Another Chase Freedom Credit Card "Promotion" Fails to Entice or Impress

October 09, 2009

Another Chase Freedom Credit Card "Promotion" Fails to Entice or Impress

I received the following email from Chase about a promotion involving my Chase Freedom card. This credit card offers 3% back on your top three spending categories each month and 1% back on all other purchases. I've earned a lot of cash back from this card over the two or three years that I've had it, but I stopped using it because some bloggers reported receiving letters that the 3% back offer was being discontinued. Since you can't cash out your rewards until you reach $50 in cash back, I didn't want to get stuck earning only 1% back on my purchases when I have other credit cards that allow me to earn more.

But this promotional email caught my eye. The subject line was "Triple Rewards until the end of the year." "Wow," I thought. Not only are they not discontinuing my 3% back, they're going to give it to me on everything!

Wrong.

This is yet another one of Chase's meaningless "bonus" offers. Here are the details:

"Enroll now and earn 3% Cash Back for every eligible dollar you spend above $1,500 on discount store, computer/electronics store and bookstore purchases between October 1 and December 31, 2009 ."

How is this a good deal? I have the Citi Forward card that gives me 5% back on all bookstore purchases, including all purchases at Amazon.com, without having to meet any threshold whatsoever, let alone a sky-high $1500 one. I'm not planning to make any computer or electronics purchases or any discount store purchases (unless Target is a discount store?).

Really, this "promotional" offer just underscores why I've quit using my Chase Freedom card. There are better deals to be had elsewhere. It's too bad that credit card offers and terms change so often that it's hard to keep the same card for years if you want to get the best deals. The only card I've kept in my wallet for years is my Discover card. From October through December, I'll be getting 5% back on all my grocery purchases. From June through August, I earned 5% back on gas. Those are meaningful rewards.