The new Bilt 2.0 cards – Bilt Blue, Bilt Obsidian, and Bilt Palladium – went live on Saturday February 7. Bilt promised that this would be a seamless transition, but in addition to the myriad of other issues that have made the transition seem less, there’s now a brand new issue.
Over the weekend, we saw widespread reports in our Facebook group, on Reddit, and in other private groups that cardholders were encountering issues with declined transactions on their new Bilt cards, with those cards subsequently being frozen.
There have been other issues with the 5x earning rate that many cardholders should’ve been eligible for not being honored, with an abysmal response from Bilt’s CEO.
5x frozen
That’s annoying enough as it is, but it’s particularly frustrating for the large subset of cardholders who signed up for the cards within the first 24 hours using the affiliate link on The Points Guy website (which we also shared on this site as that was the best offer at the time). That welcome offer included a 5x spending offer on up to $10,000 spend in the first six days in addition to the 50,000 point welcome offer, meaning a total of 100,000 bonus points were available.
Needless to say, people who were able to get in on that offer wanted to do their best to start maxing out the 5x spending component over the weekend. While some people were able to get a few purchases approved, many others reported that their transactions were declined and cards subsequently frozen even when not making purchases that were in any way substantial.
In order to get their cards unlocked, cardholders have to provide ID. However, despite immediately providing that, some cardholders are still waiting for their cards to be unlocked. With the clock ticking on the six day timeframe where eligible cardholders can earn 5x, this is seriously hampering people’s ability to max that out.
Even the means of providing ID is amateurish. This Reddit user had their card frozen after their first purchase attempt and the email from Cardless said the following:
Your security is our priority, so we have suspended your account while we conduct an investigation. To assist in our investigation, we need additional verification of your identity. Please send the following items in a reply to this email:
**- A current picture of you while holding** your valid state or government-issued photo ID
– Review your account and let us know if you see any unauthorized activityOnce we receive the requested information, please allow up to two days for our review to be completed.
Your account will remain suspended until we complete our investigation.
Thank you,
The Cardless Team
Sending a selfie of yourself with your state or government-issued ID over email – rather than via a secure method – is far from ideal.
5x not attached
There’s been a whole other issue regarding the 5x application links too. Many people applied using the TPG link within 24 hours before Bilt abruptly pulled that promotion. Bilt didn’t provide a way for cardholders to see if that bonus earning rate was attached to their card, so some people understandably used Bilt’s chat feature to verify that the 5x rate was indeed attached.
Unfortunately, it’s an AI chatbot and it sounds like it was pretty much always advising people that the offer wasn’t attached. After asking to speak to a real-life (and hopefully not also hallucinating) human agent, some people did receive confirmation that the 5x was attached. Sadly, many others were told that they weren’t eligible for the 5x – even though they were – and so it wasn’t attached to their account.
Bilt also sent out an email to some cardholders on February 6 (the day before the cards went live) confirming that they had the 5x offer attached. In true Bilt 2.D’oh fashion, they also sent that email to people who knew for sure that they hadn’t used the TPG link in the first 24 hours of applications going live.
That wasn’t the only incorrect email. Other people – myself included – received an email encouraging us to add an authorized user to our Bilt card. That’s despite the fact that we’re not cardholders (and, for me at least, have never had a Bilt credit card in the first place). They did at least subsequently send an “Oops” email.
Delays with physical cards being mailed
The “seem less” transition issues don’t stop there. Despite some people applying for a Bilt card weeks ago, they haven’t received their physical card yet even though they were assured at the time that they’d have it in hand by February 6 at the latest.
In fact, in at least one case we’ve seen, a cardholder isn’t due to receive their card until February 17 – a full week from now and more than 10 days after the latest date that it should’ve arrived. This is someone who did have the 5x offer attached to their account, but that delay in the card being issued means they’re unable to make any purchases using that physical card. Mobile wallet purchases are still possible, but that’s not always going to be a viable option for affected cardholders.
