Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is almost done! The last two weeks Greg, Nick, and Stephen competed to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines. But who completed the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?
When US Bank first unveiled their Altitude Reserve card, I argued that the main reason to get the US Bank Altitude Reserve card is for the signup bonus. It’s certainly an interesting card with it’s 3X earning on travel and mobile wallet. And with 1.5 cents per point value towards travel, those 3X points are worth an excellent 4.5% back. For an ultra-premium card it’s not even that expensive. You do have to pay $400 up front but then US Bank reimburses $325 in travel charges per year.
That’s all great, but I was turned off by the card’s limited options for getting 1.5 cents per point value. To do so you had to book travel through US Bank’s travel portal which would not always show the flights you want, or the best prices. And for those who care about hotel elite status, booking through US Bank’s portal meant giving up on earning elite credits and often giving up elite recognition at hotels.
Those negatives changed recently when US Bank introduced the ability to redeem points for travel via “Real Time Rewards”. Now it’s possible to get 1.5 cents per point value when booking travel directly with airlines, hotels, etc. That’s huge! See: US Bank makes Real-Time Mobile Rewards awesome. Are you listening Chase? Amex? Citi?
Suddenly I’m asking myself again whether or not the Altitude Reserve is a keeper…
Is Altitude Reserve a great travel card?
The card unquestionably earns respectable rewards for travel spend: 3X points worth 4.5% towards travel. But a great travel card also gives you great travel perks and great travel insurance.
On the travel perks side, the Altitude Reserve is a bit of a dud. It does offer 12 free Gogo wifi passes per year — that’s very good. And it offers Global Entry reimbursement which is necessary to compete a all in this space. But for lounge access it offers only 4 free Priority Pass visits per year. That’s pathetic. And it doesn’t offer any other significant elite-like perks that we’ve come to expect from ultra-premium travel cards.
As far as travel insurance goes… it’s not very impressive either. I recently updated my “Ultra-Premium Credit Card Travel Insurance” guide to include the Altitude Reserve. It doesn’t fair well compared to the Chase Sapphire Reserve or Citi Prestige. The Altitude requires paying in full for coverage (the Reserve and Prestige do not — except for rental car coverage). And, except for rental car coverage which is quite good, the Altitude’s coverage falls shy of the Reserve and Prestige in almost every category.
So, no. The Altitude Reserve is not a great travel card.
Is Altitude Reserve a great “almost everywhere else” card?
To the extent that it’s possible to pay almost everywhere with your smart phone (and therefore earn 3X with the Altitude Reserve), it’s hard to beat the Altitude’s rewards. Now that travel rewards are almost as good as cash, I think that it is reasonable now to say that you really do get 4.5% back towards travel when using the card for mobile wallet charges.
When you compare the Altitude Reserve to a no-fee 2% cash back card, you would have to spend $3,000 per year on mobile wallet and travel purchases to break even and fully cover the after-travel-credit $75 annual fee ($400 annual fee – $325 travel credit). That’s only $58 per week. With a modest mobile/travel spend of $100 per week, you’re suddenly way ahead.
If you have a a Samsung smart phone, then you can use mobile payments almost everywhere thanks to Samsung’s LoopPay technology (see: Altitude Reserve to offer 3X for Samsung Pay LoopPay purchases). The rest of us are limited to those merchants who specifically accept Apple Pay or Android Pay. That includes many big box stores and most merchants who use Square Readers.
That said, most online merchants do not accept mobile wallet payments. Until they do, the Altitude Reserve cannot truly be considered a great “everywhere else” card.
Not good for manufactured spend
If US Bank was friendly to those who like to manufacture spend through gift card purchases, this card would absolutely be a no-brainer. Unfortunately, they’re known to shut down accounts with even modest gift card purchases.
I’m on the fence
I originally signed up for the Altitude Reserve in May 2017 so I have a few more months to decide whether to keep the card for another year. While I’m super enthused about the new options for redeeming points, my spend habits don’t tend towards places that accept mobile wallet payments. Plus, even at places that do accept it, I often have other options for earning a high multiple (e.g. Sapphire Reserve 3X at restaurants; CNB Crystal Visa Infinite 3X at grocery stores and gas stations, etc.). I’d prefer to earn 3X Altitude Reserve over 3X CNB points, but the math is not as compelling as when comparing to a 2% card as I did above.
My plan is to wait and see how much I actually use the card over the next couple of months. I’ll use it wherever Apple Pay is accepted (unless I can get 3X with my Sapphire Reserve card). And, in May, I’ll calculate how much more I’ve earned with the Altitude card compared to the card’s I would have used otherwise. If it looks like the Altitude will more than pay for itself, then I’ll keep the card.
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It’s really annoying that you need enough points to cover the entire ticket, I had a $1700 and couldn’t put any points towards it. SAD!
If you want to keep the card a second year, call and complain about the fee and the retention offer is 10k altitude points, at least that’s what it was for me. That’s double what the fee is in travel redemption after you get back the 325 for travel purchase credits. No brainer to keep it another year for me.
[…] A second look at US Bank’s Altitude Reserve […]
Hi Greg,
May I ask what your final decision turned out to be? Did you keep or cancel the card?
Thanks!
