Chase Sapphire Reserve Annual Fee Increased to $550
Confirmed Annual Fee Increase
Chase has confirmed that they will be increasing the Chase Sapphire Reserve's annual fee by a whopping $100! This change bring the premium travel rewards credit card from a competitive $450 annual fee to a hefty $550 annual fee. As of January 12, 2020 the new annual fee will commence for all new Chase Sapphire Reserve applicants. Luckily, if you are a current Chase Sapphire Reserve card holder, you have until April 1, 2020 to renew at the $450 annual fee rate. Any renewal after that will be charged the new $550 annual fee. Chase appears to have raised the annual fee to be exactly the same as the American Express Platinum Card and added a few extra perks. Will the extra perks be enough to keep you paying your annual fee? Let's find out.
NEW Chase Sapphire Reserve Benefits
Lyft Pink - Chase Sapphire Reserve cardholders will get one free year of Lyft Pink membership. Lyft Pink is typically a monthly membership which costs $19.99/month. Lyft Pink offers members 15% savings on all rides, 3 monthly complimentary bike and scooter rides, priority airport pick up, free cancellation up to 3x monthly, waived fees, rental vehicle perks, surprise promotion offers, upgrades and other seemingly ambiguous partnership offers.
Points Passport's Thoughts: This benefit is defiantly solid if you are using ride apps for transportation very often. The free bike and scooter rentals are a great perk if you live in a city or travel to one constantly. Also, the flexibility of canceling trips as well as taking advantage of exclusive membership promotions could yield some decent savings. The bottom line of this perk though is that the membership only lasts your first year. If you were to pay the whole years cost for Lyft Pink it would cost $19.99 monthly or $239.88 in total. After your first year of Lyft Pink would you renew for that full price?
Lyft 10x Points - The Chase and Lyft partnership gets even closer! Lyft purchases will now earn 10x Ultimate Reward points per dollar when the purchase is made with your Chase Sapphire Reserve. Much like the Lyft Pink perk, if you are using ride share apps on a constant basis this new 10x earning potential is a no-brainer.
Points Passport's Thoughts: Earning 10x Chase Ultimate Rewards points per dollar spent on Lyft is massive. For example, if you spent $10 on a Lyft ride, you would earn $10 x 10 = 100 Chase Ultimate Reward points. Points Passport values Chase Ultimate Reward points at $0.02/cents per point, so this $10 ride would yield $2 back in future travel, a huge 20% return.
DoorDash Credits and DashPass - Chase Sapphire Reserve cardholders will be issued $60 in DoorDash food delivery service credits in 2020, and $60 more in 2021. There is no verbiage about these credits extending into 2022. Also, both Chase Sapphire Reserve and Chase Sapphire Preferred will get at least 12 months (and a maximum of 24 months) of DashPass depending on when you activate it. DashPass is a monthly DoorDash membership which provides $0 delivery fee and reduced service fees on orders over $12. According to DoorDash, this membership saves members an average of $4 - $5 per order. It appears that only 184 restaurants are eligible though. Both the Chase Freedom and Chase Freedom Unlimited cards will receive three months free of DashPass and only pay 50% for membership for at least one year. The Chase Freedom Student and Chase Slate card are also eligible for the 50% off promotion. After a year of membership, you will be charges $9.99/month. For more information on this DoorDash and Chase partnership check out the details here.
Points Passport's Thoughts: Like the Lyft Pink perk, both the $120 DoorDash credits and year membership of DashPass are a limited time offers as of now. DashPass seems to be limited due to only having 184 participating restaurants. Although getting $120 in DoorDash food credit is nice, you are technically paying $200 over two years for $120 in DoorDash credits ($60 per year for two years) when you consider the Chase Sapphire Reserve's $100 increase in annual fee.
Final Point
An annual fee increase is rarely exciting news, but at least Chase in introducing some new benefits to offset the extra $100 cost of the Chase Sapphire Reserve. Unfortunately, these new benefits are very specific. If you are not a typical Lyft or DoorDash customer you are likely going to have to go out of your way to use them, similar to the American Express Gold Card monthly dining credit. The Chase Sapphire Reserve's new annual fee is now $550 making it equal to the American Express Platinum Card, which has far more usable credits, memberships, perks, and benefits in our opinion. The biggest issue we see with the Chase Sapphire Reserve's new benefits is their limited time offer. Both the Lyft Pink and DashPass membership as well as the DoorDash food credits will eventually expire. Once they are gone, is Chase Sapphire Reserve still worth an extra $100 annually? Hopefully, Chase has additional partners in the works for future credits and offers. In the meantime, make sure you activate these new card benefits in your Chase Sapphire Reserve account so that you can start taking advantage of them! As always, your mileage may vary with these perks. If you use DoorDash and Lyft often you are likely super excited about this new change that could easily save you hundreds of dollars annually. Let us know what you think about this annual fee increase by commenting down below, direct messaging us on our Instagram or messaging us on Facebook !