@primechicken wrote:
OK so I just spoke with a very helpful person from cardmember services at US Bank and got some information on this. It actually sounds pretty appealing to me. Basically, the card earns 5% rewards on every purchase made at Sport Chalet. The catch is that every reward dollar earned (which come in a $25 gift card after a fixed threshold is met) must be spent at Sport Chalet.
Eh... Nothin to write home about there. BUT...
All other purchases made with the card outside of Sport Chalet wherever Visa is accepted earn 2% rewards (0.6 action points per dollar spent with a $10 reward certificate for every 300 pts) which can be used one of two ways:
1) It can be used to get $10 off your next Sport Chalet purchase, OR...
2) It can be applied as a $10 credit toward your statement.
This is true of both the Signature and the Platinum on this card. So, for a person who is ok with applying their earned rewards to their statement, this card functions as a 2% cash rewards card across the board on all purchases including those that don't fall into particular categories such as gas, groceries, bills, restaurants, etc.
So, for example, you take a card like the Priceline Visa Sig. Its appeal (for me) is in its 2% rewards across the board because that is very hard to find outside of categorically allocated rewards. Here's a card that seems to match that and, I suspect, may be easier to get. (It is US Bank, but it's a store card, and at least the Platinum version provides the same rewards as the Signature version.)
Hope this is valuable info to someone. Feel free to make any corrections or point out any oversights. It's a pretty fresh investigation at this point. Looks pretty decent to me though.
The Sport Chalet web site seems to contradict this information. It says when you reach 300 points, they automatically send you the $10 via email, which then has to be used at Sport Chalet. Without additional information, its not clear how a person could change this, if it is automatic, and if no alternative is mentioned in writing...
Does anyone here have actual experience with using the points for a statement credit?
