The Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is the card I recommend as the first travel credit card to start with for most people. This $95 annual fee card is one of the best on the market. It has a low annual fee, but gives you many of the travel benefits of a more expensive card. I think Chase Ultimate Rewards points are some or the easiest to use for good value for a beginner with a lot of flexibility.
Some of the credits and points earnings are listed below:
- $50 annual hotel credit
- Free DoorDash Dash Pass, plus $10 per month in non restaurant credit
- 5x on travel booked through the Chase Travel Portal
- 3x on restaurants, select streaming services, and online groceries
- 2x on travel
- 1x on everything else
- No foreign transaction fees
- Trip cancelation and delay insurance, baggage delay insurance
- Primary rental car coverage
$50 Annual Hotel Credit
You receive a $50 credit that renews every card member year. How this works is by booking a hotel through the Chase travel portal, then you will receive a $50 statement credit back on your card. If you use this credit, it effectively cuts the card’s annual fee in half.
Free DoorDash Dash Pass Subscription
When you add your card to your wallet in DoorDash, you will receive a complimentary Dash Pass subscription. The terms say you will receive “at least 12 months of complimentary Dash Pass use”, but Chase has continued to extend this benefit the past couple of years. If you were to pay for Dash Pass it would cost the same as the annual fee of the CSP (Chase Sapphire Preferred), so this card is a no brainer if you’re already paying for Dash Pass.
You also receive a $10 monthly off of non-restaurant orders through DoorDash. These include places like grocery stores, convenience stores, and pharmacies.
Primary Rental Car Coverage
By paying for your rental car with your Chase Sapphire Preferred, you can decline the rental car insurance and your card will provide primary insurance coverage.
2x on Travel Purchases
Chase defines travel much more broadly that most other credit card issuers. This includes all of the following:
- Flights
- Hotels
- Timeshares
- Travel Agents
- Cruises
- Tours
- Rental Cars
- Tolls
- Parking
- Ferries
- Taxis
- Rideshare
- Trains
- Buses
The standard signup bonus is 60,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards (UR) points after $4,000 spend in the first 3 months. Occasionally Chase will offer an elevated bonus approximately once per year.
These points may be used in the Chase travel portal for 1.25 cents per point. For example, If you found a flight or hotel for $125 in the travel portal, you could book this for 10,000 Chase UR points. This is would make the 60,000 UR point signup bonus worth $750. Also, by holding the Chase Sapphire Preferred (CSP), Chase Sapphire Reserve (CSR), or the Chase Ink Business Preferred, you make points transferrable to partners. And if you have a card that earns cash back like the Chase Freedom Unlimited or the Chase Freedom Flex, these now effectively earn UR points instead or cash back. You just transfer your cash back to your CSP and $0.01 becomes 1 Chase UR point.
The best use of Chase Ultimate Rewards points is to transfer to partners to book flights or hotels. Chase has many transfer partners as listed below:
- Aer Lingus (Avios) – 1:1
- Air Canada Aeroplan- 1:1
- Air France and KLM Flying Blue – 1:1
- Avianca Lifemiles – 1:1
- British Airways (Avios) – 1:1
- Emirates – 1:1
- Iberia (Avios) – 1:1
- JetBlue – 1:1
- Singapore Airlines – 1:1
- Southwest – 1:1
- United Airlines – 1:1
- Virgin Atlantic – 1:1
- IHG – 1:1
- Marriott Bonvoy – 1:1
- World of Hyatt – 1:1
I believe that World of Hyatt is the most important of these transfer partners. Only Chase Ultimate Rewards and Bilt Rewards transfer to Hyatt. Hyatt hotels can be booked for as little as 3,500 points per night for an off-peak Category 1 hotel. Your 60,000 point chase sign up bonus could get you as many as 17 free nights at one of these hotels at the off-peak rate.
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