Product Change Your Useless BofA Cards And Earn Up To $120/yr Per Card

Update 4: Rapid Travel Chai confirms that as of May, 2015 it’s still possible to product change to the BBR. Just keep trying till you get a CSR that can actually help you.

Update 3: Oren’s Money Saver confirms this is still working. If you get a rep that says they can’t process the downgrade, hang up and call again!

Update 2: Matthew in the comments was able to convert again, so it looks like this is back on. I’d recommend hanging up and calling again if they say it isn’t possible.

Update: It looks like Bank of America has stopped you from converting existing cards to the Better Balance Rewards card, it’s now only possible to sign up for this card directly.

I’ve been putting together a list of the best downgrade options for each card issuer (post coming soon) and then I read this post by Rapid Travel Chai which alerted me to an easy way to make another $100-$120 per useless Bank of America card.

Bank of America has a credit card called BankAmericard Better Balance Rewards which doesn’t come with a sign up bonus and doesn’t earn at a high rate in any categories. It does come with an interesting benefit though, for every quarter where you pay more than the monthly minimum each month you’ll receive a $25 bonus. If you hold a Bank of America checking account, you’ll get an additional $5 per quarter which gives us a total of $120 per year.

Obviously this isn’t a lot and I wouldn’t recommend applying for this card directly, but Bank of America does let you do a downgrade/product change to this card from an existing card. There is no hard pull to do this product change and the card will keep the same opening date which will help increase your average age of accounts and thus your FICO score.

When you call Bank of America ask to speak to an American phone operator if they don’t understand your request.

Sometimes the international phone operators will have trouble understanding your request. If this fails, say something along the lines of “I’d like to do a product change on <cardname you want to switch from> to the BankAmericard Better Balance Rewards” card.

To get the most value out of this card, you’re going to want to automate this promotion as much as possible. Here is what I’d recommend doing, find a small monthly charge that you don’t receive a category bonus on. Put this charge on your new BankAmericard Better Balance Rewards and then set it up so this card is automatically paid in full each month. [See also, PSA: Put a $5 Charge on that Better Balance Rewards Card]

bank of america

You don’t qualify for the bonus if you have a positive balance on your card. Because the bonus posts directly to your credit card, you’ll have a positive balance some months. If you have a checking account with Bank of America, this is easily fixed you can opt in to receive the bonus as a direct deposit instead. This is by far the easiest option and remember you’ll earn an additional $5/quarter for having a checking account with them. If you don’t have a checking account, consider opening one or remember to make additional purchases on your card in months where you receive the cash reward.

If you’re the type of person who likes fine print, you can view all of the program details by clicking here.

Checking Promotions

Once a year BofA seems to offer a $100 bonus for opening a checking account. It might be worth waiting to open an account until one of these promotions comes around. Here is the promotion for earlier in the year (note: this is actually valid again, but not open to everybody). There is no hard pull done when you open the checking account, but they will do a ChexSystems inquiry.

You also get free access to a bunch of museums nationwide when you’re a BofA checking customer.

Negatives

It’s not all roses though. Because you need to have a statement generate each month to earn your $25/$30 the chances are Bank of America will report a balance. When it comes to FICO scores, it’s best to have a reported balance on one or two credit cards and no balance on the remaining cards.

You can try calling Bank of America and asking what date they report your credit utilization to the credit bureaus, then make sure your card has a balance of zero on that date (it should always remain the same).

For example, you call Bank of America and they state they report your balances on the 11th each month. Your statement generates on the 15th of each month. You’d want to set your recurring charge on the 12th-14th, and then you’d need to make sure your statement is paid off by the 10th each month. That way Bank of America would still report a utilization of $0 and you’d still earn your $25/$30 quarterly.

It’s also worth remembering that this plays a small role when it comes to your FICO score, personally I’m not going to go to this much trouble. If I plan to make a large loan (e.g mortgage or auto) I’ll simply not bother with this card for a couple of months to ensure my FICO score is the highest it can be. It’s a lot more important to ensure that your overall credit utilization is under 30% as that’s when you see the most negative impact (anecdotal you want it in between 1-10% depending on your credit profile with one or two cards reporting a balance).

Final Thoughts

If you have any Bank of America credit cards sitting in your sock drawer doing nothing, I’d definitely recommend doing a product change to this card instead. You might as well grab a checking account as well, it’s much easier than remembering to put additional charges on the card in certain months plus you might be able to grab a $100 checking bonus and you also get free access to some museums as well.

