New Credit Card Sets Annual Fee Dynamically, Based On Benefit Usage

Among savvy Redditors and credit card blogs, there’s a common thread with many recent credit card changes. “It feels like a coupon book” is often the consumer reaction, particularly as annual fees rise as justification for an increasing number of partner offer benefits, which if consumed in entirety could lead to more value.

Since many people simply won’t use all the benefits and partner offers being baked into the card, people increasingly feel like the annual fee rises are getting too steep. In a bold move, a new card launched today which offers a flexible annual fee, based only on the benefits you actually use.

The New Card

Signed up for a card named after a precious or semi precious metal and shocked by the $450-$695 fee? You’re not alone.

To get your money back from such a fee, you’d need to take advantage of regular lounge access at airports, utilize your TSA PreCheck/Global Entry credit, maximize every monthly dining or entertainment credit and sign up for every other fee credit, which often requires a purchase.

To quell this issue, the new card is effectively a build your own card, card.

Despite the innovation, the card draws on the historical concept of the coupon book, where you only pay for the offers you tear out and redeem. The annual fee starts at zero, but as you actually redeem the cards benefits, you get billed accordingly. Your fee can be zero, or as high as $10,000 per year.

Here’s how the fees add up…

• Lounge access $50 billed to annual fee after first use
• Eats/Dash credits, $10 added to annual fee for every $15 in delivery credits
• $65 added to annual fee for $100 hotel property credit
• $9.99 in annual fee for every $12 of entertainment/streaming credit you redeem
• $50 annual fee addition for redemption of $100 TSA/Global Entry credit

Done right, you can end up paying $650 in annual fees for about $800 worth of stuff, some of which you wanted and most of which, about $700 worth, you didn’t really want or need, but felt compelled to get, just because it’s there.

This model allows you to really dive into the classic coupon book, feeling like you’re really tearing offers out of the page, and simply leaving the ones you’re not using in the book. You’re only paying for the ones you rip out, but when there’s so many offers to choose from, the book just feels so compelling.

Obviously, it’s April 1st and no such card is coming to the market (yet, lol), but hopefully this light hearted amusement has been a helpful exercise in framing the true value you’re really extracting from your premium credit card, or conversely, the lack thereof.

Consider the things you’d actually purchase without the “offer” prompt and if that number still adds up to be more than the annual fee, you’re doing it right. If it doesn’t…