2019 hoping to get it upgraded to CSR May 2020 but I’m skeptical about the value it provides for the increased annual fee. I could downgrade my CSP to one of the Freedoms and apply for a CSR before Jan 12th but I think the 1 year sapphire account rule will kick in and I would probably be denied CSR; is that right? Looks like I’m not getting the CSR until they figure out it’s permanent benefits.
Uber is significantly cheaper for me in the DFW metro. I already get weekly emails saying i have 15-25% off anyways on my Lyft fares and Uber is still cheaper. This is a bad benefit for many where Uber has a stronghold with more drivers and cheaper fares across the board.
Living in a rural area, these “new benefits” have zero value for me. No such thing as “Door Dash” or any other meal delivery service, and ride share has to be pre-scheduled. Maybe some marginal gains when I use ride share on business or leisure travel, but certainly not enough to come close to the fee increase. Will likely downgrade to SP card, and maybe explore AMEX. What is Chase thinking????? Do they want people to drop the card?
re people talking up the Lyft benefit…
– Uber is often cheaper than Lyft (and, in my experience, offers more reliable, more comfortable service)
– Lyft seems to offer 10-25% off coupons constantly, so 15% off consistently seems to be of little (added) value
No need to convince me to drop CSR card. But what would be the best use of accumulated UR points?
If I drop the card is it still possible to use the rewards or more of a challenge? Thanks.
Pardon my ignorance, but what the hell is “DoorDash”??!!
@Kathy
It’s going to be more challenging. Please allow me to give you an illustration. If you have 50,000 Ultimate Rewards Points left in your account without redeeming before you cancel this card, you can only get $ 500 values from your points. But if you keep you Reserve for another year, you can get at least $ 750 values. Since you don’t transfer your points before you downgrade your card, I am going to assume you are only using the 1.5x travel portal for your points. Then you are getting exactly $ 750 travel values if you decide to keep CSR. But minus the effective annual fee $ 250. You still only get $ 500 values from your 50,000 points. But of course you get those benefits from CSR. So always do your own math to decide if you should keep it or not.
@ Kathy — You can combine them with points on another Ultimate Rewards card first, which will preserve the points. The different cards have different redemption options, but there are several that will still allow you to move points to partners: https://onemileatatime.com/closing-chase-card-points/
For people who use Lyft a decent amount and pay with a CSR, this turned out fine. I’d actually say it turned out well. If there was some optional program that allowed me to pay $100/yr and in return get a 15% Lyft discount and 7 extra UR points per dollar spent on Lyft, I’d sign up for it because the annual points value alone is 2X or 3X the $100 cost for me. In this case, I’ve been expecting the CSR annual fee increase and so am hugely relieved by what Chase added in return.
And @Lucky, I hear you on the annoyance of temporary programs but I think 2019 pretty well demonstrated that most all credit card perks and programs are temporary in the sense that the banks can, and do, change the terms at will. Maybe Chase is to be credited for being up front in signaling that these programs are a trial but at least guaranteed for a certain period of time.
bye bye CSR…
One note is that the Lyft Pink membership isn’t applicable for the business profile. Does that mean it’ll work for my personal, but not when using business? Want to make sure I do this correctly.
“I value those points at…”
Not that I don’t believe Ben’s calculations, it is so easy for bloggers (or commenters) to throw numbers around when it comes to points valuations; it’s largely difficult to confirm. I would like to have a chart to review periodically to see some actual current redemption values people are getting, e.g. x-number of points paid for a flight of x number of dollars. (And not from the loyalty program heyday of decades ago: now.) Anybody know of such a thing already published somewhere?
So I was approved for reserve in February of 2018 but the fees have been hitting April 1st of each year. Should I be able to pay $450 for this next year since renewal should be February of each year but fee hits April 1st?
Definitely jumping ship after I burn my remaining UR points at the 1.5X multiplier.
Upto end of 2018, I wouldn’t have dreamed of doing this, as I was using CSR for every travel and dining purchase.
But then BoA Cash Rewards began offering 5.25% cashback on a category of choice, based on Preferred rewards tier. I got two of them and switched all my travel and dining spend there – exception being international flights where I wanted flight delay reimbursement, and car rentals.
Now I’ll just find a cheaper card with Priority Pass bundled, and figure out how else to get Primary insurance on car rentals. Fingers crossed that Amex Platinum starts offering the latter.
For people who read a TRAVEL blog you sure are a bunch of whiners.
