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Anyone downgrading premium credit cards to save on AF?

CalGalTraveler

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With no travel for the foreseeable future and a backlog of credit card points and travel vouchers to burn is anyone downgrading their premium cards to save on AF when they become due? If so which ones?

 

Carlsbadguy

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I canceled my Hawaiian card as the annual fee was due, WIll probably downgrade my Chase Sapphire Reserve and cancel my Citibank Aadvantage Card when the fee becomes due and downgrade the Bonvoy to the no annual fee version if not offered a statement credit.
 

Talent312

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I will likely go from Chase Sapphire Reserve to Preferred in the Fall, just before the new AF is due.

We'll have a ton of credit from travel providers for trips we're cancelling now and won't need the points.
.
 

jtp1947

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Chase sent me an email that said they will be crediting $100 on my Sapphire card when the AF is due in June. So back to $450 for this year only.
 

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I will likely go from Chase Sapphire Reserve to Preferred in the Fall, just before the new AF is due.

We're doing this as well. The extra $100 for useless(to us) added benefits was the deal breaker.
 

GetawaysRus

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The Sapphire Reserve is the big problem. My fee isn't due until late in the year, so there's no urgency for me to decide now. The problem is the value of the U.R. points. If you have a big stash of points, and if you use those to redeem directly for travel via the Chase travel portal (at 1.5 cents per point), you lose a lot of value by downgrading to the Sapphire Preferred (1.25 cents per point).

For example, I have redeemed points in the past for an Alaskan cruise. That was several hundred thousand points. 1/4 cent per point difference on several hundred thousand points adds up. (But of course you could argue that I won't be redeeming for travel any time soon, and you'd be right).

If I downgrade to the Sapphire Preferred, is there any guarantee that Chase would allow me to go back to the Sapphire Reserve once I am hopefully able to resume travel in the future?

I just saw Sandy's post above. I also won't get any use out of those new "benefits." That was just a $100 fee increase for me, and it bothers me also.
 

beejaybee

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Been using our Costco Visa predominantly since the accruing airline miles is moot at this point of virtually no travel either by land, sea or air. We've mileage awards for our August/September Europe cruise & Paris t/s flights that will most likely have to be redeposited- hopefully without a fee- since our trip seems highly doubtful even nearly 5 months out. Not ready to cancel our AA and UA cards just yet though.
 

CalGalTraveler

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I canceled my Hawaiian card as the annual fee was due, WIll probably downgrade my Chase Sapphire Reserve and cancel my Citibank Aadvantage Card when the fee becomes due and downgrade the Bonvoy to the no annual fee version if not offered a statement credit.


Is there a no fee Bonvoy card? I thought Amex only had the $95 versions. Would love to downgrade when AF is due from our Brilliant to no AF card since we have more 35k free nights, points and travel vouchers than we can use right now.
 

CalGalTraveler

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The Sapphire Reserve is the big problem. My fee isn't due until late in the year, so there's no urgency for me to decide now. The problem is the value of the U.R. points. If you have a big stash of points, and if you use those to redeem directly for travel via the Chase travel portal (at 1.5 cents per point), you lose a lot of value by downgrading to the Sapphire Preferred (1.25 cents per point).

For example, I have redeemed points in the past for an Alaskan cruise. That was several hundred thousand points. 1/4 cent per point difference on several hundred thousand points adds up. (But of course you could argue that I won't be redeeming for travel any time soon, and you'd be right).

I had similar concerns. Just cashed out more than $2000 of Chase Sapphire rewards into cash back. Only 1:1 - a penny a point but don't need points to travel for a while and I was concerned they will devalue with travel industry difficulties and people downgrading credit cards to save on AF. Visa has also noted a decline in transactions due to SIP which may affect Chase profitability.

Many of these CSR points were earned 5x and 1.5 x with Freedom and Ink cards so better than 1:1 points to cash.

Cash in hand is king...with cash back we are now guaranteed no devaluations and can apply money to future trips (or maintenance fees) when due. We left some CSR points in account in case we need it but taking many chips off the table.

Now I need a strategy to cash out some of our other points that don't convert to cash...some hotels/airlines are limiting gift card redemptions and those that remain are not good values...would love to hear from those who have found good pockets of value to cash out and lower our points balances.
 
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VacationForever

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I am also sitting on about 150000 CSR UR now. I have not used CSR for more than 3 weeks now, ever since we stay home and not eat out. My renewal is in October and for sure I will be cancelling the card. I am debating between cashing out or transferring to Southwest or United. I have 600K pts sitting in my United right now since I cancelled our Hawaii trip. All my MF are Marriott/Vistana and I use Bonvoy Amex for that. No more travel to pay for to justify the $550 per year. I am also thinking of cancelling my Bonvoy Visa ($95 AF) as I have no use for those single night hotel certificate. I am sitting on a whole bunch with nowhere to go. I do want a no fee Visa though for businesses that do not take Amex.

Any suggestion for no fee Visa? Ah, never mind. I now remember I have my Costco Visa. All is well.
 

