Chase Freedom 10+10 becomes 10% Annual Points Bonus?

[pt2005]

Hi guys,

If this question has been asked before I apologize and please direct me to the existing thread so I can learn more.

I just received a letter in the mail saying "Annoucing An Important Change to Your Rewards [Chase Freedom] Program", which reads:

"What's changing on or about August 1, 2013:

...Starting on or about August 1, instead of earning 10% Extra Points per $1 spent, plus 10 Bonus Points on every purchase made with the card, you will now earn a 10% Annual Points Bonus on ALL POINTS earned on purchases, including the points earned in the 5% quarterly bonus categories..."

Question:

I'm sure some of us have received or will be receiving this mail. Have any of you done any calculations to prove that the new program is better, and if yes how much better?

Thanks

[vn25]

I think the consensus is that the new program is better.......for Chase.

[compassion101]

Unspin the Chase spin. The old program is clearly better for consumers. I can understand getting rid of it though, cause Chase is giving more with the current status than most CCs give and they don't need to in order to compete, plus they have gotten alot of checking account sign ups through this already. Was a good promo while it lasted. The 10 bonus points were very valuable.

[longtimelurker]

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@compassion101 wrote:

Unspin the Chase spin. The old program is clearly better for consumers. I can understand getting rid of it though, cause Chase is giving more with the current status than most CCs give and they don't need to in order to compete, plus they have gotten alot of checking account sign ups through this already. Was a good promo while it lasted. The 10 bonus points were very valuable.

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Since I don't have the freedom, following might not be quite right, please correct if so.

So a rough calculation:  the advantage of the new program is that the 10% applies to bonus points.   The most you can spend is $6,000 on the 5% categories, earning 30K points.  You now earn an extra 10% on 4/5 of those (as you would have earned 10% on the base anyway) so that is an extra 2,400 points a year

With 240 transactions a year under the old system, you would also get 2,400.  So based on this, if you max out, and do less than 240 transactions a year (which isn't that likely!) the new system might be better, otherwise not.  As you spend less on bonus categories, you need fewer transactions for the new way to be worse.

However, doesn't the new program give the 10% on bonus points for UR mall transactions and the old one didn't.   So if you do a lot of those, the new program might win.

[compassion101]

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@longtimelurker wrote:

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@compassion101 wrote:

Unspin the Chase spin. The old program is clearly better for consumers. I can understand getting rid of it though, cause Chase is giving more with the current status than most CCs give and they don't need to in order to compete, plus they have gotten alot of checking account sign ups through this already. Was a good promo while it lasted. The 10 bonus points were very valuable.

---

Since I don't have the freedom, following might not be quite right, please correct if so.

So a rough calculation:  the advantage of the new program is that the 10% applies to bonus points.   The most you can spend is $6,000 on the 5% categories, earning 30K points.  You now earn an extra 10% on 4/5 of those (as you would have earned 10% on the base anyway) so that is an extra 2,400 points a year

With 240 transactions a year under the old system, you would also get 2,400.  So based on this, if you max out, and do less than 240 transactions a year (which isn't that likely!) the new system might be better, otherwise not.  As you spend less on bonus categories, you need fewer transactions for the new way to be worse.

However, doesn't the new program give the 10% on bonus points for UR mall transactions and the old one didn't.   So if you do a lot of those, the new program might win.

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I think your calculations are correct. Out of curiosity, I went back to recalculate my last 4 months to see what the difference would be. I earned $196.09 under the old system. Under the new system I'd earn $149.65, plus another $14.98 at the end of the year. Of course this doesn't include the fact that money each month is worth a little more than money at the end of the year.

Averaging that out yearly comes to $588.27 compared to $448.95 plus $44.94 (total $493.89). So its about a $100 difference or 16%. So unless I'm atypical, it's alot of $100 bills coming Chase's way.