I decided to keep it since I use mobile payments enough to justify the fee. Plus, I really like using the real time mobile rewards
Nick/Greg. I’ve had the AR for a few months now, got the sign up bonus and decided to use points to book a couple of hotels, through the USB portal, for our summer trip. I hadn’t heard about the hard no GC stance they were taking with this card until just recently (I have the flexperk and have been buying $1k in GC each month to pay rent for years with no issue). I did this with the AR last month, since i moved most of my spend that was going on the FP to the AR. My question is, if they do shut down my card, do you think it will screw up my hotel bookings? The points have already been subtracted from my reward balance, but there have been no dollar amount postings on the acct (like there was when I booked a flight through the united site and used the instant rewards). Thanks
My bet is that your hotel bookings will be fine.
The big question is – can you reduce the $500 minimum hotel spend/$250 car rental spend for a text redemption. I have many more smaller hotel stays than bigger ones. I did change my default to $100, but the language makes it unclear if I could change it. Do we have data points on this yet?
It looks like you cannot reduce it unfortunately.
Here’s an idea. Buy a used Galaxy S6 for $120 on Swappa and use it for Samsung pay. I don’t use Samsung pay so I don’t know if it requires an internet connection, but maybe you could tether it to your regular phone if it does.
Found the answer. You don’t need an internet connection when making a payments but you might need to sync on the internet after 10 transactions. https://www.samsung.com/us/support/answer/ANS00045193/
I’m sitting here wondering why the bleep anyone has an Apple phone! I’ve been crushing this card since release with legit spend. I’m going to get Greg off his apple phone, yet!
My family is deep in the iPhone ecosystem. They got us trapped!
I’ve been declined for this card twice in the past. Applied a couple of days ago and was approved for $23K!! Happy Day!
Greg, is it possible to redeem points towards travel other than by text? If I’m traveling internationally I would like to avoid costly international text messaging fees.
Hey Greg and All–What’s the story re MS using ApplePay to get 3x. When it first came out I heard a lot of people got shutdown by US Bank for not even doing 1x their CL in a billing period. Any data points?
See the headline in the post that says “Not good for manufactured spend”. Forget about 1x CL – people were getting shut down for buying one or two $500 GCs.
Read nearly the whole post but clearly missed that section. My bad! Thank Nick.
As an iphone user and holder of 5x Freedoms that I need to MS on, would I be able to buy a Looppay card and use that at certain grocery stores? Does looppay still work?
I’m pretty sure you need a Samsung phone or Samsung watch with Android phone in order to use Looppay. Yes it still works
points suck for spending. must have enough for at least one full ticket. can’t book airlines like spirit or southwest. website sucks
did you read the linked article in this post?
https://frequentmiler.com/2018/02/24/real-time-mobile-rewards/
you can book with ANY airline, hotel, car rental and use points by just replying to a txt now
Yeah Minimum $500 for lodging. Screw US Bank. big deal.
That’s one or two nights at a decent hotel
Do you have to use text? Is email or phone or something also acceptable? I don’t carry a cell phone
I believe it’s just text message.
That said, Google Voice may work.
Buy a Samsung Gear S3 and link it to any android phone. If you have an iPhone, you’ll primarily use it for Samsung Pay’s MST feature as it works when the watch isnt connected to wifi or your phone. You just have to connect it with that Android phone every few days.
I utilize the USB Altitude reserve more often than my chase sapphire reserve because of the 3x mobile payments and Samsung Pay.
Does it have to be connected to an Android phone or can it work with an Android tablet? As an iPhone user I’d be interested in this option if I can make it work.
I don’t have a Gear S3 — but if it just requires being connected with an Android phone every couple of days, there are some really cheap Android phones out there. This LG phone has been going in and out of stock for $10 for example.
https://shop.simplemobile.com/shop/en/simplemobile/phones/tfu-lg-fiesta#zipcode_needed
Should be OK with Android tablet as long as you are able to install Gear app and load Samsung Pay side app with it.
I dont have a US bank near me — I need to open a checking account with US bank first right? What’s the best way to get this card?
I don’t think they require that you have a checking account first. Try applying directly for the card: https://mycard.usbank.com/credit/mycardusb/html/altitude_reserve.html
Do we know for sure if they require if you have a US bank account before applying now?
My understanding is that you have to have some kind of relationship, but having another US Bank credit card (even a business credit card) is good enough
Greg that is great news. Is that how you were able to get the card or do you have a bank account with them as well? I just want to make sure before I apply for one of there other cards first.
Also how long would you wait between cards? I am really thinking about leaving my CSR for this card.
This post from Milenomics answers your questions (I think): https://milenomics.com/2019/02/applying-us-bank-altitude/
Greg thanks a lot. That helps tremendously.
So do you think this is actually a CSR beater or competitor? I know CSR has the transfer partners and the Altitude would not be the best option for long haul business/first class flights but I would think for many hotel and flights it would come out better to use there real time awards with the 1.5c per point. Also I like that the card is essentially $75 dollars and comes with the Gogo inflight credits.
It would be hard to let my CSR go but for right now I am just putting rental car expenses on it to get the primary insurance.
Sure, for some people the Altitude is better than CSR. I just wish that US Bank had a companion Altitude Unlimited card (like the Freedom Unlimited) that offers 1.5 points per dollar combinable with the Altitude points. That way, if you need to pay for something other than travel and can’t use Apple Pay (or similar), you can still get decent rewards. I’d also want a better card for restaurants since most table-service restaurants in the US don’t let you use apple pay since they take the card away to process it. The Uber card is a really nice fee-free card that fills that gap though (4% at restaurants)