Chase Ultimate Rewards has only had one transfer bonus in its history, a 30% bonus for BA Avios last year.
That’s by design.
Chase executives told me when they launched Ultimate Rewards point transfers to airlines that they decided to focus on strong partners with easy to understand transfer ratios and not on assorted transfer ratios and transfer bonuses.
But times change and Chase is back with another transfer bonus, this time a 60% bonus to IHG:
IHG recently switched from award chart based redemption to dynamically priced redemptions, which can mean there are some low redemption rates now, but also means that it will be harder to get outsized value from the program.
With a 60% bonus, you’ll get 1.6 IHG points for every Chase point.
IHG currently sells points for 0.5 cents each, so even with the bonus, that would value your Chase points at a paltry 0.8 cents each.
You don’t want to do that.
Other transfer options like Hyatt, United, and Virgin Atlantic offer opportunities to book awards worth 2 cents or more per point via redemptions such as Hyatt Suites, business class to Israel, and ANA First Class awards.
Indeed, you can redeem your Chase points at a value of 1.25 cents or 1.5 cents per point with the pay yourself back promotion, so that sets the baseline for Chase points value. You can even pay yourself back at 1.5 cents each and then buy IHG points at 0.5 cents each with those cash proceeds if you are after IHG points.
Thanks, but no thanks Chase.
HT: Eluzer K
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11 Comments On "Hard Pass On Chase’s 2nd Ever Point Transfer Bonus"
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“Thanks but no thanks Chase” lol
Love the gemara kup of redeeming at 1.5 and buying for 200% bonus for 0.5
A Mishnah kup is enough for that
Hey, it could be worse. You could be paying cash for an ElAl plane ticket though a specific travel agency
Dan… this analysis was not deep enough. There are people this may suit, as a transfer is (still) elite qualifying. Also, it is yet to be seen if the 60% bonus will also be elite qualifying.
If it is, a 35K transfer could end up getting you Spire status and 81K IHG points. Suddenly it isn’t such a clear-cut hard pass…
IHG elite status and $5 will buy you a Starbucks Latte.
It’s a joke compared to any other chain.
Maybe at a HIX in the U.S. In Israel, believe it or not, the CPs give Spire lounge and/or breakfast. Coupled with the VAT savings, this can be quite lucrative (IF the 60% ends up being elite qualifying).
UPDATE: 60% posted as non-elite qualifying. Ignore my previous comments/analysis, move along folks nothing to see here.
If you think about it, it’s actually pretty crazy that they really think it’s normal to even offer this. The fact that you can just redeem the points for cash at 1:1 (even though that too is a horrible deal) and buy them on your own and you’d end up with more points makes the whole thing a joke… really not befitting the Chase brand, at least I’d hope THEY would think that. It basically is them admitting they think their customers are idiots.
Is this card worth keeping? Just got the annual fee of$100.. worth it for the perks of anniversary night voucher?
It is worth it for me as I will be staying at an IHG hotels, need more points and no one is buying my points these days. Not losing.