Why or How is the CSP so great?

[FutureBillionaire]

Double points on travel and dining with an annual fee?  I can get those rewards without the annual fee with a Discover Miles.  Is the draw of this card the additional rewards you get when combined with other Chase products?

[Anonymous]

It's the marketing.   It is a metal card.  People think it's prestigious.  And then they rave about the extra 20% bonus when using UR points for travel, and 7% annual point dividend. 

But in reality - 2% on travel and dining is not great.  Infact - it's really just average. 

$95 annual fee just does not offset the added rewards from this card, IMO.  I dont really care about having an exclusive phone number to call with the card, since really how often are you calling the credit card?  

The best part about this card was the $400 for spending $3K.  I closed the card before the annual fee.  

[Anonymous]

I believe the BoA Travel Rewards or even Penfed Amex are better IMO. 

BoA has 1.5% cash back in form of travel reimbursement, with no annual fee, and no FTF.  

Penfed AMEX also is no annual fee, 5% on airfare, and no FTF.  

I'm just a big believer in no annual fee cards, at least not keeping annual fee cards around enough to receive a fee. 

[flowfaster]

The CSP has some major fanboys on this board, so be careful because they take it personal. I agree the card is mediocre at best. I would just get it for the sign up bonus and drop it before the annual fee is due. I would take it over the Amex Green though.

[Cdnewmanpac]

The biggest value comes from the ability to convert ur points to airline or hotel points. These are often worth well more than 1cpp. Of course, if you aren't actually flying or staying already, then that fact has little value. A card like the venture or discover miles can only get 1 cpp because you are getting a statement credit for money spent. They, along with Amex blue sky, are essentially cash reward cards. But csp, spg and the Amex mr cards give you flexibility beyond what a dedicated airline or hotel card would give you and allow you to deploy your points when and where they work best for you. There is a reason that every frequent flyer blog out there (even those without affiliate links) recommends this card. The ability to pair this card with a freedom to add value to the points the freedom earns in bonus categories is also a nice feature. 

For non frequent flyers, though, there are definitely better all around cards. 

[djrez4]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I believe the BoA Travel Rewards or even Penfed Amex are better IMO. 

BoA has 1.5% cash back in form of travel reimbursement, with no annual fee, and no FTF.  

Penfed AMEX also is no annual fee, 5% on airfare, and no FTF.  

I'm just a big believer in no annual fee cards, at least not keeping annual fee cards around enough to receive a fee. 

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Here's something I posted in another thread about the value of a CSP - 

To give you an example of my most recent redemption, I used a combination of United Miles and UR points to book plane tickets to Europe.  The cash price would have been around $3000, give or take.  Let's just say I used all UR points - 120k of them.  That's a value of 2.5 cents per point.  If I'm getting 2 points per dollar at a restaurant, that's 5 cents per dollar.

I get that same 5 cents per dollar on all travel expenses, including airfare (what's up Penfed?).  And that's a relatively weak redemption.  How about redeeming 200k UR points for two business class tickets?  That's a $10,000 in airfare.  I get 5 cents of value per point - 10 cents per dollar at restaurants and for travel expenses.  

There are also UR Mall bonuses, like 6 extra points per dollar for Backcountry.com, my favorite online retailer.  Those purchases net me 17.5 cents per dollar spent (2.5 cents per point x 7 points per dollar).

Toss in the extra 7% dividend on points.  Throw in the Freedom categories.  Add in the Ink cards.  Ultimate rewards is the most flexible, powerful rewards program out there right now and CSP is the nexus of it.

Seriously?  Penfed? Bank of America?  Not even in the same league.

[Anonymous]

You mentioned using 120K AND 200K points for vacation get-aways.  That's great for you. Then annual fee works for you I guess.  How much did you have to spend to attain 120,000 points?  And don't mention sign up bonuses - because I already said THEY ARE GOOD FOR THE SIGNUP BONUSES.  

But who has 200K (or 320,000) UR points laying around?  I'd guess less than 1% of the population. 

For the average (wo)man, the CSP is not a good value because of the annual fee.  

 I will take the no-fee, no FTF, 5% Visa and AMEX cards from PFCU all day - everyday over JP Morgan Chase cards.  

[bs6054]

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@djrez4 wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

I believe the BoA Travel Rewards or even Penfed Amex are better IMO. 

BoA has 1.5% cash back in form of travel reimbursement, with no annual fee, and no FTF.  

Penfed AMEX also is no annual fee, 5% on airfare, and no FTF.  

I'm just a big believer in no annual fee cards, at least not keeping annual fee cards around enough to receive a fee. 

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Here's something I posted in another thread about the value of a CSP - 

To give you an example of my most recent redemption, I used a combination of United Miles and UR points to book plane tickets to Europe.  The cash price would have been around $3000, give or take.  Let's just say I used all UR points - 120k of them.  That's a value of 2.5 cents per point.  If I'm getting 2 points per dollar at a restaurant, that's 5 cents per dollar.

I get that same 5 cents per dollar on all travel expenses, including airfare (what's up Penfed?).  And that's a relatively weak redemption.  How about redeeming 200k UR points for two business class tickets?  That's a $10,000 in airfare.  I get 5 cents of value per point - 10 cents per dollar at restaurants and for travel expenses.  

There are also UR Mall bonuses, like 6 extra points per dollar for Backcountry.com, my favorite online retailer.  Those purchases net me 17.5 cents per dollar spent (2.5 cents per point x 7 points per dollar).

Toss in the extra 7% dividend on points.  Throw in the Freedom categories.  Add in the Ink cards.  Ultimate rewards is the most flexible, powerful rewards program out there right now and CSP is the nexus of it.

Seriously?  Penfed? Bank of America?  Not even in the same league.

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Usual question:  would you have spent the $10K on those biz class tickets (i.e, you are about to buy them, and then realize you can use UR instead)?  If not, it's harder to assign a "real" value to the redemption.  

All the major cards have malls of varying quality, I just bought ink using my Barclays Reward from 123Inkjet, with a bonus of 17 points per $1 + the normal 2 points per $, so *I* got 19 cents per $!

But we agree that CSP is a good card for frequent travelers, in the same way that PenFed is a great card for those with huge gas consumption, or Cash Plus with heavy spend in some 5% categories.  No need to use phrases like "Not even in the same league"

[Duncanrr]

Come on, y'all k ow the reason.

Its metal, duh.
Paper is cut by plastic, plastic is melted by metal and Spock vaporizes metal.

[Anonymous]

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@Duncanrr wrote:
Come on, y'all k ow the reason.

Its metal, duh.
Paper is cut by plastic, plastic is melted by metal and Spock vaporizes metal.

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Been trying to think of a way to sharpen mine without people ending up cutting themselves on it in places where you hand over the card to be swiped.