The annual fee has been increased, but there is now a $450 offer on this card.
On August 3rd, 2016 the Blue Cash Preferred card will go from having an annual fee of $75 to $95. This is clearly marked on the offer page (see below):
This card earns 6%Â at supermarkets in the US on up to $6,000 spend per year. That 6% earning rate sounds fantastic, but it isn’t quite as good when you take into account the annual fee. You can earn a maximum of $360 annually from this, currently you pay a $75 annual fee and that makes your earn rate 4.75%. When the annual fee increases your earn rate at US supermarkets will decrease to 4.42%. There are cards that earn at a similar or higher rate.
It’s currently possible to get a sign up bonus of up to $450 on this card (although $200 of this is actually 10% back on US Wireless Telephone Service Providers).
Hat tip to aksurvivorfan on /r/churning
I just received my annual fee (existing card) and it was only $75.
Interesting
Interesting, as in my previous post I noted Amex would be charging me the $95 annual fee in August as noted on my June statement but they only charged $75 this year.
Agree with previous post as Chase Freedom is a great card. For me it compliments the BCP as I do spend 6K a year on groceries. For a family of four living in CA, it’s easy to hit that target. Remember, you can also buy gas cards or any other gift card under the sun at most grocery stores and that counts as grocery store spending. Gas cards are especially nice since you earn 6% or 5% with Freedom and you also get up to $.0.20 or sometimes up to $.40 off per gallon.
Freedom also gives 5% at Costco now and will through the end of the year. This quarter is especially nice with restaurant spending at 5%.
Also, you don’t need to accumulate $25 on the Freedom to redeem and you can also deposit your rewards right into your bank account and if you have more than one Chase Card that has Ultimate rewards like the CSP, you can move your points which can also come in handy on airfare if you book directly with Chase which also gives you 20% travel redemption.
On a separate note, it does suck that Chase is got he 5/24 rule. No more churn and burn.
Anyone with the BCP that doesn’t MS on it should pull up their statement and filter by grocery purchases to get an idea of how much you spend on groceries per year.
If that number is not above $3,200 you should probably just downgrade to the Blue Cash Everyday.
$95/(6%-3%)) [$95 annual fee divided by the 3% opportunity cost of getting 3% rather than 6% back]
If you have, or are willing to get, a Freedom or IT that pretty much always give 5% back in groceries for a quarter then that number increases to $4,750.
($95 x 3/4 / (6%-3%)) + ($95 x 1/4 / (6%-5%)) [3% opportunity cost for 3 quarters, 1% for one]
If you’ve got the Sallie Mae then that number increases to $5,200.
$250*12 + ($95-($250*12*(6%-5%)))/(6%-3%) [Sallie Mae is limited to $250/mo]
If you’ve got the Sallie Mae and the Freedom/IT then I think that number increases to $5,600.
$250*9+$1400+(95-($250*9*(6%-5%))-($1400*(6%-5%)))/(6%-3%) [Freedom is limited to $1,500/qr but $1,400 is the quarterly average in this scenario]
You get the point.
Very useful Thanks !
ditto that, but still the best, especially for MS if you can get a grocery that still allows.
The annual fee has also increased for existing card members too. Got my BCP statement informing me the annual fee is going to be $95 starting in August.
Thanks Sam
Was be able to get 450 Bonus offer yesterday through ExpressVPN and applied for it right away.
I hope they are not going to raise annual fee in a year or two automatically for this card even if you applied for current 75 a year annual fee.
Sorry DoC, but I don’t see anything better on that link. The Sallie Mae card doesn’t have grocery stores as a 5% option any more, and even if you value AMEX MR points higher than .01, those options carry an annual fee.
So unless you want to mess around with the temporary option where the 5% expires after 6 months, BCP still looks like the best option for Grocery spending to me. Unless you’re not spending more than $3K/year in which case the BCE is the better way to go…
Old Blue Cash is an option, as is EveryDay Preferred depending on how you value MRs.
Even if you max out Old Blue Cash exclusively on groceries by spending $56.500 in the calendar year you’re still only getting 4.53% back or about $65 annually on over 50 grand in spend.
For anyone who doesn’t MS $50k in “groceries” (and missed out on Sallie Mae) BCP is still the best cash back grocery card around (by the numbers).
I would emphasize this is for new applicants, doesn’t look like this impacts existing cardholders.
It’s for new applicants currently, who knows if they will push it onto existing cardholders.
Was planning to downgrade to BCE after my first year… Don’t know if I suppose to keep it for another year at least to manufacture more out of it before AF increase for old card holders or keep original plan…