Return Of The Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard

Limited Options

Update: As of 6/6/13, the MasterCard link is currently down. It may come back at some time in the future but not exactly sure.

As a person new to the game of frequent flyer miles and credit cards, it is fairly easy to rack up 500,000 miles / points in a single round of applications without breaking a sweat.

However, if you are someone who has been doing this a while, it gets a bit more challenging as you saw in my post yesterday concerning my most recent round of credit card applications.

The reason for this is because over the past few years, I have gotten all the low hanging fruit (mostly Chase Cards with HUGE sign up bonuses). 

Since I already have 21+ open credit cards, when I went to do last week’s round of applications, I had to pick up some obscure cards like Bank of America’s Alaska Airlines card, US Bank’s Club Carlson, and American Express’s Delta Card (not exactly obscure but not really very valuable).

While there are some cards you can apply for and get the bonus repeatedly (like US Airways), with most cards you either have to wait a long time (2 years) to get the bonus again or for many cards you simply are not allowed to get the bonus again.

If the bank enforces the mandatory waiting period or “once in a lifetime” sign up bonus per a card, there isn’t really much you can do to work around it.

Surprise, Surprise

A FFU Reader and friend who I first met on the Star MegaDO 3, Kathy from WillRunForMiles.com, sent me an email today asking which new cards to get.

I sent her a laundry list of the typical cards I recommend, but she had all of them.

She then asked about the Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard.

Last October, I talked about the Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard in my post about which Chase cards earn Ultimate Rewards Points. I was under the impression that the MasterCard link was dead because I tried to sign up for the card last week.

She sent me back a link to FlyerTalk, where apparently someone had dug through FFU and found a working MasterCard link in that post from October!

So to my surprise, it looks like that the Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard link is back up and working!

Link To Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard

Why This Is Important

The reason why this is important is because Chase considers the Chase Sapphire Preferred Visa and Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard, 2 SEPARATE CARDS!

Although the cards look identical, have the same earning features, sign on bonus, etc, because one says MasterCard and one says Visa, Chase allows you to get the 40,000 Point Sign Up Bonus for each “flavor” of the Card.

This means you don’t have to wait 2+ years to sign up for it again, or worse, not be able to get the sign up bonus again!

Although the application in the above link doesn’t say Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard, Kathy went ahead and signed up for it and called Chase to confirm.

There are also other confirmed reports of it being a Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard in the FlyerTalk thread.

So if it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it is probably a duck…

The only caveat is that if you currently have a Chase Sapphire Preferred Visa, you CAN’T also get a Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard at the same time. Kathy tried!

That being said, you certainly should be able to downgrade your Chase Sapphire Preferred Visa to a Chase Sapphire (regular) or Chase Freedom, and then apply for a Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard without issue.

Recap

The fact that the Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard link is back is great news because it was MIA (missing in action, not Miami), for a long time.

Even on Chase.com, they don’t promote or link to the Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard version!

That being said, the Chase Sapphire Preferred is one of the absolute best cards out there and Ultimate Rewards are the most valuable currency in terms of miles / points.

Had I seen this MasterCard link last week, I certainly would have signed up for it again!

If you are thinking about getting the Chase Sapphire Preferred MasterCard, I’d do it sooner rather than later because the link might disappear again!

-Parag

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