There’s been a trend where credit card issuers increase annual fees on rewards cards, and attempt to make up for it by adding credits and rebates for somewhat random things (which often require a lot of mental effort and organization to put to use.) Today, we’ll speculate how far this trend is going to go…
Coffee Break: Which cards will be couponized next?
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(00:53) – Recent history of couponization
(05:41) – Expected refresh of Platinum card
Check out the Coffee Break episode 47 where we discussed an expected refresh here, or read more about even more refreshed Platinum card predictions here.
(06:33) – Next Airline Card(s)
(12:04) – Next Hotel Card(s)
(15:10) – Next Consumer Transferable Points Card(s)
(17:25) – Next Business Transferable Points Card(s)
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Music Credit – Beach Walk by Unicorn Heads
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Any thoughts if the upcoming premium Alaska Airlines card will be couponized right off the bat? Thought being if it is already a coupon book, people would assume that’s the norm? Since United and Delta cards are more couponized than before.
It will be interesting to see what they do. I think it’s likely that they’ll do at least some couponizing but hopefully not as full force as United!
It’s a gimmicky way to advertise a certain value of card benefits, which is way more than the benefits are actually worth to most people. A free night benefit on the IHG card is logical and I can always use it. That’s a value. Lots of the stuff we see now is chasing after mild discounts or small monthly reimbursements. Maybe those have some value, but usually nothing close to the advertised amount, and they’re a bother to keep track of. On the other hand, I imagine some people get excited about stuff like that, and we may be starting see a “we’ve got to couponize to keep up” reaction now. Obviously from the card issuers’ vantage point it seems to be working, so we’ll see more of it, not less.
I think the Brilliant and Aspire cards are the only ones that do it right, credits which are easy to use and make sense with the brand (Aspire giving you credits for flights and resort stays, Brilliant’s dining credit which can be used anywhere). Other card coupons often don’t even make sense (Walmart and the Platinum card?) or are too difficult to use to be of value.
For the Chase hotel cards, I can see a $150 AF increase that gives you maybe like 50,000point IHG free night, and a Cat 1-5 for the Hyatt card along with some coupons. Hopefully they’ll actually be relevant for people but I can see Chase just doing the dumb instacart and car rental thing again.
While I can turn a profit on, say, the Amex Delta Reserve, the juice isn’t worth the squeeze. So, while the card issuers might see coupons as attractors, I see them as detractors. And, I’m driven towards greater discipline. . . towards fewer cards . . . asking which do I really, really need.
“the juice isn’t worth the squeeze”. Well said!