The Alliant Visa Signature card no longer offers the increased cashback rate of 3% during the first year. The regular earning rate of 2.5% remains unchanged. Card continues to have its $99 annual fee waived the first year.
Here’s what’s showing now (compare this to image in prior post):
Reader M.S. noticed this, and they called in and heard from an Alliant rep who confirmed that the 3% signup rate has been removed from the card. The said further that the change does NOT affect those who are currently in their first year – those people will continue to earn 3% cashback for the full year.
On a related note…
Last week we wrote about how Alliant is adding a cap on cashback earnings as limited to $10,000 per month in spend which can earn cashback. This cap will go into effect on March 14, 2020, and will probably affect existing cardholders, including those who are in their first year.
When looking carefully at how this is presented, they apparently made another subtle change here which will negatively affect people who are currently in their first year: Previously, the terms limited us to earning cashback on $10,000 (see image in previous post); those in their first year would be able to earn $300 in cashback per month while everyone else would be limited to $250 in cashback per month. Now, they present the limit differently, “Maximum cash back earnings will be $250 ($10,000 in qualifying purchases) per billing cycle.” That might mean that even those in their first year will be limited to just $250 cashback per month, not $300 per month.
Update 2/1/20: They’ve sent out a letter confirming the change for existing cardholders as well, see full letter here. HOWEVER, the $10,000 limit is for everyone, so if you are in your first year you’ll still get $10,000 in spend ($300 cashback) as your max.
Strange, the link below claims you can get 3.0% cash back the first year *and* no limit on bonuses. This was the first link shown when searching Google for “Alliant Credit Union” – guessing it is an outdated or malicious link?
https://ww2.alliantcreditunion.org/
This CU is cheap
Unlimited transfer accounts (next day) which for the past few years has made Alliant the perfect transfer hub, no fees, same HYS rates as Ally and their checking account .65 rate has no minimum whereas with Ally it’s $10k. So yeah, they are cheap – for the member.
Bummer – I used this card to pay vendors for my wedding (also did some sign-up bonuses, but there’s an upper limit to how many cards I’m willing to juggle, and it’s complicated to split payments across cards). I was recommending this card for others in that situation, but won’t anymore.
What’s the highest limit people have been granted on the Discover It Miles? That seems like the next most attractive option, but if the limit is too low than it’s not really usable for expensive events, etc.
Makes sense – it’s hard to imagine that the cardholders are profitable for Alliant even in years 2 and 3, so it doesn’t make sense to offer a “sign-up bonus” to attract new cardholders.
Even “normal” 2% cashback cards aren’t directly profitable, so the bank needs a plan to make the money somewhere else. There are a bunch of options that seem to be working elsewhere:
– Make money on interest from people who don’t pay their full statement credit every month (Citi DoubleCash)
– Get customers in the door by making them open an account, and then cross-sell asset management to them and make money off that (Fidelity, BofA)
– Acquire “sticky” customers for banking, mortgages, etc. by requiring them to maintain a specific non-trivial balance with you (PenFed, also BofA)
– Use the credit card as a marketing vehicle to get people to use your product, and make money off their usage of the product (PayPal, BlisPay). The extra .5% may be lower than your Customer Acquisition Cost anyway
Alliant doesn’t have a working model here. Their required balance in the savings account is so low that it’s trivial and doesn’t generate any stickiness, and their core banking product is not very attractive anyway. *Maybe* they can cross-sell mortgages to some of the cardholders, but the type of person who’s shopping around for a card that pays 0.5% more is also the type of person who’s going to shop around for the lowest mortgage rates, so they’re unlikely to be super profitable in that department either.
Those who have paid an annual fee are presumably eligible to continue receiving the same benefits (i.e. no $250/month cap) for the rest of the year they’ve paid for.
That would make sense, but various indications I’ve heard point otherwise.
Yeah, it sounds that way from what you guys have posted on this topic… FWIW though I’m a current cardmember beyond my first year, and I have yet to receive any kind of notification from Alliant about the institution of a cap. (They were pretty prompt last year to notify me about the annual fee increase.)
I am kind of surprised that any CB cards offer rates of over 2% general spend or 3% category bonus. Even with annual fees, the annual fee just scares away basic users and the power users will do the math and beat the crap out of the multiple.
The travel game works because Amex and Chase bulk buy travel miles under face value. Points might cost Amex 0.75cpp, I redeem them for 1.5+ cpp and the airline can fill more seats.
Penfed Powercash Visa signature credit card is much better than this crappy credit card. For .5% less you dont get charged an annual fee nor foreign transaction fees
Alliant doesn’t charge foreign transaction fees on this card. And with Penfed you have to open a checking account and keep $500 in it to keep it fee free. Not sure how that makes Penfed “much better.”
Well after 5 years having the Alliant credit you’ll be spending more than $500 in annual fees…
Plus with the newly refurbished Penfed Pathfinder visa credit card, yea it’s much better than Alliant
Yes, but if you spend about $20k/year or more with Alliant (which you should be if you have the card since that’s when it becomes more rewarding than a 2% card) then the fee is negligible since you’re earning more than you would with the Penfed Powercash you initially mentioned and don’t have to keep $500 in their checking account.
As for the Pathfinder card, that’s not a flat rate cash back card so it’s not comparable to Alliant’s Visa Signature card. Plus, your initial comment was just comparing 2 cards not each credit union’s offerings as a whole.
TL;DR Alliant’s card doesn’t make sense for everyone, but it’s still a solid choice for a lot of people.
Lack of $99 annual fee. Better for those who don’t spend a lot in the sub-5x, -4x, -3x categories.
Existing cardholder here — what indication have they given that the $10,000 limit applies to existing cardholders?
I’m fairly certain it does, I’ve just reached out to a contact at Alliant to confirm.
Just spoke with them, applies to existing customers as well.
What’s up with existing cardholders not receiving any notification about this? I was about to charge my card >$10K to pay my taxes and would have had to just eat the cost…
Locusts strike again.
The 3% for a year was in lieu of a bonus, so now, no bonus. The 2.5% will probably be gone someday, too. Has any other bank/CU been successful with a general 2.5% cash back card?
Nope, seems 2% is the limit
Shh…some of us were lucky enough to grab the no-AF 2.5% back card from USAA. Waiting for them to discontinue the 1% “bonus” for direct deposit into a checking account, but hasn’t happened yet.
A card issuer named Ollo has a 2.5% no fee card, but it’s an invite only card and usually aimed at people rebuilding/have blemishes on their CRs. Plus usually their SLs are pretty low so not really usable to the demographics who read this blog.
BoA Travel Rewards. I have a Merrill account with low fee funds so it’s 2.7% cb. No AF.