New Chase rule: only one Sapphire card
 

Speculation started on r/churning this morning, now Doctor of Credit has published the internal Chase memo.

"A Chase insider sent over an important memo which Chase is sending out to their employees that as of August 27 (that’s yesterday) it’s no longer possible to get more than one Sapphire card."

and

"If an account is closed, a customer will not be eligible for any Sapphire-branded credit card if they have earned a cardmember bonus on a Sapphire-branded product within the last 24 months."

Read the whole memo: https://www.doctorofcredit.com/chase...-cant-get-csr/

This has a similar effect to Citi's year-old policy disqualifying bonuses if you have earned one from a related card in the past 24 months. Will Chase implement the same policy with FREEDOM or INK cards?

Be interesting to see how they treat product changes. If it's counted as an account closure, then you truly have a 24 month waiting period. If PCs don't count as closures, then you could theoretically rotate from CSR to CSP each year by downgrading the previous year's card to a Freedom/FU.

Perhaps Chase thought that they'd see many people applying for the CSP and then cancelling or downgrading their CSRs since the first wave of annual fees will be upon us very soon.

Sucks because I was hoping to get one through an in branch pre approval for an easy 50k points.

And the language is up on Chase.com.

And this:

Lucky for me, i got both cards. But what alarms me was the instant changes without any time for customers to get in.

This really got me scared of the Chase putting Freedom cards as cash only(removing the transfer to CSR/CSP/Ink line). They could change this policy instantly without warning...

Moved it all to CSR/Ink+ for me right now.

The bonus eligibility change only affects new applicants. Any change in one's ability to combine points would affect existing cardholders. That's very different and should require notice.

I don't let my points accumulate in my Freedom accounts either, but I'm not worried Chase is going to pull the plug without warning.

What a bummer. I just got the CSP last week and was planning on applying for the CSR once the bonus from the first card posted.

I guess now my choices are to a) upgrade to the CSR, forego the second signup bonus but get the CSR additional benefits or b) wait 24 months after the first CSP bonus, downgrade the CSP to an ultimate freedom, and apply for the CSR?

Does that sound right?

Do the people who implement the policies just copy what other banks are doing, or is there a more thought out process involved where the banks might even share their findings and propose ways to combat churners?

BofA, Barclay, have tightened up things also.

Chase won't let you do A until you've had CSP for 12 months (CARD Act rule).

Also, there is a choice c) do both A and B. Wait 12 months PC CSP to CSR. Then wait until 24 months since the bonus. PC CSR to Freedom. Then apply for CSR again.

That's the ticket, especially since the annual fee is waived for the first year of CSP.

+1

I don't think there is any chance that the timing is coincidental. Chase can see that a huge wall of CSR annual fees are about to hit.

Makes sense, thanks for pointing this out.

Someone on Reddit also pointed out another area of ambiguity in that PC-ing is different than "closing" an account. The memo refers specifically to no eligibility for 24 months after closing an account, so perhaps it would still be possible to downgrade the CSP to a Freedom as soon as the CSP bonus posted and then be approved for a CSR with eligibility for a CSR bonus. You haven't technically closed any accounts in that scenario, nor would you be holding multiple Sapphire products at any time.

I personally doubt it, as the intent seems to be to prevent double dipping bonuses (or at least wait a few years before doing so) and this is a fairly obvious workaround. But will be interesting to see.

Edit: whoops, Diplomatico made the same point upthread! Should have read closer :)

I was planning on waiting until October to apply for the Ink Preferred. No particular reason, really. I haven't gotten a new card since Aug 22, 2016 (CSR) and just dropped back to 4/24. Was just going to give it a couple more months. But now I'm worried they'll add this language for the Ink, too, and don't want to give up my Ink Bold. So I just applied. (Got 30 day message, fingers crossed.)

Troopers, in post #5 , quoted the actual language from Chase T&C which means the PC option is dead too. It says:

"The product is not available to either (i) current cardmembers of any Sapphire credit card, or (ii) previous cardmembers of any Sapphire credit card who received a new cardmember bonus within the last 24 months."

Welp there goes my plan to cancel the CSR and sign up for the CSP when the AF hits.

Well with sites like TPG encouraging signing up for the "trifecta," it isn't like Chase was just going to standby and let everyone and their mother screw them out of AF and keep the points forever.

You and 15,000 other people. :(

Me thinks that was why Chase instituted this rule, and when they did. They are coming to the realization of CSR-flight.

