U.S Bank offers the Cash+ card which allows you to choose two 5% cash back categories each quarter from a pre defined list on the first $2,000 in purchases. You also get to choose one 2% cash back category (although there are plenty of cards that earn 2% cash back or more). U.S Bank recently made a negative change to this card when restaurants went from a 5% cash back category to 2% cash back (which was a big deal, because previously this was the best card for restaurant purchases). Looks like they aren’t finished with the negative changes though.
[Read: 5%+ Cash Back Cards]
When your statement closes, you should receive the following notice:
Beginning April 1, 2015, the $25 Cash+ Bonus you receive when you redeem cash rewards for $100 or more in a single redemption will now be limited to one per the lifetime of the account. Currently, the $25 Cash+ Bonus has a limit of one per calendar year.
If you redeem before April 1st, 2015 I am not sure if you’ll be able to get the $25 bonus again once last time in 2016 or not. I’m going to redeem $100 before that date just to make sure. I’ve sent an e-mail to U.S bank for clarification.
Just spoke to U.S Bank’s media team and as long as you get the bonus before April 1st, 2015 you’ll be able to get it once more. My plan is to redeem $100 before April 1st and then get the bonus again sometime in 2016.
In the past you got the $25 bonus every time you redeemed $100 or more cash back, then they limited it to once per calendar year. Now they are making things even worse and you can only get it once per lifetime. It seems U.S Bank is intent on killing this product, I’ll continue to use mine for charity donations, but that’s about it.
If you don’t already have this card, I wouldn’t bother signing up for it but if you have another U.S bank card it might still make sense to downgrade that to this card as it has no annual fees.
Hat tip to ArmyVietVet from myFICO forums
William stated awhile back: “I’ll continue to use mine for charity donations, but that’s about it.”
Looks like U.S. Bank has official put the nail in the coffin on this product for me. I was also using this card for just charities but my January statement that recently posted had the below statement buried in the “Important Messages” area:
Effective February 15, 2017, a new 5% Cash+ Category will be available: Ground Transportation featuring merchants such as Uber and Amtrak(R). Also effective February 15, 2017, the 5% Charity Category will no longer be available. Remember to register for your 5% and 2% categories to get MORE CASH BACK!
Oh well… time to move on.
Thanks, Jay! Really appreciate you letting me know.
To be fair, most 5% cards have become more restrictive over time because 5% is simply a loss for the issuer. Chase Freedom’s categories for Q4 include diapers.com, audible.com, zappos.com and Amazon. With the exception of maybe Amazon, very niche categories that most people will not be excited about. Even Discover tightened up a bit this year, replacing their former “online shopping” for Q4 with simply “amazon.com”.
The problem with cash+ is that US Bank released a product that was far, far too broad and unrestricted to begin with. Bill pay, airfare, hotels, home improvement, etc, 5%, no cap, was doomed from the start. They have overcompensated by removing the categories AND adding a cap, where you’d think just adding the cap would suffice. However, it’s their card, their rules. I still like the card for 5% fast food and 5% on my occasional IKEA trips, but I’d be lying if I said it were a daily driver type of card.
They do state on their site that the rewards categories are subject to change and we all know that 99% of the time, the change is for the worse, not for the better. It is what it is.
..I recently got this card and Redeemed over $100, it says I got $25 bonus, but where? Do I get a prepaid visa in the mail or something, it’s been two weeks. Thanks
This will be the last year I use the card, the categories keep getting smaller and smaller. I only use it for fast food and cell phone now.
This is not the best card for reward. But i will still keep it for mini MS activity.
You can choose Electronic store as 5% bonus category. Buy Visa GC from Best Buy.
This gives you YEARLY $400 CC reward – $238 GC Fess + $160 Best Buy reward certificate
Net $332 on annual basis.
Sorry for typo.
Net $322 on annual basis.
Agree completely, I’m slowly MS-ing my way to a xbox! No complaints
…or you can choose department stores as your bonus category and get $500 VGC’s from a Simon Malls /Outlets if you have one near by. I travel for work so I chose that plus Rental Car as my 5%. A slow MS game for sure, but I intend to squeeze every bit of juice left from the rind of this once vaunted MS card. Point is there’s no annual fee, so why not?
What a piece of junk this card has become. US Bank should just get out of the rewards credit card business for non-partner cards. Every quarter they nerf this thing just a little more which leads me to believe they have no interest in having a truly viable rewards product. They should probably just step aside and leave the rewards card industry to the big boys Chase and Amex.
Agreed. Used to use this card all the time and also have other US Bank products as a result(checking, savings). Since they started nerfing this I’ve used it less and less. The final nail in the coffin was the restaurants. This is just further proof they plan to make this card a big fat nothing in due time. I will be closing all my US Bank accounts with a few months as soon as I get one more $25 bonus which I’m a few reward bucks shy of.
I would keep the Cash+ open for a few reasons:
1. No annual fee
2. If you redeem your $100 before April 1st, you can get the $25 bonus again in 2016
3. You get 5% cash back on charities, you could donate to Kiva and MS a bit that way (although there is risk involved).
Yeah, I reconsidered and I’m keeping the card now, nerfing be damned.