Changes Coming for the Chase Sapphire Reserve® (Including an Annual Fee Increase to $550)

Let’s cut to the chase: all the rumors, talk, and whispers about changes for the Chase Sapphire Reserve® are true. Here’s what we know so far.

(This information was first reported by The Points Guy)

Annual Fee Increase

This is the biggest change you’ll likely see. The annual fee is increasing from $450 to $550. The change will take place on January 12th, so if you were considering opening a Chase Sapphire Reserve®, do so before then.

For existing cardholders, if your renewal falls after April 1st, you’ll see the increased fee. If you’re like me, and you opened the card when it released back in October of 2016, this means you’ll be paying the $550 annual fee later this year.

Lyft Pink Status

To help offset the increased annual fee, you’re going to receive one free year of Lyft Pink.

Normally $19.99 per month, Lyft Pink’s value primarily lies with frequent riders. With a Lyft Pink membership, you’ll receive the following benefits:

• 15% savings on all car rides
• Priority airport pickups
• Surprise Offers
• Relaxed Cancellations – 3 cancel fees per month are covered if you rebook within 15 minutes
• Waived lost and found fees
• Free 30 minute bike or scooter rides per month, up to 3 times per month, in select markets
• Currently, this is only for the first year. We will have to wait and see if this continues with each card-member year, or if you’ll be charged after the first 12 months.

Extra Earnings on Lyft Rides

In addition to the Lyft Pink membership, you’ll earn points at a higher rate when you use your Chase Sapphire Reserve® to pay for Lyft rides. You’ll earn 10 points for every dollar spent on Lyft when you pay with your CSR.

Keep in mind, rideshare is usually considered travel, so you may be able to stack this with the $300 annual travel credit as well. Again, this will be something we have to wait and see, but should make sense based on how Lyft has previously coded on the CSR.

DoorDash DashPass

Another targeted benefit, you’ll receive DashPass from DoorDash. You can already sign up for this benefit at https://www.doordash.com/dashpass-v2/chase/sapphire-reserve/ if you have a CSR (activate by 3/31/22).

DashPass will get you $0 delivery fee and reduced service fees on orders over $12 from restaurants with the DashPass checkmark.

If you sign up now, it will be good through December 31, 2021. Again, we don’t know if this will be an ongoing free benefit or if you’ll have to pay $9.99 per month after the expiration, but we will have to wait and see.

DoorDash Credits

Finally, the last confirmed item is DoorDash Credits. Cardholders are eligible to receive a total of $120 in DoorDash credits. Reading the fine print on this one makes it not so clear. You’ll receive $60 in 2020 and another $60 in 2021.

My Thoughts So Far…

These are pretty underwhelming changes for a $100 annual fee increase. Sure, you’re getting about $360 in services for the increase, and $60 in credits (let’s be real, saying $120 is pretty misleading when they aren’t all in the same calendar year). But unless you were paying for these before, I think most people will find them underwhelming.

While the increased earning on Lyft is nice, and will likely convince me to use Lyft more than Uber, I don’t use rideshares enough to find it worthwhile – especially when many competitors to the CSR are earning 4x or more on the same categories.

If you’re thinking of closing your card, I would at least wait to use the DoorDash credits first. Older card holders will have a few months to test-drive the benefits first to really see if they’re worth it before being faced with the increased annual fee.

What are your thoughts? We’ve got a large discussion going over in the 10xTravel Facebook Insider’s Group. Come join us, and see what others have to say about these changes.