Schwab ending card sponsorship - says no terms change though

germanpope said: defjukie said: germanpope said: I got this card on the $200 sign up promo (x2 included wife)

they have collected exactly 0 interest from me and minimal purchases --- my CL ended up about 20k where it sits now

I don't have any Schwab accounts

I am one of the reasons for them to opt out of this product


...

congratulations?

You did not get a $200 sign-up promo for this card, you're getting it confused.


actually, I got two of them or $400

sorry you missed out on the deal

This card has never had sign up bonus cash offered.

The attraction of this card is the 2% rebate on everything without a minimum spending first, AND the 0% forex fee. It quickly became a hot product, never needed sign up bonus to gain market share.

May be you have been living in Fantasy Land?

The attraction for me is getting CB every month, whereas w/ my Discover CB, I have to wait til I accumulate $20 worth of CB before being able to redeem it.

donthvname said: This card has never had sign up bonus cash offered.Note that there's more than one Schwab credit card. See the first sentence in this thread: "both its credit cards". The 2% card is what most people care about now, but the other one probably had a sign up bonus.

t60 said: Do people have to keep mentioning that the letter arrived? It's inevitable that all card holders will get it (of course unless the USPS loses yours). There's no value add for mentioning that you've received it, and IMO just clutters the thread.Agreed. Suggest we wait for additional information. Endless repetition and endless hand wringing

DEL

I had to call customer service for the second time this month because they had not deposited my earned rewards, which are usually done by the 9th. Afterwards I asked about the changes. The CSR told me that I should get a new welcome package in early October, with a new card just saying FIA, that it would still be 2% and that it could be deposited into any account. She hesitated when I asked about the no forex fee. I told her that I have a trip out of the country next month but she "believed" that I should be ok. She wasn't very reassuring about that aspect. She said that they had some new training and bulletins sent out to them yesterday and that they are still trying to figure out the changes themselves.

DaveHanson said: New NYT blog entry on this change was just posted.

Columnist Ron Lieber links this thread, and has some quotations from the various players involved. Like many here (myself included), Lieber infers that BofA will be removing the 2% rewards soon.

Since the grandfathered 2% Fido 529 cards come with a $1,500 a year cap, I'm hoping they avoid the ax a bit longer. We'll see.

The $1500 cap argues against using the card now). You may hit the cap earlier if you start charging on it now.If you are not going to use it yet, why get it ahead of time.

deerblue said: I had to call customer service for the second time this month because they had not deposited my earned rewards, which are usually done by the 9th. Afterwards I asked about the changes. The CSR told me that I should get a new welcome package in early October, with a new card just saying FIA, that it would still be 2% and that it could be deposited into any account. She hesitated when I asked about the no forex fee. I told her that I have a trip out of the country next month but she "believed" that I should be ok. She wasn't very reassuring about that aspect. She said that they had some new training and bulletins sent out to them yesterday and that they are still trying to figure out the changes themselves.

Relax. FIA must give you 45 days notice for fee changes ( http://www.federalreserve.gov/consumerinfo/wyntk_creditcardrules... ). If they don't mail out the welcome package until early October, any possible changes wouldn't go into effect until middle of November at the earliest, and I imagine your out-of-the-country trip will conclude by then.

GeniusHabit said: deerblue said: I had to call customer service for the second time this month because they had not deposited my earned rewards, which are usually done by the 9th. Afterwards I asked about the changes. The CSR told me that I should get a new welcome package in early October, with a new card just saying FIA, that it would still be 2% and that it could be deposited into any account. She hesitated when I asked about the no forex fee. I told her that I have a trip out of the country next month but she "believed" that I should be ok. She wasn't very reassuring about that aspect. She said that they had some new training and bulletins sent out to them yesterday and that they are still trying to figure out the changes themselves.

Relax. FIA must give you 45 days notice for fee changes ( http://www.federalreserve.gov/consumerinfo/wyntk_creditcardrules... ). If they don't mail out the welcome package until early October, any possible changes wouldn't go into effect until middle of November at the earliest, and I imagine your out-of-the-country trip will conclude by then.

Credit card companies don't have to give you any notice with regards to rewards. Only fees and interest rate changes.

Called today and got a CL increase. In to max before theoretical reward changes!