“This provides zero value for me”.
“I’ll get no value “
Look cancel your card. I probably will too. But to say you’ll get zero value out of something or you never use Uber/Lyft? Well you’re either lying or your 70 years old.
I recall reading the same damn posts about Amex when they raised their fees. Funny. It seems you all still kept that card. Now it’s the greatest thing ever. I’m sure it will be the case with the reserve as well.
This only works in very select cities where their is mass transit close to the cardholders residence. I think that if one lived in San Francisco or New York this would be worth it as owning a car is more of a hassle in those cities than not.
However, to the suburban living professions outside big cities (Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, Chicago, etc.) this is in fact a negative. Sure one could use the delivery service but their is price inflation with such services. Further, if one already has a car I would rather pick it up myself than wait an hour.
@ Shawn….I had never heard of Door Dash until today when this story hit. And I have the Uber app on my phone (which I only use on trips to hotels from airports twice a year) as I stick to one provider. So yeah, in my case this adds zero value for the $100 fee increase.
@Adam – your first comment is dependent on where you live. In Columbus Lyft is usually slightly cheaper. Granted not a ton but to generalize and say it’s more expensive isn’t true. Also 90% of Uber and Lyft drivers drive for both. So the comment about the cars just isn’t true. Now that might be your experience but I think it might just be bad luck.
Your second point I agree with you. Lyft is always offering me 10%, 15%, shit I’ve had 50% off for certain timeframes. So 15% off isn’t really 15% off when you’re paying 100 for having the benefit and can likely can a slightly smaller percentage for nothing.
@Steve – that’s by your choice. Ride shares aren’t like airline/hotel status. I take whatever is cheaper. Who cares?
Like I said I’ll likely cancel as well but I’ll be damn sure I get my 60 bucks of DoorDash and when I’m out of Uber credits I’ll be lyfting all around if needed until my annual fee comes.
Am I happy with the changes. Nope.
Am I chicken little getting ZERO value out of this? Nope.
I understand Chase is doing this to make the card more profitable. So why people are saying well chase should offer 5x on this and that I just don’t get. They’re not trying to lose more revenue. It’s a simple business move. So I’ll make my own business move and put even more spend on my Amex trifecta (plat/bb+/gold). Not before I max out these benefits.
Any idea where, when and how do I sign up for the Lyft benefits and when does the 10x kick in. I travel for work a ton and really will enjoy these benefits.
UR is very beneficial to me for one reason, transfer to Hyatt. I want to actually spend more on this card as I think Amex points got very easy to earn in abundance with Rakuten. I have 75 or 80k coming to me alone based on a few IHG stays when cashback was 10-15% and a good deal of holiday shopping on cyber monday. As most of us probably know, with schedules that are not the most flexible I cannot utilize Amex points like many bloggers do. I don’t have the luxury of booking close-in first class fares to xyz destination for the experience nor do I value any flight $5,6,7K or above whether it’s in first, business or I get to fly the plane. I do recognize it can be helpful in certain situations but I get a lot of value as a hyatt member. Just this past week I booked a room in excess of $1,200 a night as I was able to combine a suite award with a 25,000 night booking over the holidays. Ease of use, fair points values and globalist status are all reasons why UR (and hyatt) are a good value for me.
I also have the ritz card which I never understood why the bloggers never pumped that card when it was available. Same chase PP (not the Amex crap), 100 off any pair of coach tix (which you can double dip and have used to save 200 off tix to take the kids here and there too). My husband is an authorized user for free and gets PP for free.
But yes for those where this is their only chase PP I could see where they might be pissed canceling it. But honestly crunch the numbers. If you go to a PP restaurant once or twice a month this is still likely worth it. Granted the restaurants aren’t exactly Michelin Star but a beer and an entree could easily be worth 25 bucks.
@Shawn….Yeah I remember that Ritz card as being a good card when it was available. Had the CSR already and couldn’t make a case for taking on another premium card. If it were available today I’d be jumping on it. Lucky you for having it.
Shawn, I’d put the age limit at more like 30.
This is CSR for kids, and kids have no money. Dumb. The over 50’s have all the money these days, apart from the odd lucky dot.com adolescent.
I’d never even heard of Doordash. WTF?
A lot of people have commented that Lyft is always offering promotions. I’ve actually found that this stopped being the case since I started using it more frequently – when I hardly ever used it, I was always being offered discounts, now I almost never see them.
