Wells Fargo Propel 365 American Express® Card Review

Overview

APRs:

• APR: 13.99% to 21.99% depending on your credit worthiness
• Introductory APR: 0% for 12 months
• Cash advance APR: 23.99%
• Grace period: 25 days
• Minimum interest charge: $1

Note all APRs may vary based on the prime market rate.

Fees:

• Annual fee: $45, waived for the first year
• Balance transfer fee: $5 or 3% whichever is highest for the first 12 months, then $5 or 5% whichever is highest
• Cash advance fee: $10 or 5%, whichever is greater for SUPERCHECK advance, ATM advance or advance through Wells Fargo Online. $20 or 5%, whichever is greater for all other cash advances
• Foreign transaction fee: None
• Late payment fee: Up to $35
• Returned payment: Up to $35

Card Benefits

• Sign up bonus of 20,000 Wells Fargo points when spend at least $3,000 within the first three months of account opening
• 3X points at U.S Gas Stations, 2X points at U.S restaurants, 1X points on all other purchases
• No foreign exchange fees
• No annual fee for first year (then $45)

Card Negatives

• No EMV chip

Application Information

This is a brand new card and as such there isn’t a lot of application data currently. We will update this as more comes to hand.

What Credit Score Is Required

	Credit Boards	Credit Karma
Lowest approved score	?	?
Average approved score	?	?

 

What Credit Bureau Does Wells Fargo Pull For The Propel 365 Card?

Wells Fargo will pull different credit bureaus depending on which state you live. We suggest entering your state and
“Wells Fargo” into the credit boards credit pull app to see more data.

What Credit Limit Will I Receive?

Minimum Credit Limit	Highest Reported Credit Limit	Average Credit Limit
?	?	?

Rewards Program

This card earns Well Fargo’s points which are worth a minimum of 1¢ each, as they can be redeemed for statement credit or a check. The points also never expire.

Earning Rewards

This card earns at the following rates:

• 3X points per dollar spent at U.S Gas Stations
• 2X points per dollar spent at U.S restaurants
• 1X points per dollar spent on all other purchases

You also earn an additional “relationship” bonus if you maintain an additional account with Wells Fargo, the bonus rates are as follows:

• Checking or savings account: 10% relationship bonus
• PMA package with a relationship balance of $250,000 or less: 25% relationship bonus
• PMA package with a relationship balance of $250,000 or more: 50% relationship bonus
• Wells Fargo Private Banking PMA Package client: 50% relationship bonus

This bonus is paid out on the 13th month billing cycle after you first opened your account and then annually after that. You do not earn this bonus on sign up points or bonus points (e.g if you make an $100 purchase with an Airline you’d receive 300 points and then an additional 10 relationship bonus points if you hold an eligible checking or savings account). There is currently a $100 sign up bonus for Wells Fargo checking accounts.

The most basic checking account has a monthly fee of $7 if you opt for paperless statements, which is waived if you receive direct deposits of $500 or more per month or have a minimum daily balance of $1,500 or more. The most basic PMA package has a monthly fee of $30 unless you have deposits totalling $25,000 or more.

Wells Fargo doesn’t offer great rates on their checking & savings products so we wouldn’t recommend signing up for these, especially since the relationship bonus doesn’t count towards sign up and bonus points.

Mall

You can also earn additional points through their shopping portal, although all of the offers that we checked had better discounts when we looked on other cash back sites.

Sign Up Bonus

Current Sign Up Bonus

• May 1st, 2014  – Current: This card earns 20,000 bonus points when you make at least $3,000 in net purchases within the first three months

Sign Up Bonus History

This card has always had the same sign up bonus.

Redeeming Your Rewards

Wells Fargo rewards points can be redeemed at https://mywellsfargorewards.com/. Points have a value of 1¢ per point when redeeming for cash or cash equivalents. They have the following things that you can currently redeem for:

• Cash, you can redeem for cash in denominations of $25 (1 point = 1¢). You can have this cash given to you in the following ways: statement credit on your card, check,  Wells Fargo mortgage, Wells Fargo home equity loan, personal Wells Fargo loan, deposit into a Wells Fargo checking account or deposit into a Wells Fargo savings account
• Gift cards (starting at 2,500 points for a $25 gift card). 59 different merchants currently available with Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Fandago and host of other big brands.
• Travel. You can also redeem your points for airline tickets at a rate of 1 point = 1¢, although some people have found that when they actually go to book their tickets they end up getting closer to 1.5¢ per point.

Our Verdict

This card is an interesting one, if you can get 1.5¢ in value out of your points by redeeming them for airline tickets then it’s effectively a 4.5% cash back on gas & 3% cash back on restaurant card, which would make it one of the best credit cards for gas & restaurant purchases. 

If you maintained a PMA account it’d also become 5% on gas and 3.5% on restaurants, but because you need to maintain a balance of $25,000 or greater and Wells Fargo offers low interest rates we wouldn’t recommend doing this unless you’re putting through a massive amount of restaurant spend every month.

I’m still not convinced that’ll make it worth the annual fee as there are other cards on the market that offer 4.5% or more on gas purchases and 3% on restaurant purchases. The sign up bonus is nothing amazing, but for those looking for straight cash back it will be one of the better offers currently on the market ($200 in cash and possibly $300 in travel).

I’m personally not going to sign up for this card, but I will be signing up for their new Propel world card which has a higher sign up bonus of 40,000 points (and $100 reimbursement for airline incidentals).

We Recommend This Card For:

• People looking for a decent cash sign up bonus
• People wanting a card that earns a decent amount on gas & restaurant spend

We Don’t Recommend This Card For:

• People looking for a card with decent every day spend

Alternatives to this card

• American Express Fidelity: This will be better for those people looking for a credit card with decent cash back for everyday spend. This card earns at a flat 2% on all purchases.

• Barclay Arrival: This card comes with a sign up bonus of 40,000 miles which can be redeemed for $440 in travel expenses. It also earns 2.22% miles/cash back on all purchases

• Wells Fargo Propel World American Express: This card has a bigger sign up bonus of 40,000 Wells Fargo points