The 1% card was a great card. 6-9% interest rate, even for cash advances. 1% Cash Back. Many great "teaser" APRs "until paid off".

Where else could you cut a check for 2.9% for 18 months -- or 5.4% "until paid off" (and sometimes less!) on a regular basis? This was better than auto loan rates before the economic bust.

And most of all... they didn't jack with the terms when everyone else was raising rates.

Not to mention the ~$200 I received for opening it (Thank you, fat wallet, many years ago).

I'm not saying it's the best, but it's a very well rounded card and has some very good purposes as a source of unsecured liquid cash.

If your solely looking for rewards, there's probably better vehicles for this, but 1% isn't too shabby.

pc500 said: The 1% card was a great card. 6-9% interest rate, even for cash advances. 1% Cash Back. Many great "teaser" APRs "until paid off".

Where else could you cut a check for 2.9% for 18 months -- or 5.4% "until paid off" (and sometimes less!) on a regular basis? This was better than auto loan rates before the economic bust.

And most of all... they didn't jack with the terms when everyone else was raising rates.

Not to mention the ~$200 I received for opening it (Thank you, fat wallet, many years ago).

I'm not saying it's the best, but it's a very well rounded card and has some very good purposes as a source of unsecured liquid cash.

If your solely looking for rewards, there's probably better vehicles for this, but 1% isn't too shabby.

If you are affected by interest rates on credit cards, you're doing it wrong.

IMO, there is nothing special about the Schwab Worldpoints card (I believe they took away the no foreign transaction perk on that one years ago, which I seem to remember is why I closed the account). It is essentially just one of many 1% CashBack cards.

germanpope said: some of us played our cards right --- took just a few deals, worked the credit lines --- and ended up untouched by 2008

I took every deal I could (within reason) and not a single one of my credit lines was affected.

defjukie said: .... IMO, there is nothing special about the Schwab Worldpoints card (I believe they took away the no foreign transaction perk on that one years ago, which I seem to remember is why I closed the account). It is essentially just one of many 1% CashBack cards.
.

there is nothing wrong with a post-2008 20k+ credit line hooked up to MBNA bill pay at 5%

maybe there are dozen of cards that could give me such a low rate --- but this one did

and this one is part of thread

....

defjukie said: back to the topic at hand:

I think the reason they had mostly "devil customers" (and, in turn, the card wasn't profitable for them), is that you really had to jump through hoops and be financial-minded to take advantage of this card. IMO, the average CC user is not interested in having to open up an investment account to collect CC rewards (and they probably didn't realize you could just take the cash out, either.)

I think if FIA wanted to attract more interest-producing customers for themselves, they could lower the bar for entry (just make it a flat 2%, or 2% in Worldpoints) and we could go back to letting the unwashed masses subsidize our rewards.

when Schwab ventured into this business ... they may have had a bigger marketing purpose (attract customers to Schwab and make Schwab more of a one-stop shop)

the promos for the original card ran for a period of time and must brought in new customers to Schwab ... later they may have moved to the 2% card to have a competitive offer

and in the end ... it was a business decision to drop the whole thing ... AT&T did the same thing years ago except back then you didn't pay people but you guaranteed no fee for life

ufguy2006 said: Card Update: Hello everyone. Just received a replacement card in the mail (requested it as my other card was cracked) for my Invest First Platinum Plus card. Spoke to a senior rep who informed me that the card will not longer have the 2% Cash Back, but will have a 1 point per dollar reward structure which can be redeemed for "Cash Back", airline tickets, etc. She mentioned this new rewards structure will be in place soon. She said they've been getting numerous calls about this card and that seems to be the direction FIA is taking. When I asked about the no forex fees she said that for that one item they have not yet heard the decision but expect that there will be forex fees. I am not surprised at how quickly they are changing the rewards program.

She did say however they will have new promotions including some interesting "balance transfer" promotions in the near future. No thanks.

So basically this card went from amazing to dud overnight?

now let's see how long the Fidelity 2% Mastercard stays around

because they closed this one off in 2006 --- maybe we get lucky

Eff u Schwab and FIA...we will all move on from your BS!

if forex fees are coming back, that's the last straw for me and the card...

In the beginning, God created Fidelity MC 2% rebate.

Later, he stopped the Fidelity MC for NEW CC accounts and only allowed AMEX.