Bilt’s stance: Pound sand
We reached out to Bilt over the weekend when first hearing reports of cards being frozen. We asked if affected cardholders would be given an extended 5x spending period due to the inability to make purchases and, if so, how many extra days they’ll be given.
In addition to that, we asked about the issue with people not having the 5x spending offer attached to their account in the first place.
We haven’t heard back from them yet, so we’ll update this post if and when we do receive a reply.
That said, the prospect of any kind of satisfactory resolution appears to be highly unlikely. A Reddit user sent a DM to Bilt CEO Ankur Jain and received the following response (spelling, grammatical, and punctuation errors are per his reply):
Sorry we can’t accept anything on TPG. This was a TPG offer not us. And we were given a list of participants.
In the past few days I’ve received thousands of people claiming to have participated with hundreds using the same identical screenshots (clearly all shared in online groups), many also sending doctored images etc
Not saying that’s your case here. But the attempt at showing good faith to a few people early on has clearly backfired and thousands of people online sending in fake requests has meant we can’t honor anything beyond what TPG provided us.
Sorry not a better answer. Have always tried taking care of Bilt members first but seeing the extreme levels of gaming and false inbounds has hurt our ability to make exceptions for good customers like you.
There will be plenty of ongoing promos that you be able to take advantage of.
Thanks for understanding and for being a bilt members
That’s a crazy policy. I can understand Bilt’s frustration that some people are probably trying to game the system, but I can also imagine that a not insignificant number of people who they think are gaming aren’t actually doing that. There are many reports of people who’d legitimately applied within the 24 hours that the TPG link was live not having the 5x earning rate honored. If they didn’t happen to take screenshots, video recordings, etc. at the time of their application, it wouldn’t surprise me if many of them are subsequently relying on other people’s screenshots. That doesn’t mean they’re trying to scam Bilt – they’re simply trying to resolve the problems caused by Bilt themselves.
It’s also wild that Ankur is explicitly placing all the blame on The Points Guy. The 5x offer link was indeed advertised on the TPG website, but that special offer was done in partnership with Bilt and the earning rate is being processed by Bilt; it’s not like TPG is awarding the 5x points themselves. As a result, Bilt should’ve had proper processes in place to track eligible applications not only on the TPG side, but on the Cardless side too. If they didn’t set it up that Cardless could also track where applications were coming from and when those applications were submitted, that points to rank incompetence on Bilt’s end, not TPG’s.
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This is a remarkable display of ineptitude by Bilt.
I think they were desperate after Wells dumped them and they took whomever they could find for a replacement issuer.
Cardless looks to be way out of their depth.
I was among the Bilt doubters (plus I don’t pay rent) so I never signed up for the original version.
Thank goodness I stayed away from this disaster. If they get it together, I will give them another look.
Are we going to trust them with our mortgage/rent payments after all this?
Regarding Ankur’s response, Kerr is a major gamer, so the suspicions abound.
Regarding the 5x for 5 days…not sure why that was available on a shill website, but not to the Bilt faithful/longstanding customers who went to the app (as has been thoroughly marketed to us to do by Bilt — their whole platform and messaging is around engaging the app!) to apply. \
Visionary disruptors in the truest sense of the word.
I think they are very limited on how many free points they can dole out right now. I am pretty sure BILT is on an extremely short leash with Cardless and Cardless does not want to be the new Wells Fargo and cannot afford to be. They should have never offered this TPG bonus to even begin with. They should have either offered this promo to anyone signing up in the first 24 hours or just not do it at all and saved themselves some face with all the launch disasters that already went down. I think getting out of doing the TPG promo for as many people as possible is definitely intentional and to their benefit as Cardless probably went into this with a caveat to BILT that they have a short window to either become profitable or go away into the sunset forever.
