This is not a card for people looking to maximize rewards. It’s for Apple users who want decent benefits and no fees, who will mostly use Apple Pay. (Apparently it’s also good for folks establishing a credit history who might not otherwise get approved.)
I’ve got 300k points between AmEx and Chase and I recently realized I can’t ever use them when I want to. I don’t want to play all the games of which points can I use where and when. I don’t want an annual fee. I don’t want to have to juggle several different cards. I don’t want to have to “activate” this quarter’s latest deals. So I just switched to a straight 2% cash back card.
My one exception was keeping the Chase Amazon card since it’s 5% back at Whole Foods and that’s too much to turn down.
But I made the Apple Card my other exception today. My credit files are unfrozen at the moment as I juggle cards so I decided why not grab it. It was a simple application process and I tied it to my Apple ID so I get 3% back from Apple for my iTunes and iCloud purchases.
I don’t get folks coming here to criticize the card. It’s just a credit card. Take it or leave it.
I get not wanting to have to "activate" each quarter's deals (though really, it's literally a single button push once every three months...), but I don't get your point on any of the other stuff.
Both AmEx and Chase have multiple cards that earn points that have no annual fees. Both of their point programs can be redeemed for straight cash back (just like the Apple Card, except Chase's offers better cash back percentage). And both can easily be added to Apple/Google Pay and be used just like you will use an Apple Card.
It's not so much criticism of the card as much as it is criticism of people who are for some reason hyped up about it. Like most Apple stuff, there are always a weird group of people obsessing over it and will go to strange lengths to defend it. This is weird, because, as you said, it's just a credit card. It would be less weird if it was at least a good credit card that people were defending, but it's not even that.
What's exciting about Apple Card is not that it will put more money in my pocket, but how it modernizes payments. I signed up yesterday morning, and made my first purchase a few hours later. Unlike my current card, the app doesn't try to push "special offers" and I think it won't share my purchase history with "affiliates." I can see my purchase on a map, and Apple can't - nice.
It's a pretty cool experience and I hope Apple Card sets a new baseline.
If see a transaction you don't recognise. By looking at it on a map it may remind you of that small shop you bought something from. Or it might be in a town you've never been to.
I'm not likely to grab this card, but every few months going back over my statement I see some small purchase I can't quite place. The text description for stores is often really vague, especially for gas stations.
Confirming where a purchase was made can help with budgeting and detecting fraud.
I used to use Simple bank and they did this as well. One time I was at my desk and got a notification for a purchase at a Grocery store that sounded unfamiliar. Opening the notification took me into the detail page that showed it was located in Florida. I then put a block on my card and notified support of the fraudulent transaction all through the app within 2 minutes.
I've since switched banks, but I still haven't found a bank that had as good of an experience as them. Hearing about the Apple cards digital experience is actually enticing, because both of the credit cards I use are slow as hell, or make using rewards difficult in some way (one card makes me 'activate' the reward tiers for the 3 month period, the other takes you out of the app to an external page to use any rewards).
> Even Apple doesn’t know what you bought. Or where. Or how much you paid.
> At Apple, we firmly believe in your right to privacy. That’s why we created a unique architecture for Apple Card that generates things like your transaction history and spending summaries right in the Wallet app on your iPhone. Of course, Goldman Sachs will use your data to operate Apple Card. But they will never share or sell your data to third parties for marketing or advertising.
Payment does not need modernizing. The more 'deals' and 'convenience' they introduce, the more complicated paying becomes overall. This complexity makes it for you, the consumer, more difficult to determine the actual value of the thing is you are purchasing, makes it more difficult to figure out whether you want to support the business processes that go with it.
Do the points and rewards for this transaction manipulate you in an unacceptable way into buying other things later on? Does Apple really care that much about your privacy, or will they use this information in a way that you don't like? Do you think that them having almost absolute say over what happens on your phone is a good thing or a bad thing and will this purchase endorse that or not?
You can have all kinds of answers to those questions, but do you really want to go through all of them when you buy an album on iTunes? Just keep it simple. You have this good/service and I want it. I give you money, you give me the thing. End of story.
I'm confused, the point being made is that the Apple Card modernises payments by getting rid of all the points schemes, special offers and back room deals over your data.
When I came to the comments section there was no one hyping the card but already several folks critiquing it.
