I also have an Altitude Card.
It really depends on if you will take advantage of the perks of the card. I like the bonus categories better then other premium cards, I travel a lot overseas for work but I stay overseas for long periods of time so 4 visits is prefect for me with the lounge access. I save a little money over the other premium cards in that regard since unlimited would be overkill.
I see a lot of value in the card because of the mobile pay. I also have a Galaxy Workphone, and since MST counts as mobile wallet I’ve managed to accumulate a ton of points already. Last month alone, I earned $170 back in rewards just for using Samsung pay on things like fixing my car, paying my insurance etc.
I do make sure to charge other things using regular 1X spend. I try to spend about a 1/5 of my total spend on 1X to fly under the radar with USB. They can and will shut down your account if they think you are abusing mobile pay.
Never buy giftcards using mobile pay.
The travel portal isn’t bad, it’s run by Expedia but with real time rewards, don’t see why you would want to unless your buying a vacation package or something.
It really depends on if you will take advantage of the perks of the card. I like the bonus categories better then other premium cards, I travel a lot overseas for work but I stay overseas for long periods of time so 4 visits is prefect for me with the lounge access. I save a little money over the other premium cards in that regard since unlimited would be overkill.
I see a lot of value in the card because of the mobile pay. I also have a Galaxy Workphone, and since MST counts as mobile wallet I’ve managed to accumulate a ton of points already. Last month alone, I earned $170 back in rewards just for using Samsung pay on things like fixing my car, paying my insurance etc.
I do make sure to charge other things using regular 1X spend. I try to spend about a 1/5 of my total spend on 1X to fly under the radar with USB. They can and will shut down your account if they think you are abusing mobile pay.
Never buy giftcards using mobile pay.
The travel portal isn’t bad, it’s run by Expedia but with real time rewards, don’t see why you would want to unless your buying a vacation package or something.
@imaximous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:I was thinking about possibly applying for the Altitude Reserve in the near future. I know that you must be an existing member of US Bank to do so. So if you open an account with them how many days do you have to wait to then apply for the card? Is it 35 days as previously stated by many? Has anybody found this card to be worthwhile long term especially with the 3x mobile payments? What about their travel portal or their real time texting portal, are they worthwhile? I would love some insight! Thanks in advance, guys!
You don't have to wait 35 days. Right on the AR page, it says that you must be a US Bank customer a minimum of 5 business days. I applied for the Cash+ first, and 10 days later, I got the AR. I've had the cards since late February - early March.
Mobile payments is what makes this card worth it to me. I switched my work phone to a Samsung Galaxy just so I could use Samsung Pay, since it's accepted almost everywhere. I used to have 2 iPhones (work & personal), but Apple Pay does not work at a lot of places I regularly shop. Samsung Pay works anywhere Apple Pay does. So, keep that in mind if you have an iPhone, and think about the places where you usually make purchases.
Never used the travel portal and problably never will since they created Real Time Rewards. I just haven't used any of my points yet, and I'm close to 100K. Real Time only works for purchases within the US, and you have sign up and set your $ thresholds for purchase categories to trigger them. There's a list of categories that you can included in RT Rewards. Restaurants and Gas are excluded at the moment. Redemptions for Hotels is a minimum of $500, and Car Rentals $250. The rest of the categories, you can set the minimum starting at $10.
If the program stays the way it is, I'm keeping the card. If they decide to take away or limit drastically 3X for Mobile payments, I'd have to reconsider depending on how it gets nerfed. I could always go back to Chase UR if that happens.
Hope that helps.
Thank you for that info! 
I actually have both an S9 and an iPhone. Since Samsung has MST it's virtually excepted at most places and that's what makes this card so attractive to me. All of my Fico scores are above 750, 65-70k income, no baddies, and I always PIF. I just need to open an account with them as I'm not sure if I want to apply for another card from them prior to the AR (Cash+ does sound tempting). Is US Bank inquiry sensitive or sensitive to new accounts? Thanks in advance!
As said USB is a conservative lender.
They are very much a relationship bank.
I’ve been a banking and investment customer since 2014.
I started out in April 2017 with a secured card with USB $300. Low 500’s
August 2017 was approved for FlexPerks $4000. Auto CLI to 6K at 9 months (650 FICO 8)
Jan 18 $5000 Altitude Reserve. (690 FICO 8)
When I was approved for the Altitude I had 12 new accounts and 9 Inq within the past year.
They can be sensitive to new accounts and inq’s but with a prior relationship with the bank. I think it’s easy to get new products once you have a good internal score.
They use FICO TU classic mortgage version for new app’s
USB is definitely been the easiest lender to grow me with and was willing to approve me when my scores weren’t so good. I Think the banking relationship helped.
They are very much a relationship bank.
I’ve been a banking and investment customer since 2014.
I started out in April 2017 with a secured card with USB $300. Low 500’s
August 2017 was approved for FlexPerks $4000. Auto CLI to 6K at 9 months (650 FICO 8)
Jan 18 $5000 Altitude Reserve. (690 FICO 8)
When I was approved for the Altitude I had 12 new accounts and 9 Inq within the past year.
