The Chase family of credit cards are excellent choices for those wishing to accumulate and use points for travel, mostly do to their ease of use and flexibility. They are especially useful to someone starting out in the points game due to the wide variety of cards and transfer partners. The Sapphire products are a step up from basic, no fee credit cards, and now that Chase has elevated the sign up bonus on the Sapphire Preferred card, it is one you should consider adding to your wallet if it fits with your travel goals.
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Sign up bonus
The Sapphire Preferred currently offers a SUB of 80,000 Ultimate Rewards points when spending $4000 in the first 3 months of account opening. This bonus is worth a minimum of $800 when redeemed for cash back at .01/point and can have even greater value when transferred to travel partners. Note that you cannot get the SUB if you have received a SUB from ANY Sapphire product in the last 48 months, so if you have had a Sapphire card in the past, make sure it's been longer than 48 months since you received the bonus. The card comes with a $95 annual fee, which can be largely offset with the perks the card offers.
Perks
The Preferred has a $50 annual hotel credit when booking through the Chase travel portal. So even if you booked one hotel night via the portal, the first $50 would be credited back to your account, effectively making the annual fee $45.
You receive a 10% points bonus every card anniversary year based on the points you've earned throughout the year. So if you spent $10k on the card in your first year, you would receive a 1000 point bonus.
Additional perks such as Trip Cancellation/Interruption Insurance, Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver, Purchase and Extended warranty protection, as well as no foreign transaction fee come with the card.
Earning
The Preferred has a pretty straightforward earnings structure with solid bonus categories. You earn:
5x points on travel booked directly through the Chase UR travel portal
3x points on dining including takeout
3x points on online grocery purchases (excluding Target, Walmart and wholesale clubs)
3x points on select streaming services
2x points on travel
1x points on everything else
Redeeming
There are a variety of ways to use the Ultimate Rewards points you earn on the Preferred card:
For statement credits or gift cards at 1 cent/point. For example 100k points could be redeemed for $1000.
To book travel (flights/hotels/car rentals, etc) directly through the Chase UR travel portal at 1.25 cents/point. That 100k points would then be worth $1250
The Sapphire products, including the Preferred, allow you to transfer your Ultimate Reward points to their list of travel partners. You can transfer points to 11 airline programs (British Airways, Flying Blue, JetBlue, Southwest, Emirates, Singapore Airlines, United, Virgin Atlantic, Air Canada, Iberia, Aer Lingus) and three hotel programs (Hyatt, Marriott, IHG). This affords flexibility and the ability to redeem points for much greater value than the 1 or 1.25 cents/point with the above options. Opening up this opportunity can really elevate your points strategy beyond simply cash back.
Complementing Chase cards
The best feature about the Sapphire Preferred card, besides the ability to transfer points directly to airlines and hotels, is the ability to pair it with other Chase cards and pool your points. For example, if you have or get any cards in the Chase Freedom family of cards (Freedom Unlimited or Freedom Flex), which have complimentary earning structures that don't really overlap with the Preferred, you can combine the points earned on all those cards and redeem them as you see fit using the options above. This is huge because, although the Freedom cards earn Ultimate Rewards, they are essentially cash back points at 1 cent/point, because you cannot transfer them to travel partners for extended value and flexibility nor do you have the 1.25x multiplier that the Preferred does. So now, the Preferred can be the catalyst for helping the Chase ecosystem really work for your travel benefit.
Conclusion
If you have dipped your toes in or are wanting to start in the Chase family of credit cards, the Sapphire Preferred is a great card to do that. It's low annual fee, solid perks and earning structure, and great redemption flexibility make it a perfect card to help reach your travel goals for free. And now with an 80000 point sign up bonus, the timing is perfect.
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