But, regardless, what I’m actually wondering is whether anyone understands how Lyft Pink works in this regard. The assumption people are making seems to be that if you get 15% off from Lyft Pink, that’s in place of any other promotion. Do we know that this is the case, as opposed to the 15% off stacking with any other promotions you are eligible for? Does anyone have any experience with Lyft Pink membership that would shine any light on this?
Lucky, would love to see a post on comparing CSR, Amex Plat and Citi Prestige. Would also like to see a post on options for CSR for those of us for whom these new “benefits” are not worth the additional $100.
“In the short term I think these are actually pretty compelling benefits for many, at least for those who live in big cities.” – I live in a big city (NYC) and I almost never use lyft or uber (as it is in order to use my uber credit I need to use uber eats). Doordash? Its not available for all of the restaurants that deliver, so sure if you want to be limited in your restaurant selection. Heck I can’t find ANY of the restaurants I like to order from here even though they are all available on grubhub and there are a ton of restaurants in my area yet doordash doesnt work with them? I just don’t see how these can be called pretty compelling benefits across the board for people who live in big cities. If someone is a somewhat to frequent lyft user sure, but I’m willing to bet a lot of people aren’t. When do I use uber the most? When I travel out of the country. Lyft is mainly domestic. Feels like this post is putting lipstick on a pig.
Wow! Talk about bad timing. Just received My CSR card in the mail today:(
Maybe they’re trying to recoup the cost for the extra plastic in the card that makes it feel heavier than my others cards:) Doordash and Lyft are of no benefit to me. So, $100 extra for what??
When I upgraded from the Preferred to the Reserve a few years back, it was a simple calculation: an extra $55 (effectively) annually, in return for an extra point per dollar spent on travel/dining. That made it worthwhile. Now that the $55 has become $155 I need to recalculate, but my guess is that I’m not putting enough spend to make the points cover the difference in annual fees.
Not worth it. For $250 (after the travel credit) / 2.25% (your return on freedom unlimited spend, move that up a half point or so if you spend a ton on travel and dining) means you either have an overpriced World of Hyatt card, or you need to spend $11k (and then use the points on travel booked through Chase Travel Portal) to break even.
Would rather take that $250 and put it in my pocket to spend on whatever I want to spend it on.
The only way to beat the banks is to evaluate these rewards programs like they do. There’s a reason why they dissuade you from liquidating your points as cash. And it’s not because they want you to burn 25k points or that 1 night stay at an ok Hyatt, or a UA transcon booked on whacky dates through KrisFlyer by transferring your points instead of cashing them out…
On the other hand, at least you can liquidate UR at 1cpp no questions asked and with no minimums. Amex MR is like taking your rebate in Monopoly money…
Are these just changes that signify that there is a refresh coming to this card.? Chase hasn’t really announced anything… We’ve just been learning this from the bloggers.
@James good points, but also: I used PP 20 times in 2019 (one big reason why Amex Green is probably a no-go for me). Now, I’m not gonna value a single PP entry $25-30 usd like you would if you entered one and paid cash, but I think this is a big reason why I will still keep CSR around. Currently planning a little less PP access this year but still a positive gain.
I can confirm the changes are being applied to the JP Morgan Reserve card as well. I see people crying about this change, I’m not one of them. The Lyft value proportion is great- Lyft is already marginally cheaper in NYC, this is the tipping point for me. I don’t have a car so I use either Lyft or Uber regularly.
With the way things are going with reward programs and cards, I find my self doing annual evaluations of my portfolio of cards. As the programs change or as my life changes- I make adjustments either by putting a card on the bench (sock draw) or product changing.
The Lyft promotions almost always exclude the weekends, which is when I use rideshare most, so the 15% off will be of value to me. I’ll also have to redo my math on what length of trip is my breakeven on airport parking v. 2 Lyft rides…I think the Lyft benefits will be worth it to me
Doordash, meh, I’ll probably use the credit, but since I would never order from them without the credit I don’t really consider that to be a face value redemption.
And for people saying Lyft/Uber are only for young people, that’s nonsense. My parents are in their 70s and they use Lyft pretty frequently. It’s great for older people who are cutting back on driving or can’t drive but still want to live independently
This increase wouldn’t be bad if Chase would do away with the $75 authorized user fee, which no other card I know of has. The new benefits are not worth anything to me. As it is, I’ll be getting rid of CSR shortly before my annual fee renewal date.