My other comments were directed not at other comparable cards but at folks critiquing the card for not having the best benefits. I only know of two cards offhand that are straight 2% cash back on everything with no annual fee and no gimmicks, the Fidelity Visa Signature which requires a fidelity brokerage account and the Citi DoubleCash card. And both of those cash back at the billing cycle end, not daily.
The other cards which offer points, you’ve got to go do something to turn the points into cash or redeem the points in some other way. I get that you don’t think this is much hassle. But for some folks it is. For them, there’s this card.
Does the daily cashback make a practical difference? It feels gimmicky to me.
For anyone considering this card I'd suggest that they compare it to a 2% card like the DoubleCash and the Uber card. Depending on your spending habits one may be significantly better than the others.
Consider there's no fees or minimums associated with a Fidelity brokerage account and you're already entering a business relationship with Fidelity anyway.
There's also the PayPal Mastercard, which requires a PayPal account.
The Chase Freedom Unlimited is 3% back on all purchases (up to $20k/yr), and if you're willing to play the categories game, the Chase Freedom is 5% back.
Chase Amazon is also five percent in Amazon reward points when buying from Amazon as an Amazon Prime member. That alone pretty much made the card a lock for me. Throw in that they have hook ups with other vendors randomly that are worthwhile.
As with many elective services, be it credit cards, grocery shopping, to online streaming, the more effort you put into your selection the more you can save. it is up to the consumer to choose when savings is exceeded by effort. the real battle though is simply in privacy and hopefully Apple's emphasis on this facet will lead to similar features spreading beyond the CC industry
Regarding "designed to help customers lead a healthier financial life"--the difference is that, via the app, the card encourages you to pay it off and to not overspend. That's probably about it, though.
Cash on the AmEx is 1/2c per point. I’m willing to go through the hassle of swapping for gift cards at this point to get 1c per point on 200k points there. I grabbed an AmEx EveryDay so I can cancel the Gold and not lose my points.
If you're not against another card, you can get 1.25 cpp for Amex points when you cash out with the Schwab. Still not as good as booking flights or hotels, but better and easier than liquidating gift cards.
In addition to the Everyday, AMEX also has a couple business cards that earn MR points with no fee. I have the Blue Business Plus which doesn't have an annual fee.
For what it’s worth, almost every bank/card I’ve signed up for has this clause. Apple is the only one I’ve seen where you can opt out by text message, usually it requires mailing a letter.
Plus in all cases they bury it in the terms and expect nobody to notice/opt out. It is a practice illegal elsewhere[0] and Apple doing something to save themselves money doesn't make them the consumer's hero, it is still an immoral anti-consumer practice that should be illegal.
Now if they required that you select opt in during sign up, that would be quite different. But that's not the case. Instead it is on Page 14/15 on an agreement you don't even need to read.
- "At Apple, we firmly believe in your right to privacy. That’s why we created a unique architecture for Apple Card that generates things like your transaction history and spending summaries right in the Wallet app on your iPhone.
Of course, Goldman Sachs will use your data to operate Apple Card. But they will never share or sell your data to third parties for marketing or advertising."
- "Apple will not charge a late fee or apply a new high-interest penalty rate for a missed payment. However, customers will continue to accrue interest on their balance at their regular interest rate. "
- The APRs are still relatively high, when compared to how low other borrowing rates are.
If this number is leaked somehow, you can block it and get a new one right from the wallet app. They don't say anything about having to request a new physical card after that, so I believe this number you see on the app is not the same of the internal-only, not printed number of the physical card.
Because it's not a tech product, it's a credit card, and plenty of places, in the US at least, still require the use of a magnetic strip. As for how they deal with a changing card number, I have no idea.
The main thing that makes me pretty much "meh" on the card is that the 2% is only for Apple Pay which I use for a tiny percentage of my purchases. So it's really more like 1% back and I already get that and more with other cards.
I have no doubt you're right. And I'm sure GS wants to be in early on whatever change in payment mechanisms happen in the US over time as well. But it doesn't change the fact that it's not too useful for me today. Sticking a card in a chip reader may not be as high tech as NFC using a phone or watch (or even using a contactless card) but in practice it's pretty convenient.
