There’s an interesting—and concerning—new addition to the terms and conditions of some Chase Offers. Some now have the following sentence included:
Abuse of offers may result in exclusion from future offers.
If you’re someone who uses Chase Offers legitimately, this wording should be of no concern to you. However, if you’re a cardholder who likes to make use of as many Chase Offers as possible in ways that you know that Chase wouldn’t deem to be kosher, it would be advisable to reevaluate whether it’s going to continue being worth following that approach.
I first noticed this wording on an Air Canada Chase Offer (we’ll have a post about that later on today), but I wouldn’t be surprised if we start seeing it on more offers, especially travel-related ones like those for other airlines, as well as hotels, seeing as those are probably the types of offers that are more prone to abuse.
What’s not clear is if Chase is warning that you’ll lose access to all Chase Offers if they regard you as having abused offers, or if it’ll only be certain types of offers you’ll lose access to.
A few years ago, American Express seemed to be putting more of a focus on rooting out rewards abuse via its Rewards Abuse Team, more affectionately known as RAT. We don’t hear as much about Amex’s RAT anymore, but the introduction of this warning in Chase Offer wordings makes me suspect we’re going to hear more about Chase’s version of RAT in the coming months.
Update: There appears to be some concern in the comments about what constitutes abuse. If you’re using Chase Offers to make legitimate purchases, you’ve got nothing to worry about. Even if you use the same offer on two or more cards, that’s not going to be a problem either.
Ultimately, people who are abusing Chase Offers will know full well that that’s what they’re doing. If you’re not sure if you’re doing activity that Chase might deem as abuse, there’s a strong likelihood that your activities aren’t going to be a problem.
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So I guess they did finally notice me booking and cancelling Turos five times a month to take advantage of $25 off $150 across my cards.
Could be taking advantage of targeted offers not sent to you.
I assume large manufactured spend is a main target. What I don’t understand is why Chase recon agents never offer approval of an application with no sign up bomus if credit’s not an issue. Crazy that’s it’s better to get rejected and have a shot at recon than to get a pop-up and be done.
Ok but there’s “abuse” as in people booking things to get points and rebates and then returning or cancelling, “abuse” as in people literally only use their card when a hot offer hits it, spending the exact amount needed and across multiple cards, and “abuse” as in people stacking deals and buying gift cards when the “deal” is clearly meant for food purchases at a grocery chain.
I could see any of these being considered “abuse” but at the same time they’re nowhere near the levels of abuse going on out there with the mass MSers. No clarification?
I think there’s enough data out there for banks to see what is normal purchase behavior for you and what is gaming that is out of the norm.
Just because something doesn’t fit with your normal behavior for you doesn’t automatically make you guilty of pulling something.
That’s not what I implied at all.
For example – you used to have to notify your bank when you traveled internationally with your credit card, you no longer need to do that for most banks and credit cards.
Going internationally for many people is not normal behavior from most people’s daily lives but the banks think they have figured out what purchases are in line with someone planning and going on a “normal” trip vs. someone internationally stealing your card and making fradulent purchases.
The same probably applies here. They think they have enough data to distinguish between someone who is manufacturing spend or gaming vs someone who may have bought an Air Canada flight for $1000+ but then ended up changing their mind and canceling the flight later on.
This works well for Chase.
The mere announcement of “Abuse of offers may result in exclusion from future offers.” in and of itself may serve as a deterrent for the unwanted behavior just like the presence of a police cruiser in the median slows traffic.
Sure.The police can still pursue anyone who exceeds the speed limit, but simply being there will slow down a great many drivers regardless. The real question is how willing Chase will be to enforce this.
Its hard to believe that there are that many worthwhile or valuable – Chase Offers – a few exceptions here and there i.e. Whoop (CSR/CSP) Function Health are the only recent memorable ones – it’s been a few years since I’ve seen semi-worthwhile – OD, Kohls, on GC purchases – perhaps just not targeted – occasionally Viator CB – combined with a stack.
Perhaps I’m (We) just jaded and just “Couponed” out with 4 Plat, 2 CSR, 2 CSP, 4 Aspire, etc, between the Resy credits on six cards, Ride share on even more cards, Instacart, Doordash, now Paze etc. Sometimes the juice just isn’t worth the time or squeeze – I even stopped bothering with Bank bonuses.
I don’t think this is new, Stephen. A subset of my Chase biz cards (one specific company) lost access to Chase Offers a few years ago. I never deliberately abused it but I do a lot of returns with that biz so it must have been flagged. I tried twice to get it restored but couldn’t get an agent to even understand what Chase offers are….lol
This is what Im concerned about. I don’t intentionally abuse them, but my travel patterns are such that I book a lot of speculative bookings that end up getting cancelled and I’m sure a handful of those have had Chase offers attached.