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127 Comments
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James L
James L (@guest_1580397)
March 19, 2023 19:24

Probably time to take this page down now that the BBR is finally being phased out.

Alex - big_deals🔗
Alex - big_deals🔗 (@guest_1360142)
April 7, 2022 13:38

 William Charles  Chuck please fix page

Chuck
Editor
Chuck(@chucksithe)
April 7, 2022 14:40

What is wrong?

Brian G.
Brian G. (@guest_1119922)
January 1, 2021 12:54

 William Charles this CC has been discontinued, can the title be edited to note that? The page is one of the top Google results for BofA product change.

Orin
Orin (@guest_727421)
February 26, 2019 11:15

 William Charles this page should be fixed. Card no longer available

John
John (@guest_547519)
January 5, 2018 01:04

DP for those still interested…talked to a BofA CSR tonight about PCing to this and was told the product is no longer available. Was hoping to do something useful with this Americard but no dice……

Blue
Blue (@guest_394855)
April 24, 2017 11:17

Ok, data point on this one. I have two old credit cards from BOA and I called to see if either could be converted to a BBR. American rep. Apparently each card has a product change offer screen that gets called up. A BBR change can occur only when this offer pops up on the screen. May be worthwhile calling from time to time to see how the offer mix changes. Also the screen is different for each card you have.

Jian
Jian (@guest_383367)
April 4, 2017 20:34

CSR very friendly and helped me submit the product change request from preferred rewards VISA. However credit card team called back and said that they don’t permit product change to BBR and that I have to apply for it if I want it 🙁

Zburk
Zburk (@guest_375095)
March 22, 2017 17:51

I called today to switch from the BoA cash back card to the BBR card and had no issues. I called back again to speak with another rep just to make sure it was submitted and he said it was and I should see the change in my online account in a couple business days.

Eric
Eric (@guest_378050)
March 27, 2017 21:40

Which phone # did you call? Did you speak to a normal CS rep or someone else?

zburk
zburk (@guest_378052)
March 27, 2017 21:41

I called the number provided through the help section in the mobile app about account services and the first rep transferred me to someone who could handle product changes

Eric
Eric (@guest_378054)
March 27, 2017 21:43

Do you recall around what time you called? I’ve already tried at night so maybe that’s a bad time. Was your BAC card a Visa or MC?

Eric
Eric (@guest_378055)
March 27, 2017 21:44

I meant to write “always” and not “already”.

Zburk
Zburk (@guest_378056)
March 27, 2017 21:45

I have a Visa. I called around 3pm

Martin
Martin (@guest_355604)
February 17, 2017 09:32

I called BofA Credit Card Customer Service (800.732.9194) today to request the product change from my BofA/Merrill VISA Signature card to the BankAmericard Better Balance Rewards card. My first call, the CSR said that there is no such thing as a product change to the Better Balance Rewards card – I would have to make a new application for that card. The second phone call, the CSR said that I need to call back when the Sales Department is open, after 8am EST (I was calling at 7am). The third call after 8am, the CSR knew what I was asking for and simply asked why I wanted to change my rewards program. I just said it was a better fit as I like to pay my balance off each month. She proceeded with the product change smoothly, no problem. I was informed that my card number might change; it would arrive in 2 to 4 weeks; the card history and balance would be transferred; and any auto-payment that had been set up would need to be redone. She did couch the change in the words “reward program change” rather than “new account” or “new card”, which says something about how they view this changeover.

Eric
Eric (@guest_355734)
February 17, 2017 12:21

Did you call (800.732.9194) and simply ask for Sales? Have you had success changing over other BAC cards in the past?

Martin
Martin (@guest_355942)
February 17, 2017 17:59

I called the number: said “product change” when the voice prompt asked what I was calling for, then said “representative” at the next prompt and hit the number 4 for “other” at the next prompt – something like that. I spoke with the CSR that answered. I didn’t ask for Sales. This is my first time changing over a BofA card.

Eric
Eric (@guest_378049)
March 27, 2017 21:40

I just tried these steps and was told from 2 separate reps that this is no longer offered. Did you just get really lucky or do I just have really bad luck?

Did you receive the BBR yet?

Taylor
Taylor (@guest_348712)
February 4, 2017 13:36

I HUCA-ed numerous times to try and get the product change to BBR, to no avail. The most recent agent I got was actually quite friendly, and confirmed the system doesn’t show the BBR as a valid product change from the AS card. She offered to consult a supervisor and try and manually request it, but that was also unsuccessful.