In the US, many point of sale terminals are still not converted to use chips. I most frequently encounter stripe readers at gasoline stations. I'm fairly sure that each time my card has been cloned in the last 5 years, it has been via criminals modifying gas pump card readers to harvest card numbers.
I hate gas stations so much that I bought an EV. Ironically, my wife makes me pump gas for her, so my cards are still at risk.
It's just a co-branded credit card, not a new tech product.
Same agreement as a card offered by a charity, alumni association, airline, or baseball team. Uber has a co-branded card too, which is also not a tech product.
Incidentally Uber's credit card has particularly attractive rewards.
Apple was [probably] a bit more involved with the design of the UI than your average airline, but that's it.
I don't know if this is a false memory but I seem to recall at least one time when I saw a vendor swipe a card because chip didn't work on that particular occasion for some reason. I don't know if magnet is actually more reliable, but it does seem to be that way to me.
The chip is nearly 100% reliable (absent any manufacturing defects). It's the network in the U.S. that is stuck in the 1970s. Even with the supposed requirement to move to chip terminals, I still come across so many merchants who either (1) don't even have a chip reader, or (2) have a little sticky note on the payment terminal that says "chip broken".
What's really surprising is when a new store opens (restaurant, typically), and they don't have a chip reader on day one. They still swipe.
I've had my card skimmed more times than I can count over the decades. That we're still dealing with this problem in 2019 is maddening.
As with any Apple product ever, this is not a "completely new tech product". This is a long established market that Apple believes they can do better than everyone else.
For an exorbant price of course, but that stage is some years into the future.
I think that the number that they show you in the app is different from the number on the card. They show you a number that you can enter into websites etc but there is a section for "physical card" that only shows you the last 4 digits. If this is stolen by skimmers then I guess they have to send you a new card.
When the prime rate decreases, your variable APR will decrease by the same amount. But when the prime rate increases, your variable APR will also increase by the same amount.
The lending bank profits from the premium you pay over the prime rate. Generally, this premium doesn't decrease as long as you hold the card, although some banks will lower your interest rate if you have a long history with them, your account is in good standing, and you ask them nicely over the phone.
My biggest hope for this card is that it encourages far more people to use Apple Pay (2% vs 1% cash back), which, in turn, encourages more retailers to optimize the checkout process for contactless, and hopefully gets rid of having to use that gross stylus that everybody touches to sign that low-res LED screen with something that looks nothing like my signature.
And it would also be great if it encourages US restaurants to switch to using the portable machine at your table instead of taking your card away.
It's funny. I'm from a third world country and there restaurant waitresses will bring a mobile card reader to your table. The reason being that it was very common years ago for restaurants to clone your card and then use it somewhere else; so people don't want to lose sight of their card ever to make sure it won't get cloned.
I'm travelling in Europe right now and I can tell you that signatures are definitely still required with the chip. The only exception is if I use the one card I have with contactless payment.
US chip cards require a signature in Europe virtually 100% of the time, even on low-value transactions that would be under the signature threshold in the US.
However, using contactless avoids signatures 99% of the time. I think I had to sign once on my last trip at a contactless terminal.
That's actually my main use for Apple Pay. It's easier in Europe as a way to avoid having to do the signature thing (which the cashier is often not prepared for) with my US chip card. But it only works up to $30 or so.
What do you mean with it only works up to $30? I pay bills of several thousands with Apple Pay without pin or signature - I am from EU, but I expect them to work the same.
Wow, yeah, I've never had that issue with NFC on the card, using my Garmin watch, Apple watch, iPhone, etc, most places I've traveled (Canada, Norway, NZ, Aus, continental europe.. Germany and their weird credit card hatred notwithstanding)
I had assumed the restriction was more widespread but it seems to be (mostly) a UK thing for some reason. (Though France as well I see.) I hadn't really looked into it because I almost always have a card with me in the US--given how many places don't take Apple Pay--and most of my European travel is UK.
ADDED: Apple's support page mostly says "Your mileage may vary." I haven't tried to do larger purchases more than once or twice when they didn't work because I don't want to be the guy holding up the line fiddling with payment options. I don't know if I got unlucky or if it's the norm.
Strangely enough, it seems that this applies to mostly transactions in North America, for some reason.
