Barclay Arrival Plus Announced, Arrival Cards Now Come With EMV Chip & Other Changes

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Barclaycard has announced changes to their two Arrival cards on their Barclay Travel Community blog. Here’s a summary of what will be changing:

• Barclaycard® Arrival™ World MasterCard will be changed to the Barclaycard Arrival Plus™
• Barclaycard® Arrival™ World MasterCard – No Annual Fee will be changed to Barclaycard® Arrival™ World MasterCard
• They will be introducing a new card called Barclaycard Arrival Plus™ World Elite MasterCard® (you’ll either be given this card or the Arrival Plus world card, depending on your credit worthiness). Later today we will be posting a summary of World Elite benefits.
• You can redeem your Barclay Miles against travel expenses (at a rate of 1 mile = 1 ¢) for a period of up to 120 days (previously it was 90 days)
• When redeeming against travel expenses, more merchant categories have been included. The following are new:
  • Taxis
  • Buses
  • Tourist attractions
  • Campgrounds
  • Limousines
  • Timeshares
• The Plus cards will come with an EMV chip, this will be chip + signature by default but will have the ability to have a PIN entered if necessary (great news for those travelling internationally as the card comes with no foreign transaction fees & more countries are switching to chip + PIN only for their residents).
• Cards will come with a new card design (pictured below)

Starting today all the new redemption options will be available, new applicants will also receive the new card design that also comes with an EMV chip for the Plus card. Starting May 28th existing card holders will be transitioned to the new cards (those with the no annual fee version of the card won’t receive a new card until their current card expires due to it not coming with an EMV chip). If you’re an existing card holder you should expect to receive a letter shortly announcing these changes. You should receive your new card 7-10 days after May 28th.

The following won’t be changing:

• Sign up bonuses will still be 40,000/20,000 miles (annual fee/non-annual fee)
• Free tripit pro
• Free TransUnion FICO Score (2008 classic model)
• Access to a shopping portal which gives an additional boost at certain merchants
• 10% of your miles back when you redeem against travel expenses

F.A.Q’s

I have the annual fee version of the card, will I receive the World elite version of the new card or just the world?

We called Barclaycard to ask and they state the card people receive will be dependent on their credit information (e.g credit score). In addition to that we believe they’ll also take your payment history and card usage into account but this hasn’t been confirmed or outright denied. Update: We’ve confirmed with an insider that the main thing they are looking for with existing cardholders is how much they’ve spent.

When you log into your Barclay account you should be prompted for some details (such as your income) they’ll then do a soft credit check to see which version of the card you’ll be transitioned to.

Will the new card come with a different sign up bonus?

At the moment the sign up bonus is staying the same, they recently upped the minimum spend requirement to $3,000 from $1,000 but we don’t have any reason to believe this will be changed again anytime soon.

I’ve held the Barclay Arrival card before, can I get this card and get the sign up bonus again?

Barclaycard is considering this card as the same product. This means you’d have the same chance of getting the sign up bonus again as you would’ve before. Unfortunately there aren’t a lot of data points about this as this is a relatively new card and most people haven’t held it for 12 months+.

Will DisneyWorld be considered “travel” now?

We’re not sure. That being said, Undercover tourist was already coding as a travel expense. They are a certified ticket broker and have discounts on the face value of tickets as well.

Will Uber be considered travel? 

Some people have reported that Uber often shows up as a limousine purchase, so it should now count. Which also makes sense as to why they would include limousines in the first place. We haven’t confirmed this yet, if anybody takes an Uber ride let us know how it codes in the comments. Update: This has been confirmed as counting as travel

I’m going to be travelling before May 28th, can I get the new card before then?

You should be able to request a card before then and ask for expedited shipping. Some people have reported customer service reps telling them that this new card would expire at the end of June which indicates that the cards might also be changing numbers (possibly due to World Elite status). Barclay usually charges a $29.95 fee for this, but you should be able to get it waived if you ask nicely.

Our Thoughts

All of these changes are positive ones, Barclaycard recently removed the introductory 0% APR on this card so it’s good to see them making some positive changes as well. Chase announced their intentions to offer EMV + PIN cards sometime in 2014, but it looks like Barclaycard has beat them to the punch. There has been reports of Barclay doing testing with EMV cards to select card holders and it’s great to see them finally roll these changes out to all of their customers.

Having a card that is PIN enabled is especially important for self-use checkouts. If a merchant accepts a type of card (e.g Mastercard, Visa or AmEx) they need to accept your purchase regardless of whether you have an EMV chip or not according to the processor agreement. That said, it’s important to argue with a self check out machine (e.g for public transport) which is why it’s becoming more and more important to have an EMV enabled card that can handle PIN transactions.

The Arrival cards are some of my favorites, it’s nice being able to get 2.222% back on all of your purchases. The sign up bonus is also great at $440 and I love not having to worry about award redemption. It’s definitely not for everybody, but it’s worth getting it for the first year at least (no annual fee) just for the sign up bonus.

You can view our full reviews of these cards below:

• Barclaycard Arrival World Elite Plus™ Mastercard 
• Barclaycard® Arrival™ World MasterCard (No annual fee)

These reviews will be updated today to include the new benefits.

Hat tip to TBB comments section for first making me aware of this change. Also thanks to some of the commentators there for additional information.