Doctor of Credit has uncovered something that will only be of interest to a subset of readers: Rakuten offers a Rakuten+ subscription. The subscription costs $100 per year and comes with 10% back all the time at select merchants. Potentially the most useful of those will be Hotels.com and Viator. Overall, I think it’s probably not worth the $100 per year, but those with the right purchase patterns might find it worthwhile, particularly after the $50 signup bonus for spending $250 or more at the included merchants within the first 90 days.
The Deal
- Rakuten is offering a Rakuten+ subscription service whereby members can earn 10% cash back at a number of retailers all the time. They are also offering $50 back when you spend $250 or more with those qualifying merchants in the first 90 days. Though you’ll have to first join the waitlist and then clear it in order to take advantage of that.
- Direct link to this deal
Key Terms
- Eligible stores include: 3.1 Phillip Lim, A.L.C., Alice+Olivia, AllSaints, ATM Collection, Avocado Green Mattress, Bogner, Bulova, Bergdorf Goodman, Citizen Watch Company of America, Inc., Cos Stores, Costa Del Mar, Derek Lam, Diesel, Eberjey, Eric Javits Operations LLC, FARM Rio, Four Seasons at Home, Frances Valentine, Hotels.com, Kate Spade & Company, L’Agence, Lagos Inc., LAMPS PLUS, Mansur Gavriel, Merlette, Michael Kors (USA), Inc., Michael Kors Outlet, Moschino, Mytheresa GmbH, Neiman Marcus, Persol, rag & bone, Ramy Brook, SMCP – Maje, SMCP – Sandro Paris, Tessabit, TUMI, Inc., V Opco, LLC, Viator, Zadig et Voltaire, Sephora and more.
- Membership auto-renews yearly unless you cancel before renewal
- Only new members of Rakuten+ are eligible, unless you are an existing member of Rakuten who joined with a complimentary one-year subscription to Rakuten+.
- One Rakuten+ Bonus per eligible new member to Rakuten+.
- Qualify for the Rakuten+ Bonus of $50 when you sign up as a new member to Rakuten+, meet the eligibility criteria, and make Qualifying Purchase(s) totaling at least $250 within 90 days of starting your Rakuten+ subscription.
- A “Qualifying Purchase” means a purchase that earns Cash Back through Rakuten+ Merchant(s).
Quick Thoughts
Many of the included merchants can often be found with portal rates of 10% back or more, though some of them less often than others. If you’re a regular shopper at one of those stores, it might be worth it to you to always have access to at least 10% back. I can imagine that if someone is a big Hotels.com user, knowing that they could always count on the 10% back rate might be useful.
On the flip side, we sometimes see rates climb above 10% for all of the included merchants, and I’ve seen rates significantly better via Capital One Shopping numerous times for sites like Hotels.com and Viator, along with a number of the other merchants. I’d have a hard time imagining that it would be worth it to pay $100 per year for this, but it might work out if you have an imminent purchase to make. If 10% back via Rakuten+ would be significantly better than your next best option, it would probably be worth signing up and spending your $250+ to get $50 back plus 10% back of your large purchase.
The trouble here is that you can’t just join, but rather you need to join the waitlist. I have no idea how long it takes to clear the waitlist, so you might not be able to join it with an imminent purchase to make after all.
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If you have Bilt status and were going to spend the $250 at one of those merchants any way, then you are essentially paying $100 to buy 7,500 Bilt points.
Mater sez, “Dad gum.”
Interesting first sentence, I feel like most individual articles will only be of interest to a subset of readers, and that’s okay.
I was targeted for this last november/december and it looks like the email link still works to join. So if this is of interest, check your emails. I passed because too fashion focused for me, and Rakuten often has a hotels.com equivalent at ~10x (today I see Priceline at 8x, but certainly have routinely seen 10x and higher for various sites).