Chase Sapphire Preferred – 40,000 Point Bonus Offer

To see the latest, updated offer on this card and others, please visit this page.

Please Note: the current offer on this card has been reduced from 50,000 points to 40,000 points

Here is the first of the many credit cards we will look at. This card is my new-everyday-use card. It is called the Chase Sapphire Preferred. It is one of Chase’s cards that feed into their Ultimate Rewards program. For that reason, this is an excellent card to consider. The Ultimate Rewards program is one of the flexible programs that allow the transfer of points to many different airline and hotel programs. Here are the programs that the points from this card can be transferred to:

• Amtrak (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Amtrak’s Reward Redemption Chart
• British Airways (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – British Airways Award Calculator
• Continental Airlines (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Continental Airlines Reward Chart
• Hyatt Hotels (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Hyatt’s Points Redemption Table
• IHG (Intercontinental Hotels Group) (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – IHG’s Reward Redemption Table
• Korean Air (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Korean Air Redemption Tables
• Marriott (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Marriott’s Award Redemption Chart
• Southwest Airlines (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Southwest’s Redemption Chart
• Singapore Airlines (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Singapore’s Redemption Chart
• United Airlines (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – United Airlines Award Chart
• Virgin Atlantic Airlines (at a conversion rate of 1:1) – Virgin Atlantic Redemption Table

These give amazing options as all the major airline alliances are represented (Oneworld – British Airways / Skyteam – Korean Air / Star Alliance – Continental/United). This gives a lot of flexibility to the card holder as you can use each of those airlines to book tickets with any of the partners within the alliance – basically, you can go anywhere in the world. It also gives excellent hotel redemption options as well. Finally, should you want to go to your next destination by rail, you have that option through Amtrak as well.

When you use this card for purchases in the following categories, you earn 2 points per dollar spent:

• Airfare and Hotels
• Taxis and Rental Cars
• Trains and Cruises
• Fine Dining
• Fast Food
• Takeout

All other purchases earn you 1 point per dollar spent. There is a great exception to that, however. If you shop online by going to the Ultimate Rewards shopping portal first, you will earn bonus points per dollar spent. *Understand – you will still be shopping with the online retailer you had planned on shopping with, you won’t be paying anything extra – you will just be using their referral links to get to your store.* This allows Chase to get commissions on what you spend, so, in return, they give you bonus points for your spending.

Here are some of the details of the credit card itself

• No foreign transaction fees (nice bonus for those who travel internationally)
• $95 Annual Fee (waived for the first year)
• 40,000 Ultimate Reward points after $3,000 of spending in the first 3 months of having the card
• 20% less points for travel redeemed through the Ultimate Reward site – you can purchase any airline ticket (that will accrue airline miles) at a rate of 1.25 cents per point (so, your 40,000 points would give you up to $500 in airfare)
• 15.24% APR

This is a great card to start your travel planning. Since this card is a Chase-issued card, make sure that you have waited at least 30 days since your last Chase application.