Chase has really been doing a good job of making sure their customers are able to use their cards to the max during this period of travel slowdown and financial uncertainty.
Chase “Pay Yourself Back” Program Extended
This has included allowing the Chase Sapphire Preferred and Chase Sapphire Reserve to use their awesome travel redemption rates to pay yourself back on things like groceries and home improvement.
Well, that is hear to stay, at least for a while! This was reported in this Facebook group and I spotted it over at Doctor of Credit. This feature is great for anyone that normally would use Ultimate Reward points to pay directly for travel, especially for Chase Sapphire Reserve members.
How the “Pay Yourself Back” Works
How this works is that you login to your Ultimate Rewards account and choose to Pay Yourself Back. You will see a list of eligible purchases (supermarkets, restaurants, food delivery, home improvement stores) and you select which purchases you want to redeem points for.
It shows you the amount and the amount of points it will take to issue the rebate to your account. You have 90 days from the time of purchase to pay yourself back. Once you do, you will receive a statement credit for that amount in just a couple of days!
Plus, you will still earn points on the spending you did for that as well! So, this is a nice way to get a good rebate while also earning points, especially bonus points, on the spending.
If you have the Chase Sapphire Preferred, you will be using 1 point for every 1.25 cents you want to redeem. The Chase Sapphire Reserve will give you 1.5 cents for every point – just like with direct travel redemptions.
Changes Coming?
Now, we don’t know what kind of changes may come in the future, but there are rumored changes. That could be a lowered rate (though I would not expect that until 2021) or possible a revolving list of categories it could be applied too (like the Chase Freedom has for earning bonuses).
Is pay yourself back actually going to be available after 9/30/20?
That was the word from Chase a while ago but I have not seen any specifics lately. My guess is we will hear something Friday, if they are continuing it. I certainly hope so – I am still waiting for tens of thousands of points to be returned to me from a canceled flight (from 5 months ago!) that I want to use like this!