That being said, an individual payment terminal can be configured to require a signature and it might take a while to switch over. The first day they were optional my grocery store got rid of them on their terminals, even for high value transactions, which I appreciated and commented on.
Especially with pads, signatures as a verification mechanism are just silly in this day and age. Maybe some people actually sign legibly but most of us just do a scribble. (My signature on the back of my credit card is equally illegible so, in the rare occasions when someone does a compare, I've never had an issue. Fortunately, they do seem to be on the way out though I do typically have to sign a slip in Europe and Asia when using a US chip card.
I have been asked for ID once or twice. (I think you sometimes get young clerks who were told to do something and they haven't figured out no one takes that "rule" seriously.)
Most modern terminals (i.e. with a contactless option), should be able to use chip and pin for US cards, no signature required. That's probably why they do not require signatures.
I think that the majority of terminals in EU have the contactless option - at least in Denmark all non contactless terminals have been phased out.
Most US cards simply don't have PINs (or the card owner doesn't know the pin). I had to ask to assign one to a CC before I traveled, but then, it was never requested. I just had to sign.
I live in Europe (Sweden, Germany and Switzerland) and I have never needed to sign when paying with card (i.e. the chip – never used the magnetic strip). Perhaps its because you have a foreign card?
This is because US Cards have a Chip but no PIN. So the signature is the only "security measure". I've all but stopped using my US Cards for this reason unless the terminal supports contactless through apple pay
Correct, it’s only for Americans traveling abroad. It’s because our credit cards (finally) have chips but no pin. Apparently chip/pin would cause too much friction in the purchasing process or some nonsense like that?
It's even worse. I have a US card that supports chip+pin, but most terminals in Europe will preferentially use chip+signature if it's also supported. So I still end up signing when I travel.
Might not be required, but vendors in the U. S. still ask for a signature. Hell, the local pet supply store asks for a signature when I use Apple Pay on my watch. Kinnndda missing the point of NFC there.
I was recently in England. Nearly every payment terminal supports contactless in the cities I visited. I found myself using Apple Pay throughout the trip because it was fast and convenient. Also in restaurants they bring a payment terminal out to your table so you can pay with Apple Pay.
Unfortunately, contactless payment terminals are somewhat more rare in the USA. My local grocery store (Kroger) doesn’t have them.
It's genuinely shocking how far behind the USA is in terms of consumer banking. I moved from Chicago to London about six months ago, and I can't believe how much more convenient it is. You can wire money to anyone with a bank account without an intermediary like Venmo or Zelle from your phone, either as a one-off or recurring. I can revoke permission to draw regularly on my account from my phone, so I don't have to go 10 rounds with the gym or something to quit. You can pay for anything you like with a tap of your phone, and it takes maybe a second to clear. My credit cards never leave my possession.
I still have the envelope of cash I pulled out when I got here in February, minus maybe £40. I haven't needed it!
What is more maddening is that vendors had to replace their POS terminals to support chips after Apple Pay and other contactless payments were a thing and they still have new terminals that don’t support contactless payments.
The adoption of contactless payments in Romania has been astonishing. When I first moved here four years ago you could only pay by card at restaurants and supermarkets and definitely not contactless. Now, four years later, you can pay contactless everywhere. Including all the little stores. Any place that supports card payments also supports contactless payments. Hell, you can hop in any bus now and buy a ticket on the spot with the contactless payment terminals in the bus. No human interaction required, you just hold up your card or phone and it prints a ticket.
Ever since Apple Pay became available, I can't remember the last time I pulled out my card.
There are only two things I still use cash for. Tipping and taxis. The latter can be worked around by using Uber or one of the local competitors.
In London you generally don't even get a bus, rail or underground ticket. You just swipe the contactless pads to hop on, or in and out at stations. Very occasionally an inspector just holds a hand terminal to your card to check you paid.
>Very occasionally an inspector just holds a hand terminal to your card to check you paid.
For a ticket inspector, there is hardly any information to discern if a journey has been made when using a Contactless card. Furthermore, anybody who uses this method knows that it can be several days before a journey shows up on the list of transactions. Although, it is largely to do with how the TfL payment system was implemented, with Contactless being more of a hindsight. However, it is significantly better than nothing at all.
Many smaller places are now going cashless too. The coffee shop that I go to near my office just renovated last week and is now cashless. I don’t think they even have a chip reader, I think they are contactless only.
