I’ve had a Chase Freedom Visa card for a couple of years now, and it had been my go-to card for pretty much every purchase I made.
This was because it offered great rewards on a good chunk of my regular purchases through a mildly-confusing rewards program: It gave me 3% cash back on many of the things I spent the most on, and 1% back on everything else. On top of that, if I waited until you’d accumulated $200 in rewards, I could redeem that for a $250 check — giving me a 25% bonus reward on the spot.
Over the last couple of years, I’d been averaging more than 2% cash back per month with this card after the bonuses, which made it a really great deal.
Apparently, this was too good a deal for Chase to continue giving us customers, as it’s all about to change.
The company just sent out a mailing detailing the following changes (among others) to the Freedom Card rewards program:
- No more 3% cash back at your most-visited stores.
- No more $50 bonus if you wait to redeem your rewards.
- Rewards are now just a flat 1%, with periodic bonuses through special offers.
In other words, the Chase Freedom just became almost every other basic rewards card out there. Therefore, I’ll treat it just like I treat all of the other basic rewards cards out there: I’ll ignore it.
At least this will make my life easier: I’d just been rethinking my credit card usage, and had planned on switching most of my spending to a new Charles Schwab Invest First card that gives a flat 2% cash back on everything — automatically, and on a monthly basis — and has the great bonus of not charging any fees when used overseas.
The plan was to keep buying my groceries on my Freedom Card, along with using it to pay the few bills which would earn me 3% back. I’d be using the 2% card for everything except the purchases I knew I’d get 3% for from Chase. Potentially a bit confusing, I know, but I’d be saving a bit of extra money.
Now I don’t need to do that. Chase has done me a favor: by removing all incentive to use their card, they’ve made my decision to totally switch to one of their competitors a very straightforward one.
Thank you, Chase, for chasing me away.