They can be sensitive to new accounts and inq’s but with a prior relationship with the bank. I think it’s easy to get new products once you have a good internal score.
They use FICO TU classic mortgage version for new app’s
USB is definitely been the easiest lender to grow me with and was willing to approve me when my scores weren’t so good. I Think the banking relationship helped.
No I did not have to recon.
I did call after submitting the application and it went pending. I was told that all Altitude Reserve Apps go through a manual review for approval. Even those that received an instant approval. They are still reviewed manually.
It took around 2 days to get an approval. That was the only thing that was discussed. Was approved 2 days later and received the card the next day after approval. 5K is the minimum CL for approval. It is a visa infinite.
I will be keeping the card after the first year. It makes sense for me, especially with having a Samsung phone. I normally make sure to charge my monthly bills to it to give it some 1X use to fly under the radar.
With Samsung Pay, and the rapidly expanding Apple Pay. I get 4.5% return on almost all my in-person spend.
It was nice getting $170 bucks last month for around 5K spend (around 3.5K mobile pay spend and 1.5K 1X spend). This was on car repairs and auto/home insurance. Things that no other card would have given me any bonus points for that spend.
Plus there’s the obvious groceries, gas, and normal spending which accept mobile pay.
I would question the value of the card if they did away with the mobile pay. Until that happens I will continue using the card.
While you don’t get as many Priority pass visits as some of the other premium cards. The annual fee is $50-$100 less then the other premium cards and gives 12 free WiFi passes on most domestic flights except southwest and JetBlue. I think the benefits are very comparable to CSR if you account for the WiFi passes which are normally $10 each flights
I did call after submitting the application and it went pending. I was told that all Altitude Reserve Apps go through a manual review for approval. Even those that received an instant approval. They are still reviewed manually.
It took around 2 days to get an approval. That was the only thing that was discussed. Was approved 2 days later and received the card the next day after approval. 5K is the minimum CL for approval. It is a visa infinite.
I will be keeping the card after the first year. It makes sense for me, especially with having a Samsung phone. I normally make sure to charge my monthly bills to it to give it some 1X use to fly under the radar.
With Samsung Pay, and the rapidly expanding Apple Pay. I get 4.5% return on almost all my in-person spend.
It was nice getting $170 bucks last month for around 5K spend (around 3.5K mobile pay spend and 1.5K 1X spend). This was on car repairs and auto/home insurance. Things that no other card would have given me any bonus points for that spend.
Plus there’s the obvious groceries, gas, and normal spending which accept mobile pay.
I would question the value of the card if they did away with the mobile pay. Until that happens I will continue using the card.
While you don’t get as many Priority pass visits as some of the other premium cards. The annual fee is $50-$100 less then the other premium cards and gives 12 free WiFi passes on most domestic flights except southwest and JetBlue. I think the benefits are very comparable to CSR if you account for the WiFi passes which are normally $10 each flights
@Shadowfactor wrote:
No I did not have to recon.
I did call after submitting the application and it went pending. I was told that all Altitude Reserve Apps go through a manual review for approval. Even those that received an instant approval. They are still reviewed manually.
It took around 2 days to get an approval. That was the only thing that was discussed. Was approved 2 days later and received the card the next day after approval. 5K is the minimum CL for approval. It is a visa infinite.
I will be keeping the card after the first year. It makes sense for me, especially with having a Samsung phone. I normally make sure to charge my monthly bills to it to give it some 1X use to fly under the radar.
With Samsung Pay, and the rapidly expanding Apple Pay. I get 4.5% return on almost all my in-person spend.
It was nice getting $170 bucks last month for around 5K spend (around 3.5K mobile pay spend and 1.5K 1X spend). This was on car repairs and auto/home insurance. Things that no other card would have given me any bonus points for that spend.
Plus there’s the obvious groceries, gas, and normal spending which accept mobile pay.
I would question the value of the card if they did away with the mobile pay. Until that happens I will continue using the card.
While you don’t get as many Priority pass visits as some of the other premium cards. The annual fee is $50-$100 less then the other premium cards and gives 12 free WiFi passes on most domestic flights except southwest and JetBlue. I think the benefits are very comparable to CSR if you account for the WiFi passes which are normally $10 each flights
Great data points... thanks for explaining.
I also have Samsung Pay which is what got my attention with this card to begin with. I've searched the usual places and have yet to get a clear understanding of how (precisely) the 'real time rewards' works - perhaps I'm just being dense.
What's not clear to me is if you can use rewards to partially cover a purchase. For example, I've read that the minimum redemption for a hotel is $500. Once you have enough points to cover a $500 purchase, what happens if you have a hotel stay that's $800? Will they allow you to use your points to cover part of the charge? If so this could be interesting, indeed.
I got a Cash+ back in December. They gave me a $7500 credit line, so the Altitude might be within reach if I could make the numbers work.