CalGalTraveler

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@VacationForever That's a lot of points! Did you know that your 150,000 CSR points can be converted to $1500 cash back? Although I wouldn't recommend cashing all of them. You could take 100k or half off the table and then put in the bank for future travel - not as good as portal 1.5x but guaranteed not to devalue.

Chase also allows you to combine cash and points if you want to use the portal in the future. But not sure whether you get the 1.5x conversion on cash portion in the Chase portal. Would love someone to weigh in on this.

I wouldn't recommend adding any more points into UAL. 600k is a lot of points. UAL is going to devalue worse than Chase - worse yet, they could declare bankruptcy and you would lose all (don't want to scare you but they declared bankruptcy once before). I believe SWA will survive and I am keeping my 200k points balance with them. If it were me I would take the cash instead of adding to SWA because their tickets are aligned with the cash value and you may want to use the cash elsewhere.
 

VacationForever

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@VacationForever That's a lot of points! Did you know that your 150,000 CSR points can be converted to $1500 cash back? Although I wouldn't recommend cashing all of them. You could take 100k or half off the table and then put in the bank for future travel - not as good as portal 1.5x but guaranteed not to devalue.

Chase also allows you to combine cash and points if you want to use the portal in the future. But not sure whether you get the 1.5x conversion on cash in the Chase portal. Would love someone to weigh in on this.

I wouldn't recommend adding any more points into UAL. 600k is a lot of points. UAL is going to devalue worse than Chase - worse yet, they could declare bankruptcy and you would lose all (don't want to scare you but they declared bankruptcy once before). I believe SWA will survive and I am keeping my 200k points balance with them. If it were me I would take the cash instead of adding to SWA because their tickets are aligned with the cash value and you may want to use the cash elsewhere.
Thank you! I just checked with my husband and he said the same, cash out of CSR UR and when year end comes, we will close the card.
 

CalGalTraveler

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Thank you! I just checked with my husband and he said the same, cash out of CSR UR and when year end comes, we will close the card.
If you don't think you will use them you could cash out most of the points now and then cancel the card when AF is due. I cashed out now because I am concerned they will change their 1:1 value between now and then. I even sent payment to a non-Chase bank so they can't claw it back. Citi just devalued the cash value of their points so that's why I acted. (Yes I may be over-reacting but bird in hand.)

I am still letting 100k points remain in our CSR accounts because we will keep at least one of the cards.
 
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VacationForever

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If you don't think you will use them you could cash out most of the points now and then cancel the card when AF is due. I cashed out now because I am concerned they will change their 1:1 value between now and then. I even sent payment to a non-Chase bank so they can't claw it back. Citi just devalued the cash value of their points so that's why I acted. (Yes I may be over-reacting but bird in hand.)

I am still letting 100k points remain in our CSR accounts because we will keep at least one of the cards.
I went ahead and cashed out $1200 and it is like a COVID-19 stimulus check! ;)
 

GetawaysRus

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I am also thinking of cancelling my Bonvoy Visa ($95 AF) as I have no use for those single night hotel certificate.

Marriott cards are another problem. Both my wife and I have a bunch of personal and business Marriott cards from Chase and AmEx. I'm OK with these so long as I can use the annual night certificates, but my certs are sitting unused now. So I may close a number of these. A few caveats, however:
1. The AmEx Business Marriott cards sometimes get "AmEx offers." These offers save me money and help defray the annual fee, so I may keep those.
2. A few days ago, Marriott changed its elite night credit policy. Now I am getting 15 elite nights for having a Marriott personal card PLUS 15 more nights for having a Marriott business card. 30 nights credit will make it much easier to retain Marriott hotel Platinum status. As a Marriott timeshare owner, 30 nights from credit cards plus 3 weeks at Marriott timeshares = 21 more nights = Marriott hotel Platinum status.

So bottom line: I may end up keeping AmEx Business Marriott card + one (Chase?) Marriott personal card. It also remains to be seen if I will receive any worthwhile retention offers, however. A good retention offer might change things.
 

buzglyd

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I'm gonna bit the bullet and keep my Sapphire reserve because I get a lot of value out of it. My Citi Prestige is due in August and I'll probably downgrade to Double Cash which will be paired with my Citi Premier.
 

JudyH

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I would like to thank the person above who mentioned cashing out all or some of the Ultimate Rewards points on the CSR card. We have way too many points on this card, as we have also on our British Air cards. In fact, before all this virus mess, I started using CSR points for hotels as well as air fare. Today we made the decision to cash out 1/2 of our accumulated points. We still have quite a bit left. I am hoping that Vantage Travel will cancel our Iceland trip in June, and Iceland Air will cancel or change the flight, and then I will push for a refund for both, which will go to whatever Chase card I put them on. After all that is done, we will reevaluate and combine the leftover points and close one of the cards.
I like to transfer the Ultimate Rewards points to Southwest, so I can book SWA with points when I go to see the kids, and cancel or change the flight without a hassle.
 
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