These credits are getting out of hand. Someone needs to come up with some sort of central mobile payment app or card that picks the optimal card to charge. I don’t want to have to think so hard. The Amex charge cards are already a lot to keep track of. This all makes me wonder what these delivery and ride hailing companies pay for these bank partnerships. The banks must love these partnerships.
It’s all for stuff we don’t really use or it’s complicated to use (e.g., limit per month, available for one year.
The other thing that has bothered me about these “benefits” is that they’re not very useful abroad. Many of us that hold these premium travel cards spend time (and money) abroad. I spend more in taxis abroad than I use in the US. Uber/Lyft are often not available or even banned in many countries. I spend more on MyTaxi or KakaoTaxi in year than I do on Uber or Lyft.
If they brought back Korean Air as a transfer partner, I would pay $100 more annually. I would pay even more for a better Marriott Bonvoy transfer ratio (e.g., yielding at least $0.015 per UR point).
I have an Amex Platinum and a CSP I was thinking of upgrading to CSR, but this price hike has me conflicted.
The Lyft benefit is pretty good — I don’t have a preference between Uber and Lyft and most drivers drive for both, but Lyft doesn’t have an international presence like Uber, so for a lot of my trips, it’s less useful. I’ll use the $60 a year on DoorDash, but the fact that that benefit is limited rubs me the wrong way. Still, I can’t feel like there is a lot of inherent value here. I feel like I get my $550 worth with American Express, but it’s hard for me to justify upgrading to the CSR from CSP at this higher rate with these benefits. I could justify $450, even with a lot of benefit overlap. Adding another $100 to that changes the scenario a bit and makes me much more likely to stay with my CSP.
In light of this I hope you would consider writing a new post that compares the updated CSR with the Amex Platinum head-to-head.
I just applied, using your affiliate link, and got approved.
Your credit line is $20,300.00
Your purchase APR is 18.49% variable
Not bad. Let’s see if I have any reason to keep it for more than a year.
You can do pickup using DoorDash. Doesn’t work for every restaurant, but a good amount of them. I’ve been using DoorDash for a few months now just to order online and pickup myself. I don’t like delivery. I do the same thing with the GrubHub credit with my Gold card.
I get the Travel credit twice per AF, so I’m making $50 every 12 months just using my card on travel purchases. Close to a 10% return.
And I still value the 1.5cpp on the travel portal. It saves me a lot of points compared to if I were to use the CSP 1.25cpp.
@Andrew That AmEx platinum has a $175 authorized user Fee. Citi Prestige is $50.
Can one easily “downgrade” to the Preferred card?
@ Sue — Assuming you’ve had the card for at least a year, you should be able to do so.
I am not renewing. I don’t use Lyft or Door dash. Too bad as I really liked this card
I don’t agree with you. If you redeem with the Chase travel service unlike the Platinum card there’s no redemption fee and the point value for most tickets are much more reasonable than redeeming with Amex travel. You’ve forgotten that Chase Reserve points get a 50% bonus when redeeming with their travel service so it’s not the same as with the Amex card you compare it to. Even point transfers from chase, while I would only suggest for a top up to liquidate an account, at least it’s 1-1 direct transfer. Some Platinum partners aren’t 1-1 and are a poor deal or involve a service fee.
I also appreciate the flexibility with redeeming the perks of Chase compared to Amex such as no airline restrictions or fewer perks that are given monthly/over time, etc
Ben, you stated the new $550 fee “…applies for new accounts opened as of January 12, 2020”.
– Chase web site for Sapphire Reserve applications still says $450 Annual Fee as of today (1/13). Did they slip the date?
– In any case, I wonder how Chase defines “opened”. That is, I applied on 1/11, but my application is “pending further review”. Assuming I do get approved, any guess as to whether my “opened” date will be 1/11 or the date it is approved?
I’d been toying with the idea of getting this card for a couple of years, and finally got it in Sept 2019. It took all of four months for them to change the terms to all but guarantee I’ll be dumping the card before my renewal comes up.
I’d already done the math on my actual spending trends, and while it came ahead of CSP and behind AmexG before, it’s now well behind both.
I suppose I may as well enjoy the earn rate til September, but unless they up the earn rate on another category, it’s history. A shame, as I have been enjoying it, and consider their service good.
It’ll likely be a downgrade to CSP, or else a complete switch to whatever Visa/MC looks good around that time. The Capitol One Venture seems to earn well, but I’ve heard some horror stories about their service.