When I still lived in Scotland, I did everything day-to-day with either Apple Pay or (on busses, which somehow didn't support it) non-Apple Pay contactless.
According to Mastercard CEO Ajay Banga[1], they've noticed that if the transport system in an area becomes contactless enabled, then contactless adoption ramps up faster.
My understanding is that's how contactless (somewhat) took off in Japan. Though Japan as a whole is still even more cash-centric than Germany is. It wouldn't surprise me that the use of contactless cards at least in places like convenience stores and vending machines arose in part because credit card use isn't that widespread.
It's not the only reason but the US has a scale and population density disadvantage which makes it more expensive to roll out technology nationwide. You can see this with cellphones as well - rolling out 3G coverage across the UK is a lot cheaper 'per customer' than it is across the US, so we have better coverage.
Have you noticed any wear and tear on the card itself? I've got a mostly white credit card (not metal) that is stained from my wallet and sliding it and such, just curious.
As a privacy product the Apple Card is interesting, but as a financial product the interest rates are high and the rewards boring. All it takes is another bank to say "we will also have a strong and clear privacy agreement with you" and they will match Apple in my mind.
I mostly like "boring" when it comes to card rewards. I find the more "exciting" they get the harder rewards are to use or at least to use in a way that actually is of more value than a theoretically smaller amount of cash, e.g. flight and hotel upgrades that are nice enough but which I wouldn't actually pay for out of my pocket.
Pretty sure that privacy and good rewards can't go together. There is a reason that high earners are entitled to better rewards with traditional cards and it's because their data is more valuable.
It seems like a pretty decent card for most people with a number of privacy, security, and usability upgrades. I'd get it if I wasn't able to extract most of the benefits and rewards from my Amex Platinum. As it stands, it's hard to beat the flight, lounge, Uber, and hotel benefits if you go on trips even semi-regularly.
Privacy? It's still a credit card. MasterCard still gets all your purchase data and can do whatever they want with it. Goldman Sachs gets your SSN, credit report, and bank account info.
Agreed the application process was slick. However, I have a fraud alert so I was expecting a phone call and didn’t get one. I guess I’m okay with that since I had to provide photos of the front and back of my license.
I was less impressed when I wanted to switch to the card for my Apple purchased to get 3% back on my iCloud subscription and I had to manually go into the Wallet app to get the card number, expiration date, and security code and manually copy that all over to the payments section associated with my Apple ID. (Twice actually since I have separate IDs for iTunes and iCloud for historical reasons.)
There’s a “make default at Apple” button in the card settings that I was able to use to accomplish that without copy/pasting. Weird they didn’t just ask during the setup process.
You change the setting in the Wallet app. Tap your Apple Card, then tap the 3 dots in the top right corner. Press the button labeled “Make Default at Apple”.
I looked there. I really don’t have that button. At this point I’ve manually copied the card info for both my Apple IDs but I don’t think I had that button at any point. Maybe it’s because I have separate IDs for iCloud and iTunes.
That seems like a pretty big error... With a launch is pivotal as this, you would think they would do more testing to ensure you’d at least be able to make purchases at launch.
First thing I "purchased" after applying was two charitable donations, which I hear is two big red waving flags for fraud when done on the web. Transactions went through just fine.
I had a hearty laugh when I saw a seven minute unboxing video for the Apple Card on the front page of reddit. An unboxing video for a credit card that was somehow stretched into 7 minutes. The video included genius quotes such as "it fits into my wallet" and "it's about the same size as my other credit cards". This is the content that somehow got thousands of upvotes.
It's seriously amazing how far the apple fandom has come.
The amazing thing is probably more generally the fact that unboxing videos, no matter how trivial, are popular video content. The Apple fandom just adds a tiny bit.
Is it your intention to miss-lead or do you not realize that the credit card is made entirely out of Titanium, which is a novel concept and obviously raises questions about weight, size, and look.
"novel"? Is it your intention to miss-lead [sic] or do you not realize that metal credit cards have been a thing for decades?
The Chase Sapphire Reserve/Preferred, two of the most popular credit cards in recent years, are metal cards. The Amazon credit card is metal. The AmEx Platinum is a metal card. And this is just a handful of cards among the 22 listed here [1].
