topic Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite in Credit Cards

Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

Anonymous — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 01:05:00 GMT

Hi,

I'm relatively new to credit cards, so I was wondering about these types of Visas. I currently have two cards; Amazon Prime Visa Signature and the CSP. I didn't realize that there were three types of Visa levels until recently. To what I've observed, I thought most people have Visa Signature. I've never actually even seen a Visa Platinum until yesterday at my friend's place. The only Visa Infinite card I know of is the CSR. Am I correct in saying most people have a Visa Signature?

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

AverageJoesCredit — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 01:18:38 GMT

I would say most people dont have a Visa Signature but seems everyone wants to have one

Its hard to say about general population, but if you can get your limit to 5k in many cases you can get a siggy.

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

Anonymous — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 01:20:23 GMT

My first card was the Amazon Prime Visa Sig and it had a 2.5k limit, my CSP is almost 10k. It's rather large jump if you ask me.

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

AverageJoesCredit — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 01:32:02 GMT

Since the Chase Amazon Visa cards are all siggy, you can actually get it at $500, lol, so there is that.

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

Anonymous — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 01:36:08 GMT

As of now there are five cards that I know are visa infinite. Even though theoretically visa signature should have minimum 5k and for infinite 10k, I have seen respective cards are issued for less CLs. So there is no set rule for it.

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

Anonymous — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 01:48:34 GMT

Is there a reason why the Amazon Prime credit card is Visa Sig only?

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

AverageJoesCredit — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 02:35:55 GMT

Probably just because Chase wants it to feel high class? not sure but cant complain

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

Schwartzinator — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 02:50:12 GMT

From what I understand, it's up to the issuing bank to determine which tier so to speak the card is issued in and what the respective requirements for that tier are. In the last two years I've seen requirements go way down as issuers such as Chase and USBank are relaxing the minium entry towards what qualifies as a siggy. I am told the same sort of devaluation occured to the Platinum Visa in years past. Perhaps we'll even see a new tier here at some point.

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

CYBERSAM — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 03:07:12 GMT

There are some banks that don't have Visa Signature at all regardless of what the CL they offer. This is very common among Credit Unions that issue credit cards.

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

Anonymous — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 06:31:54 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Hi,

I'm relatively new to credit cards, so I was wondering about these types of Visas. I currently have two cards; Amazon Prime Visa Signature and the CSP. I didn't realize that there were three types of Visa levels until recently. To what I've observed, I thought most people have Visa Signature. I've never actually even seen a Visa Platinum until yesterday at my friend's place. The only Visa Infinite card I know of is the CSR. Am I correct in saying most people have a Visa Signature?

Back when they first introduced CSP (right after the last 'crash') and even for a few years after that, signature was a big thing (and CSP might as well have been the only non JPM Chase signature card but don't quote me on this).

Fast forward to 2016, Chase now has so many signature cards that the renewed(higher AF) Ritz can't stand being just another signature card any more, thus it was the first chase infinite card, and CSR was the 2nd and it probably won't be the last.

If a visa card is not signature it would probably be 'platinum', and visa also has (or had?) 'gold' card as well. But there has been so much 'card tier' inflation among the various visa issuers that 'gold' or even 'platinum' are as good as gone nowadays. MC faces similar thing, no AF WEMC is fashionable nowadays. AMEX on the other hand has pretty much only 1 issuer (not exactly but other issuers don't quite use AMEX tiers like vias/mc) so their 'card tier' hasn't inflated as much, 'platinum' is sitll a big name among AMEX's cards, even 'gold' is likely still a 'premium product' and 'signature' would be centurion's tier, now think about infinite

I'm sure at this rate and without major macro economy disruptions visa infinite will become common soon and they would have to add another tier on top.

Just shows how far the marketing guys will go to entice more people to sign up for the 'newest and best'

Re: Visa platinum, signature, and infinite

iced — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 14:50:24 GMT

@AverageJoesCredit wrote:
I would say most people dont have a Visa Signature but seems everyone wants to have one

Its hard to say about general population, but if you can get your limit to 5k in many cases you can get a siggy.

I would say most of the general population can get a 5k credit card, which in turn means most of the general population can get a Visa Signature. I would counter that a majority of those who don't have one either don't care if they have one or don't know what it is (or that they exist).

As for the actual differences between the Visas, my perception has been that the line gets thinner each year. Signature was the source of most of the various insurances you think of with travel cards (lost luggage, rental car, etc), but whether that's still the case today is debatable as some issuers provide those benefits independent of Visa, and this is the same issue with Infinite. There's also some advertised benefits that are revoked ($100 discount on Visa Infinite with CSR, for example), which has led me to believe that the Visa benefits are more or less superceded by the issuer's benefits and that the Signature/Infinite label itself isn't conveying any additional benefit other than taking up space on the card front/back.

Functionally speaking, they're identical and merchants don't make a distinction between them. Having a Signature or Infinite is not going to get you special treatment at a restaurant or a concert.