Clickbait. If you can’t identify concrete examples STFU. You’re just wasting everyone’s time.
It’s a slow news day. Sensational but content-free articles with stock photos of pouting, finger-wagging blondes will always get eyeballs…and requires zero effort. The very definition of clickbait.
Lol, the post title is literally “Some Chase Offers now warn that abuse will lose you access to future offers.” That’s about as close as you can get to being the antithesis of clickbait as it states precisely what’s happened. In fact, you could read that title and not need to click through as it pretty much tells you what you need to know – again, the polar opposite of what clickbait sets out to do.
A clickbait title would be something like “You won’t believe what this bank now warns about its offers.”
I had to chuckle at your last sentence. The word “this” in any headline is a 100% guarantee it’s clickbait. I’m disciplining myself never to click on such a headline. Thanks for your general alert to play nicely with Chase Offers.
Wow, take a deep breath.
I am a specific example…see my post above. Oh, and STFU, lol
(whispering: Larry, what are you doing… don’t insult our host….)
Please excuse Larry. He has not taking his medicine today.
Huh I wonder if redeeming 20+ “$85 off $85” Dish Network offers across the Chase cards so far this year (some cards got the offer twice this year) in my family is considered abuse. It’s to the point where the “$80 of $89” Amex offer for Dish isn’t worth it.
Like others, I’d like to know more about what they mean by “abuse.” Their system straight up allows you to add the same offer to multiple cards, so I would not think it would be “abuse” to, for example, use each of the Blue Apron offers I have across my CSP, CFU, and CFF?
No, that kind of activity would be perfectly fine. Ultimately, I think the people who are abusing certain Chase Offers know full well that that’s what they’re doing, so they’ll know it applies to their activities. If you’re using offers as intended and aren’t doing any kind of shenanigans – and using an offer on two or more cards to make legitimate purchases aren’t shenanigans – then you’ll be fine.
Do you have/can you obtain what — specifically — is meant by “(a)buse of offers”? I, too, had the 15% off at Lowe’s offer but I checked the terms before redeeming for a $50 Shell gift card and gift card purchases were NOT excluded. They may not have been intended, but they weren’t specifically excluded. Does my use according to the stated terms of the offer fall within Chase’s definition of “abuse”?
I don’t think that would get you removed from the ability to receive Chase Offers. As someone else pointed out below though, that Lowe’s Chase Offer was only for online purchases, so I doubt you would’ve gotten the statement credit from the in-store purchase.
they had this language before on the chase travel offer. guess they want to deter people from systemically booking refundable things if they don’t claw back
Last month they had a 15% off Lowe’s offer that I used to buy Amazon gift cards with. After 30 days I still haven’t gotten my 15% back. This may be what they’re talking about.
Well, that might just be the standard “gift card purchases excluded”.
That offer was for online purchases only. Lowe’s does not sell Amazon GCs online as far as I know.
How exactly do you “abuse” a Chase Offer? They’re not even scaleable, right?
Maybe across multiple cards like I’m doing for the optimum offer
Don’t they give some offers for multiple cards as well? How would that be considered abuse? Are we expected to only use 1 card?
I did that too. I wonder if that is considered abuse?
No, using the offer on two or more cards is fine.
Using an offer on two or more cards will be fine.
Historically Chase has not clawed back Chase Offers if you redeem it and then refund the item, that probably is changing now
Is this what Stepen is referring to as “abuse”. i would love to know.
I think Chase has worded the term vaguely here intentionally and not giving clear defintions to be able to use their discretion who to go after and who not to.
If you happen to use an offer and then find out you have to return the item, you’re likely not going to get penalized by Chase. Now if you have 10 Chase cards and the Air Canada $100 off $1000 offer on all of the cards and buy 10 refundable flights, claim the offers, and then refund the 10 flights, then that’s clearly builds more of a case for Chase to go after you for abuse.
Abuse is redeeming the offer and then cancelling or returning the item excessively.
Welp, at least Chase RAT uses ‘nice’ stock-photos for suggestive disapproval… *wagging finger* ‘nuh, uh uh… no more ‘10% off Lululemon’ or ‘SUBs’ for you, mister…’
Clip-art and stock photos: the favorite tools of lazy would-be influencers and clickbaiters everywhere
Exactly why are you here since you seem to have such animosity toward the FM team?