The Offer
- Alliant has sent out a targeted e-mail to some existing members for a sign up bonus of 20,000 points (worth $200) on their Visa Platinum Rewards card.
Card Details
- No annual fee
- Card earns two rewards points on every dollar spent
- Offer valid until May 31st, 2017
- E-mail subject line is <name>, exclusive 20,000 bonus rewards points just for you.
Our Verdict
Alliant offer three credit cards: this card, a card that doesn’t offer rewards and a 3% cash back card (first year, then it drops to 2.5%). You’re limited to one card with Alliant, but you can product change between the cards. The sign up bonus on this card is normally 5,000 points and points are worth 1¢ so this is basically a $200 sign up bonus on a card that earns 2% cash back on all purchases. Not bad at all.
It’s made even better by the fact that you could at a later stage product change this card into the 3% card and still get that rate and the annual fee waived first year. If I was targeted, I’d be jumping all over this deal. Hey Alliant, how about something like this for loyal DoC readers? If you have any questions about Alliant or want to find out more about their credit cards, I’d read this post first.
Hat tip to reader gary a and others.
Got this offer for 3k spend. I won’t be under 5/24 until Jun 2019. Kinda torn being jumping on this, waiting for a better offer, and staying put for one of the big Chase offers.
Important to know, and maybe Will & Chuck can add it on the dedicated Alliant thread once we have a data point or two: How long aft getting the 2% card can you upgrade it to the 2.5% one? Will a hard pull be required to product change to it?
Also whether there’s any other qualifying upgrade criteria, i.e. can anyone upgrade? I’m guessing yes but wouldn’t be surprised if it’s otherwise, Alliant seems to be the a la carte type & is currently experiencing growing credit card pains (bumpy rides, reinvent things as they go along, lot of hands on as opposed to automated processes).
A value comparison type guide as a separate post would be cool at some point (not sure if Sirtheta or someone else thought abt it =:). I know a lot of people will want to jump on Alliant cards, who can blame them, 2-3% cashback on everything, but for instance if you are near 4/24 think about the Chase opportunity cost + the fact that Alliant seems to be MS allergic and it is s smaller bank so might for instance do more manual account reviews, especially as they evaluate their credit card expansion portfolio during the next couple-few months.
I haven’t ventured into the Alliant card/s yet, to me it is a ? and risk via opportunity cost, it would be valuable only at mid-high MS levels and I am not sure I’d be able to pull that off + get to keep the cashback, especially with online activity.
No hard pull and unsure on how long you need the card for. I think your card needs a minimum credit limit of $5k to be able to upgrade.
> How long aft getting the 2% card can you upgrade it to the 2.5% one?
I strongly suspect the answer is 1 year, but it’s possible there are exceptions?
Assuming the targeted offer for the Visa Platinum Rewards card is the same as the standard offer, it comes with 0% APR for 12 mos. When I upgraded my Visa Platinum (non-Rewards) to the Cashback Visa Signature, it was the last day of my 0% APR period. Due to the CARD Act, issuers are not allowed to change your APR for the first year (unless a promotional APR expires), and I was specifically told that they could not upgrade me within the first year due to my promotional APR. My account was locked from upgrading that day because of it (it was upgraded within a few business days). (The timing worked out almost perfectly for me, but that’s the basis of my reasoning.)
> Will a hard pull be required to product change to it?
No, as long as you have a $10k+ CL because that is the minimum CL required for the Cashback Visa Signature. If you aren’t immediately approved and call recon, the analysts do have the ability to give you $10k+ CL even if they would normally approve you for less. I believe you can request a certain CL on the application page. When I upgraded, the customer service representative specifically confirmed I was good to go because I had $10k+ CL, and asked me if I just wanted to upgrade or also go for a CLI (I declined the option for a CLI).
If you don’t have $10k+ CL, I am assuming they will need to do a hard pull to upgrade you.
> Also whether there’s any other qualifying upgrade criteria, i.e. can anyone upgrade?
As far as I am aware, anyone can upgrade as long as their card has a $10k+ CL. If they need to do a CLI and won’t approve a CLI to $10k+ then you may not be able to upgrade.
>Alliant seems to be MS allergic
I didn’t know this; do you have any links to DPs or such? I’d be very interested in perusing them!
I don’t have any links re Alliant & MS, but I do recall that when there was a post here about them offering $50 sign up bonuses for new membership (checking) shortly after they contacted Will or Chuck to let them know the offer had expired. I got the impression they were hands on in either monitoring web presence in general or new account flows and then tracing back to here.
I also recall reading similar impressions as comments on the web about Alliant being non-MS friendly. I guess we will find out in a few months being that a lot of churners & MSers have signed up for their 2.5% card. I suspect it would be riskier with online MS like GCM & GC since that is pretty obvious and no level 3 data is needed for them to guess what people are buying.
Thank you for clarifying the rest!
Sorry for being so dumb…but what is MS GCM GC. MSers…
Thx for reply! That info really helps. Also, RE:”…The sign up bonus on this card is normally 5,000 points…” is that only equal to $50? I thought the “normal ” alliant visa platinum rewards card bonus was $100 for $500 in purchases in the 1st 3 bill cycles.
Yeah the points are equal to 1c each, and I’m not too familiar with Alliant’s cards as I’ve never been targeted before, but an older DoC post (https://www.doctorofcredit.com/alliant-visa-platinum-rewards-credit-card-review-2x-purchases-5000-point-sign-bonus/) seems to show yeah it’s normally $50.
Hey DoC, I was targeted. My email on the bottom said that the minimum spend to get the bonus is $4,000, which makes it significantly less appealing for me.
how much do u have to spend to get the 20,000point bonus? & in what time frame?
$4,000 spend, mine doesn’t list a time frame, I’m assuming it’s 3 months like normal.