Usually I talk about weird or unusual credit cards every Wednesday, there are so many I want to talk about so I thought why not sprinkle in some throughout the week. You can view more posts in this series here.
Santander is the fourth largest bank in the world when sorted by profit. They are relatively new in the US and are trying to rapidly gain market share. Whenever companies do this, it’s usually a boon time for consumers as they hand out all sorts of bonuses to attract consumers.
At the moment Santander is offering you $20 per month with their Extra20 savings & checking products, in my opinion this is the best bank bonus on offer at the moment. They also have the Santander Bravo credit card which now comes with a $100 bonus and earns at 3% on gas station, supermarket and restaurant purchases (limit of 15,000 points/quarter).
Santander Sphere Basics
They also have a credit card that I haven’t talked about before, called the Santander Sphere. This card offers a $100 bonus (10,000 points) when you spend $1,000 or more in net purchases within three months. It also comes with a 0% introductory APR on balance transfers for 24 months. There are a number of “gotchas” with that introductory APR offer though, we’ve listed these below.
0% APR Gotchas
- There is a balance transfer fee. Santander charge a balance transfer fee of $10 or 4% (which ever is higher) for every balance transfer.
- Introductory APR of 0% only applies to balance transfers. If you make a purchase, it will not receive the introductory APR 0%.
- Late payment will cancel your 0% rate. If you make a late payment they reserve the right to cancel your introductory APR period and then charge a penalty APR of 29.99%.
- Only balance transfers made within the first 90 days attract this 0% rate. If you make a balance transfer outside of this period it will attract the usual rate of 12.99% to 24.99% depending on your credit worthiness.
- There is no grace period on balance transfers. This means if you make a balance transfer outside of the introductory APR period, you will be charged interest instantly. It also means that if you make a purchase after taking a balance transfer and do not pay in full, you will be charged interest instantly.
Final Thoughts
The sign up bonus on this card is only $100, there are a lot of higher cash sign up bonuses out there. This card also earns 1x point on all purchases (you should be using a card that earns at least 2% cash back on non-category spending).
It’s not worth considering the balance transfer option, the balance transfer fee makes it pointless to even consider before even thinking about the other gotchas. I hate most balance transfer and introductory APR offers because they are designed to take advantage of uninformed consumers.
If Santander wants to gain any market share in the crowded credit card market, they are going to have to do a lot better than their current two offerings.