And if I understand it, if they don't let you apply for a CSP, bonus or not, then you have to cash out your points or lose them cancelling the CSR.

This affects a colleague who closed his CSP when he got the CSR, but was thinking about downgrading back to a CSP when his AF is up, so he could keep his URs.

Wait. Is Chase not allowing downgrading from CSR to CSP? I thought that was still allowed.

On another point, if you have a spouse who has (or could get) a CSR/CSP/INK, you could transfer your URs to him/her. My wife is an AU on my CSR and has her own CF card (two of them, actually). She transfers her URs to my account. Thus, we both generate URs yet between us we pay an annual fee on only one card. (Shhh, don't tell Chase.)

Pretty sure that's still allowed.

From the language in the memo downgrading seems to be allowed. Just can't receive any new sign-up bonus.



So now that I think about it, and assuming I'm understanding the new rules correctly, it's not all that bad...

My understanding is that the 24 month wait triggers only when you receive a Sapphire bonus. Cancelling a Sapphire card doesn't trigger it so come this time next year we can cancel the CSR / sign up for a CSP.

Yeah, this seems right. I think it's annoyed a lot of people who were planning to apply for the CSP in the very short term.

What is Chase intending to accomplish by denying people the card itself?

I understand what they're accomplishing by denying the bonus to anyone who has had a Sapphire-series card in the past 24 months, but if I cancel my CSR tomorrow and decide 6 mos from now that I want a CSP (or want my CSR back, for that matter), what is Chase gaining by telling me "no" instead of "sure, but no bonus UR points"?

They're trying to incentivize people to pay the annual fee to keep the CSR for the second year. If you cancel, you can't get another Sapphire product for 12-14 months, depending upon when the bonus posted.

Just wondering how PC csp->csr works? When PC it, how much AF will they charge? Keeping same anniversary and prorated 450-95 or whole 450 and new anniversary?

This would really hurt if people decided to transfer all UR points to Freedom or Freedom Unlimited and cancelled the CSR thinking they could just wait to apply for CSP..... and then Chase rolled out their rumored no UR points transfer from free card to paid card... Now all your points are locked at $0.01/point forever...

Yep. To avoid this, transfer/get the Ink Business Preferred if one doesn't already have it or the Ink +. Or transfer out.

Well, we knew something like this was coming, right?! Chase has lost so much on the CSR card that they had to find a way to stop the hemorrhage.

Given that change, I decided to product change my CSP into the CSR card. My CPC banker called on my behalf and it took about five minutes in the branch. To avoid another HP on my Experian, I simply moved some credit from my other Chase cards to cover the difference between the $6K SL on my CSP and the required minimum $10K SL on the CSR. The CSR is a VISA Infinite card and has a minimum SL of $10K.

No, I didn't get any bonus UR points but over time, the CSR card makes far more sense for me than the CSP card. If you travel at all on business or pleasure, consider getting the CSR card. Even though it has a higher annual fee than the CSP card, you can easily make up for that each year with better benefits. See this article for more information: https://thepointsguy.com/2017/05/sho...-csr-over-csp/

According to The Points Guy: "Even though the CSR has a higher annual fee, it easily comes out on top because of its great benefits. But as we’ve seen, even if you don’t include the value of those perks, it still doesn’t take much in the way of annual travel and dining spend for the CSR to make sense, even at $450 per year."

The ability to PC cards and move SL around among cards is one of many reasons that I like Chase.

How AF & anniversary work in your case? $450 today for CSR and prorated refund CSP?

Changing cards sounded allowed from the source link, but you had posted about the PC option being 'dead too' (See quote of your earlier post). Did you mean only with respect to sign up bonuses?

Not certain but I believe that's how they'll handle it.

Honestly I'm not too concerned about the AF on the CSR. With the $300 in travel credit annually, it's really a $150 AF card. And you can make that up easily in UR benefits alone.

Yes.

Careful! As DoC points out
Unlike Barclay and Citi, when you close Chase still uses the clock started at date of last bonus.

I'm keeping my CSR for at least another year. My 165K+ UR makes it worth paying a net AF of $150 again.

May I ask how long have you had your CSP?

When I did a PC from CSP to Freedom Unlimited, they prorated the $95 (due April) for 6 months (PC on October) and refunded $47.50.

So I am guessing it would be the same PC from CSP to CSR. Prorated CSP and fully charging the $450 on CSR.

Is it possible to pc from CSP > Freedom?