I have been a Chase Sony Rewards card holder for several years, as I discussed in my post What is in My Wallet. Yesterday in the mail I received a letter that my Chase Sony Rewards card has been turned over to Capital One. When I looked more into it last night, I guess I never paid to much attention that according to the thread on FatWallet, new cards apparently have been issued by Capital One for a while now.
The terms of the new offer can be read here.
Ideally, nothing is really changing other than the branding of the card. I can not imagine that it would, but I need to call Capital One within the next day or two to make sure they do not perform a new credit pull for the new card. I have read Capital One pulls from all three bureaus on a credit check, so I want to make sure they are not going to pull again. One would think it might not be typical for the practice to pull credit reports again since I already have the card, but when my old NetBank account was going to be transfered to ING Direct several years ago, ING was going to do a new credit pull just because they were taking over the account. Therefore, I need to protect our interests, and it is critical that I monitor my credit reports since we know we will be getting a new mortgage once we sell our current home.
So other than the issue of possible new credit pulls, what might be some implecations of this change? Well as I mentioned in my previous discussion on this card, we do not really use it much since Sony Reward points have little value to us. As of this writing, I have over 60,000 points sitting in my account, for which I have little use for them. It would be one thing if I actually needed a new television or other major electronic, but we do not. We already have a Sony flat screen in our living room. My wife and I have discussed that once we get our new home, we might use the points to get a new Sony flat screen television for another room of our home.
Overall, I am kinda glad that the Sony Rewards card has been transferred to Capital One. My main reason is that the majority of the good airline credit cards offers that I have seen over the past year have all been through Chase Bank. Therefore, I was limited in the amount of Chase cards I could hold, which was reported as three cards. I had held two Chase cards between my Sony Rewards card and United Airlines card. Therefore, this change just opened up the door for me to open new Chase airline credit cards should the offer be notable in the future. Again, we would only consider pulling new credit cards though after we acquire our new mortgage so we do not impact our credit reports.
Capital One is the worst card to own. They are tricky and change the terms whenever they want.
Hard to close account and quick to burn your credit.
You have any problems and they will eat you alive.
Absolutely agree. I wonder if we can do anything about this.
I hate capital one I dumped them years ago now I,m stuck with them again I will close my account with sony
@Danny- Before you close your account, make sure to think about if it will have any impact on your credit file. If you have held the card a long time, and have a substantial credit line in relation to other cards, you might want to consider just putting the card in your drawer. Closing the account might not just be the best decision, depending on your own circumstances.
When are the new cards being transferred over to capitol one. I have not received mine yet
@Jack: The conversion over to Capital One has officially happened. New cards are supposed to be issued no later than mid-July, so we still have some time until the new cards arrive. I have not yet received mine either.
I haven’t received mine yet, either. My main concern is whether or not a one-time payment I had scheduled via Chase, prior to the switch, will be still be applied by Capital One, come the scheduled date 6/22… I don’t want get hit w/ a $35 late fee! That would be a bad start to business w/ Capital One. haha
Dear Readers: FYI, my new card arrived today. Same number as before, only with a new look.
Capital One has ruined a great program. Sony Rewards just isn’t worth having anymore. Once I get to 11,000 points I’m buying a gift card and will put away my card.
@WOF- Would you mind elaborating on why you have not been happy with Capitol One and the Sony Rewards program? I have not used the card since the transfer, but am curious to hear other people’s experiences.
Frankly the Sony program has gone down hill to the point that it isn’t worth having whether it was backed by Chase or any other bank.
I’ve had the card for nearly 10 years and in the early years I used it for so many business trips I was able to rack up enough points for some pretty nice stuff… Now the site has become little more than a clearance center. I am sitting on about 700 dollars in points at the moment and can’t find anything worth buying. I look at another digital camera and the good ones are always out of stock…. I look at the TVs and they are so vastly overpriced compared to the same thing in a Bestbuy that it seems like throwing the points away…
I am just waiting now for the chance to grab some lucky random clearance item and then quit.
I was a real happy camper when I signed up for the Sony card with Chase. I have earned so many points just by playing the daily games and answering poll questions. At least 500 points a month. When Crapitol One took over, they got rid of all the polls and games, except for WOF Bonus Puzzle, which was 20 points before, is now 10 points. I am very close to $300 in points and as soon as I hit that, this card is shredded. They have ruined a great program. I had been with Crapitol One before. They are a terrible company and I never want to be their customer again.
I have used the new card once, at a gas pump out of emergency. Then I remembered what they did to the Sony Rewards program, so it was very discouraging to use this card. I applied for the Chase Sapphire, spent 3k in the first 3 months and got 25k bonus points. Then I got a promotional email to sign up for a free checking account, deposited 1,5k in it and got a bonus of 150 bucks. 2X points on dining and traveling, 1X points for everything else, no annual fee and the points never expire. I love Chase.
Capital One has the worst customer service, without any warnings they will refuse to honor payments, I’ve just got screwed with a late fee because the wonderful capitol one Sony card declined to post the payment.
Closed all my credit card accounts with them, prefer to use cash than credit.
I’m very concerned about this transfer. Capital is the worst of the worst. We should have been given an option rather than this.