This is, in fact, not a novel concept. Billy McFarland of Fyre Festival fame had previously started a company, Magnesis, which also offered a metal credit card.
And a much worse APR than every other card I have. I was mildly interested until the application process showed me how much extra I'd pay just to not have a late fee.
I'm dumbfounded anytime I hear people even talk about credit card interest rates. Why are people borrowing money at double digit interest rates? Unless your kids are starving, what could be the investment that makes borrowing at that cost worth it?
I have no clue what my credit card interest rates are, they're all set to autopay.
You really should be paying off your balance in full every month so you’re not paying interest at all. Even the lowest credit card interest rates are exorbitant.
You're in luck! Currently there is no law requiring you to sign up for an Apple Card. Since it doesn't meet your criteria, you can avoid getting it just simply doing absolutely nothing! Problem solved!
American society is centered around spending money, and the ability to do so - look at the hoop-la around identity theft, credit ratings and the Equifax data breach.
No other developed country has that hoop-la.
The Apple Card is just a new "device" that allows people to spend money, and Americans love that ability, and will continue to worship it.
I've had my Apple Card for a little over a week, and it's great how well the app works.
Paying my bill is two taps and a FaceID authentication. That's it. There is simply no comparison to the process using my other credit card apps.
Apple let's me make multiple payments each day. My Chase card used to allow that, but hasn't for about a year.
Apple lets me pay any day I want. Chase doesn't process payments in weekends. It sometimes credits me for the payment, but it doesn't fully process until Monday. And if I make a payment in a Saturday, I can't make another one on Sunday.
The Apple Card is the most frictionless credit card experience I've had in the 28 years I've had credit cards.
In terms of security, I've had my card cloned. Within minutes the bank locked the account and had a new card shipped. Hardly a big pain point they are solving. And most of us have more than one, so if any of our cards are down, we have others. It's merchants that currently carry the cost of low quality financial instrument standards we have.
For privacy, if I valued it over the $x,xxx I get back every year in the form of cash back, free insurance on rentals, etc, I'd use the most private of all instruments.... Cash.
Pretty mediocre card if you ask me. Of course, the cool factor will make this a success. They only need the right % of the cool crowd to move in on it, and the rest will follow the virality. Oh us humans.
>For privacy, if I valued it over the $x,xxx I get back every year in the form of cash back, free insurance on rentals, etc, I'd use the most private of all instruments.... Cash.
My guess is that Apple is trying to provide a middle ground between fully private instruments such as cash, with convenience of a credit card.
Its much more privacy focused than your average credit card, while offering the same convenience. The price you pay for the extra privacy is the lack luster rewards.
My guess is they are trying to appeal to that group... as an aside to the main cool factor.
Look at the presentation of the card and the offering. When the presentation is more competitive than the offering, you know they are trying to sell you $10 bars of chocolate. Very cool. Not the best.
How are you doing 3%? Rolling rewards? Doesn't seem like there are a lot of 3% cards out there without an annual fee or a set of conditions to try and fulfill.
2% on all Apple Pay purchases is pretty straightforward.
Not to mention the 2% and 3% cash back are for certain categories and there are limits to how much you can get back in a given year with other cards.
For example, most cards will allow you to get a 2% cash back up to $6,000 per year. I have yet to find a card that has unlimited 2% cash back on ALL purchases.
Apple Card is unlimited 2% back, no category restrictions, as long as you use Apple Pay. That's quite a deal.
2% back at places that allow NFC payment is a major distinction. All the major credit cards seem to offer some kind of incentive to use Google Pay, Samsung Pay, Apple Pay, NFC, etc.
But I expect these incentives to start to dry up when you can actually use it regularly. I've never been able to use NFC payment to buy a meal at a sit down restaurant or bar, grocery stores and Target are just barely getting it everywhere. Its hard to get excited about 2% on my in store 7-11 purchases.
Samsung already destroyed the worth of their points last year when there was even a slight tick up in retailers. Theres only one fee free card I know of thats even slightly worth getting that offers true unlimited 2%, the Double Cash, and its usually not recommended because people who actually regularly use and research cards because it doesn't offer a bonus.
FWIW, unless you're on one of their lower end phones you can also use Samsung Pay on a regular credit card reader. Most Samsung phones can emulate the mag stripe of a credit card if you hold them near the swipe area.
