topic Re: uChoose Rewards in Credit Cards

uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Wed, 22 Jul 2020 22:16:27 GMT

I am curious if anybody here has a credit card that is part of the uChoose Rewards program? If so, please let us know what you think and how the cash redemption works. My understanding is there are several credit unions that use uChoose Rewards. Thanks!

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 03:20:52 GMT

UChoose?

Know about CURewards.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 16:02:45 GMT

Thanks for the reply, Birdman. Yes, it's uChoose and here is a link with their FAQs.

https://www.uchooserewards.com/e/members/article.php?method=faq

I think I'm going to hold off unless I get some real reviews from the community here.

Re: uChoose Rewards

kdm31091 — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 16:43:38 GMT

I think many of those CU reward programs are relatively weak. Usually the cards are good for fewer fees, lower interest, etc but the rewards are usually just okay, nothing to write home about. A 2% cash back will outperform a lot of them.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 21:00:17 GMT

Can’t beat AOD for 3% non-category, really.

edited.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 18:55:20 GMT

I checked out that link and it’s definitely not familiar to me and I’m a member of several.

Hopefully someone who has experience with it will chime in.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 19:01:08 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Can’t be AOD for 3% non-category, really.

Close! It's actually for the other 3% card mentioned on here from Tropical Financial in South Florida. Tough to get many data points for this one.

https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/Florida-Tropical-Financial-3-Mastercard/td-p/5976099/page/3

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 19:06:10 GMT

If you search "uchoose credit union" you see lots of credit unions use this system: Service CU, Corporate America Family CU, America First CU, Choice One CU, Cooperative Choice CU, CFCU, U$X CU, First Federal CU, Education First CU

are all on just the first page. Now if any MyFico people are members (none of these sound familiar as MUST HAVE credit cards!)....

This is a FISERVE product, which is a major supplier of financial software to CUs and others.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Jcbotero — Sat, 07 Nov 2020 13:57:14 GMT

Old reply but thought I'd share.

I have the Tropical Financial CU 3X Rewards.

it does indeed get me 3 points per dollar spent and they are worth a cent each.

It is not quite a true 3% cash back card though. Uchoose rewards rounds any purchase down to the nearest whole dollar, so if you purchase something for $13.91 you only get 13 points.

It is still more than a 2% card but I wouldn't say it's a 3% card because you lose a few cents on every purchase by them rounding it down.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Jcbotero — Sat, 07 Nov 2020 14:01:07 GMT

So basically it seems as though on every transaction you lose about half a cent... which is not much so nothing to choose another card over.

maybe this is industry standard though? I have never checked other rewards programs.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Sat, 07 Nov 2020 16:03:53 GMT

@Jcbotero wrote:
So basically it seems as though on every transaction you lose about half a cent... which is not much so nothing to choose another card over.

maybe this is industry standard though? I have never checked other rewards programs.

I think it's more like 1.5c on average per transaction (the rounddown on purchase loses an average of 50c, and you lose 3% of that)

Don't think it's industry standard at all, but you made me check! Looking at Freedom, I have a paypal charge of 161.64. I would expect 5 x this, which is 808.2 points. On my statement:

Bonus from 4Q 5% category: PayPal 647

+ 1% (1 Pt)/$1 earned on all purchases 162

Total Ultimate Rewards® points 808

So the 162 is rounded up from 161.64 (good) 4X bonus points = 646.56, now rounded to 647 (good)

But, then the rounding is a little undone, as those with advanced arithmetic skills might notice that 647+162 = 809.

Still, I am only 0.2 UR short on this transaction, if only class actions suites with punitive damages weren't barred!

And on flat rate cards, there is no need to deal with transactions. Just calculate total spend and multiply by the rate. I think USAlliance is doing this. Of course, if you round down each transaction, the CU can save some money as you noticed!

Re: uChoose Rewards

Jcbotero — Sat, 07 Nov 2020 16:08:28 GMT

Thanks for that!

So for my TFCU I am still getting somewhere over 2.9% if not 2.99% cash back every purchase, which it still beats any other flat rate card I have.

I also checked discover and they round up.

Re: uChoose Rewards

Anonymous — Sat, 07 Nov 2020 16:34:53 GMT

Sounds like they’re truncating it and just using an integer.