Can I add my user experience with the Bilt Palladium? Received my Bilt Card early last week – and anticipated the 2/7 kickoff after I activated (or so I thought) my card. I waited until 2/7 – and opened my Bilt App. The $500 in Bilt Cash was there, but no Palladium card was listed. Strange? It gets better. In the drop-down – it offered the ability for another Palladium card – preapproved, no less … despite me physically having my first card in my possession – yet not shown anywhere. Not on the PC – and not on my Phone App. Hey – but the Bilt Cash is there – right? Lol. Naturally, just for giggles, I tried adding the shiny new Palladium (I did ‘activate it’ after all) to my Samsung and Google wallets to get the additional 3x multiplier for the mobile wallet (expires today – oh well). Of course, neither the Samsung nor the Google wallets would add it… Why would I expect a different result? Then I called Bilt, who, after a very long hold, told me that it was not their issue – I needed to call Cardless. Three calls later to Cardless after being ‘expedited’ two levels, I have been told that it is a ‘system problem’ affecting many accounts, and they ‘hope’ to have it fixed by the end of the week. Of course – they did offer to send me another brand new Palladium card if I’d prefer – but it wouldn’t arrive for10 days. I told them I’d wait for the fix (it’s ‘in’ by the way…lol). True story. Can’t make this up.
I guess I’m the one lucky guy who hasn’t had any problems. Got the card early set up first day. No TPG promo, but I also didn’t sign up from that link.
Card worked online and in person on day one. With 3x point boost activated and tracking. Only goofy thing was not being to add card to DoorDash. Also be careful at Walmart I got a display at the register with the option to pay with points.
I set up mortgage account and bank linking to pay card. I have not paid my mortgage yet, but seemed pretty integrated, fingers crossed.
Right now I’m pretty close to the SUB, and was thinking about building a good stack of points in Bilt. I was not a 1.0 member but have decent ish amount from rakuten and Lyft.
My hope for this not being Mesa 2.0 is there are several other aspects of their business beyond cards. However I do worry if a panic run on points becomes a “run on the bank”.
I know 5 people personally who got Palladium, 2 with TPG promo and 3 without (including myself and my P2). And only these 3 with no problem at all (online transactions and in-store).
The statistical sample is small, but thought-provoking.
All the blogs that have spent hours promoting the card for the last year, glad I never got involved .
All of this!!! Thanks to the FM team for calling out Bilt and running this down. I’m one of the folks who has been screwed out of the 5x offer. Bilt gave me the same insane “we’ll have more promos” response after waiting 4 days for a reply after I heard that email was sent around (but not to me).
I am one of those people who applied using the TPG link but isn’t having the offer honored despite reaching out to Bilt repeatedly. I find Bilt’s response here absolutely unacceptable.
Stephen should really listen to the FM podcasts. Then he would know how great Bilt is from the dozens of ads.
Has anyone else had a problem using their card at a gas station? I was prompted to enter a PIN. I cannot find anywhere on Bilt app or website where I would set-up a PIN. This is such a lousy roll-out. I concur with the idea of earn the SUB and transfer out ASAP – low/no confidence in their ability to make it long-term.
I was approved for the Obsidian on 1/26 and still don’t have it. Absolutely absurd, and Ankur’s attitude only makes it more ridiculous. A bunch of incompetent children.
The sign up bonus issue for those who truly qualified seems worthy of a CFPB complaint. Indeed, anyone induced to open a line of credit by the promotion only to be denied it by not being sent their card in time also would seem to have a legitimate complaint if Bilt does not extend their earning period. There’s zero chance that a real credit card bank would do any of this. tl;dr — this does seem like Mesa all over, and I’m not sure I want to trust them with making my rent payment.
TPG provided a list of individuals who applied during the stated window. Bilt is relying on TPG’s representation. Many are claiming they submitted their application during the window via a digitally altered image. Many people submitted the exact same image altered in the same exact way. Bilt caught the miscreants. Tough (cookies).
The thing is, some people who didn’t use TPG’s link are getting the 5x, while people I know who definitely did use the TPG link don’t have the 5x offer attached. This isn’t a case of people trying to scam Bilt; there night be some trying to do that, but there’s no excuse for Bilt simply ignoring customers who did have legitimate applications.
O.G. ‘1990’ here… I didn’t write that above comment, but, I’ll assume it’s a common number or name, like Jack, and not an impersonator, because, the O.G. is no fan of BILT 2.0 or TPG; I’m for the users!