Like other people mentioned, the tech is called magnetic secure transmission. I don't have a source for "most", but it's been in all of their flagships and some of the midrange phones since the Galaxy S6 so it seemed like a safe assumption. The only 2 places it doesn't work easily for me are Trader Joe's and gas stations. There's a hacky workaround to use MST at gas stations but IMO it's not worth the effort (the pumps expect a card to be physically inserted, so you can just put in a library card or your driver's license before you hold your phone up to the reader)
I had double cash until someone skimmed my card and citi didn’t notice. I had to catch it, make a complaint, then sign bullshit forms asking if the following name was mine. It just stumped me how they didn’t catch it - there were purchases being made in different geographies on the same day as I was making purchases elsewhere. I lost total confidence in citi as a trustworthy company after that.
Capital one is way more proactive on catching fraud, so I use their 1.5% quicksilver. Several times they have asked me about potentially fraud purchases. Totally worth it for peace of mind.
I realize that I’m not liable for fraud credit card purchases but it’s still a stressful hassle to catch fraud yourself, challenge purchases, go through the motions and eventually get them dropped months later.
Barclays I use for dining out and travel, have yet to see how they are.
The way the Citi Double Cash Card works is you get 1% for every dollar spent and 1% for every dollar paid.
- It is actually 1.98% because when you apply it to a statement credit you are not really paying off the full total. You get a straight 2% back, daily, with Apple Card.
- There is also a redemption minimum with Citi, in this case there needs to be at least $25 dollars in cash back before you can claim it. Apple doesn't have that.
- Citi card has foreign transaction fees. Apple Card does not.
- The rewards "expire" with Citi. Apple's doesn't.
- Citi's rewards are given to you after your first statement is paid off and higher than 25 dollars. Apple's is given daily, and you can do what you want with those cash rewards.
> - It is actually 1.98% because when you apply it to a statement credit you are not really paying off the full total. You get a straight 2% back, daily, with Apple Card.
You get a straight 1% back, daily, with Apple Card (except for Apple Pay purchases).
There are plenty of 2% cash back credit cards (just Google the term and you'll find plenty of places blogging about them.) I have the Alliant 3% cash back card--it's 3% for the entire first year on every purchase.
Amex has Blue Cash Everyday - the non fee on gives you 3% on supermarkets, no fee. The premium one with a $95/year fee gives you 6%. The max on these amounts is really high, and I have a number of cards to work with.
For online stores and restaurants/bars, I get 4% back with my uber card from barclays, again no fee (in fact both of these cards give you money just for signing up).
For me, restaurants/bars + supermarkets are the majority of my expenses, the other being housing, which I pay with direct transfer, no credit card option.
Most of my cards also offer extended warranty, free insurance on rental cars, free trip insurance, phone insurance, etc.
2% is the least I get when swiping, there's a lot of options for this including the city double with no fee. Apple wants me to exchange that for 1% and they make a big deal out of it. I mean, ok, they give a little more privacy, but again, if you value that, cash is king. I will say, their cool factor is really high, the packaging for this is way nicer than even very premium credit cards I've had.
It's not difficult to average 3% or more with a stack of credit cards, if you're willing to juggle them. Obviously going with an across the board 2% rate is easier.
Uber Visa 4% on dining
Costco Visa 4% for gas
Amazon Prime Visa 5% on Amazon and Whole Foods purchases
[add more to cover your major spending categories]
Citi Doublecash for 2% on everything else
I’ve got 300k points between AmEx and Chase and I recently realized I can’t ever use them when I want to. I don’t want to play all the games of which points can I use where and when. I don’t want an annual fee. I don’t want to have to juggle several different cards. I don’t want to have to “activate” this quarter’s latest deals. So I just switched to a straight 2% cash back card.
My one exception was keeping the Chase Amazon card since it’s 5% back at Whole Foods and that’s too much to turn down.
But I made the Apple Card my other exception today. My credit files are unfrozen at the moment as I juggle cards so I decided why not grab it. It was a simple application process and I tied it to my Apple ID so I get 3% back from Apple for my iTunes and iCloud purchases.
I don’t get folks coming here to criticize the card. It’s just a credit card. Take it or leave it.