Which New JetBlue Card Is Right For You?

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Update: Offer expired.

-The base card has no annual fee and offers 10K points for spending $1,000 in 90 days.
-The Plus card has a $99 annual fee and offers 30K points for spending $1,000 in 90 days.

What’s that signup bonus worth? It all depends on the flights you take, but here are 3 examples:
1. JFK-Chicago on 5/11 is $63.10 or 3.7K points+$5.60. That’s a value of 1.55 cents per point (63.10-5.60/3,700).
2. JFK-Los Angeles on 5/11 is $138.10 or 9.2K points+$5.60. That’s a value of 1.44 cents per point.
3. JFK-Fort Lauderdale on 5/11 is $85.10 or 5.3K points+$5.60. That’s a value of 1.5 cents per point.

Assuming a value of 1.5 cents per point that would make the 10K bonus worth about $150 and the 30K bonus worth about $450.

-The Plus card also offers a 10% points rebate every time you redeem your points. The rebate will post within 1 business day of using points. That effectively makes your points about 10% more valuable and bumps up the signup bonus value of the Plus card to about $500. It means that the JFK-ORD example will really only cost Plus cardholders 3,330 points, the JFK-LAX flight will cost 8,280 points, and the JFK-FLL flight will cost just 4,770 points after the 10% rebate.

-JetBlue points never expire. JetBlue also allows families to pool their points together.

-The Plus card offers a free checked bag for the cardholder and up to 3 passengers on the same reservation. That’s a value of up to $160 in waived checked bag fees per round-trip.

-The Plus card offers 5,000 points upon every card anniversary. Combined with the 10% rebate that’s 5,500 points that are worth about $83 towards JetBlue flights. That drops the effective annual fee from $99 down to just $16.

-The Plus card offers an annual $100 statement credit when you book a $100+ JetBlue vacation package.

-If you spend $50K in a calendar year on the Plus card then you’ll get JetBlue Mosaic status for the remainder of the calendar year and for the following calendar year.
Mosaic status includes free changes and cancellations on JetBlue tickets for the Mosaic member and for everyone on their itinerary, 2 free checked bags, 15K bonus points for earning Mosaic status every year, free even more speed checkin and security access, early boarding, 3 additional points per dollar spent, free alcoholic beverages onboard, and a dedicated Mosaic 24/7 customer service line.

-Both cards offer 2 points per dollar on groceries and restaurants as well as 1 point per dollar everywhere else. The Plus card also offers 6 points per dollar on JetBlue purchases while the base card offers 3 points per dollar. That’s on top of the 3-11 points per dollar that you earn for the flight itself, which makes for a nice rebate on JetBlue flights.

-Both cards also offer a 50% rebate for in-flight purchases of cocktails, food, JetBlue movies and other eligible purchases.

-Both cards offer no foreign transaction fees.

It’s nice that they are offering a no-annual fee base card, but the benefits are pretty spartan when compared to fee-free cards like Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, and AMEX Everyday. The main advantage is the lack of foreign transactions fees, but other than that it’s slim pickings.

The Plus card on the other hand is a no-brainer, even for once-per-year JetBlue flyers. The signup bonus makes it well worth the initial $99 annual fee and the anniversary bonus makes it worth keeping the card despite the $99 annual fee. The free checked bags and the 10% rebate on award tickets seal the deal on a very solid card offering. And the very generous bonus points offered on JetBlue purchases is icing on the cake.

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21 Comments On "Which New JetBlue Card Is Right For You?"

All opinions expressed below are user generated and the opinions aren’t provided, reviewed or endorsed by any advertiser or DansDeals.

yitz

How is JetBlue with offering availability?

Dan

@yitz:
It’s a revenue based program, there are no blackout dates. You just redeem your points at a value of about 1.5 cents per point, so the amount of points will correlate with the actual cost of the flight.
Click “TrueBlue points” from JetBlue.com to check how many points you need for any given flight.

thenewguy

Dan i gotta say, most people donyt spend enough on “jetblue purchases” to make that special enough to get this card over a typical card. the signup bonus on any of the other airlines cards of 50k (southwest) or 40k (american) seems to be a much more solid deal

Dan

@thenewguy:
Ignore the spend benefits. There are typically better cards for spending than on any airline card.

The main value of the card is that there’s practically no annual fee on the Plus card due to the signup and anniversary bonus. That means the main perks, the free checked bags and the 10% points rebate are nearly free for the taking and that’s a very solid value proposition for even infrequent JetBlue flyers.

The AA card doesn’t have such an anniversary bonus and Southwest’s anniversary bonus is less generous and that card doesn’t offer any additional luggage benefit or points rebate. That means there’s no real reason to hold onto the Southwest card, but the JetBlue card is worth keeping around.

Anonymous

Barclay’s might refund AF first year if about to close ??

Dan

@Anonymous:
Definitely a possibility, they’re pretty generous on other cards.

emak

3bm works on barclays? what other cards should i look at?

Dan

@emak:
3 would be tough, 2 might be doable.
Arrival Plus has a nice signup bonus:
http://www.dansdeals.com/go/ArrivalPlusCB/

Jesse

I called them after receiving the $99 a year card and said I don’t want it because it’s too expensive.
They waived the first year!

Mendy

Do you think i can sign up for multiple JetBlue plus cards at once, and get only one pull? (The idea is to get approved for all of them in one day 😉

Dan

@Jesse:
Nice!

@Mendy:
It’s worked in the past, but things are tougher nowadays.
If you try, let us know!

Strugglin

Had the AMEX JetBlue card, and was automatically sent the Barclay’s free JB card. Will Barclay’s allow the Plus card in addition to free card; am I eligible to get the sign-up bonus for the Plus card? Thanks!

thenewguy

@dan: if you’re maintaining that the value of the card is the checked bags and the 10% “rebate” on your spent points, then the Barclaycard Arrival Plus is a better bet– you get 10% on points and a big signup bonus of 40,000 points. no annual fee first year. so if you factor that at face value the barclaycard points are worth $400 (plus 10% back)then the valuies are about the same–the only value you get extra from jetblue card is checked bag for free. thats it.

is it really worth holding this card every year to get the anniversary value when youd get teh same value from a card in only the first month?

Anonymous

Best flights to the C. Islands

Sean

@Dan:

Dan – for LAX-JFK (11/3 at 6:25), Blue class is $240, Mint class is $974. But with points, Blue class is 10.7k points, Mint class is 74.4k points. I don’t see a linear increase, more like an exponential one

Noam

Hi you received the card and called them right away and said the fee was too much and they waived it? Didn’t they say you could just get the no annual fee card instead? I want to do the same as you just want to see how you argued it so I can pay no fee.

Anonymous

@Strugglin: yeah. I’d like to know too

Dan

@Strugglin:
If you get approved you’ll get the points.
Let us know what happens if you try.

@Anonymous:
You can, but if you just want to keep the card the points are worth nearly as much as the fee.

@thenewguy:
You make it sound like the bag benefit is a small thing. On 1 trip I’d spend $160 on bags. To have a card that lets you do that for an effective $!6 annual fee is a sweet deal.

@Sean:
The value of the points are less for Mint class.

@Noam:
I’ve done that before, just need to plead your case.

12Hrs

@Strugglin I have the amex converted Jetblue card and the New Plus Jetblue card

@Dan from what I can tell the 15k bonus won’t post from earning Mosaic via the CC. At least from Jetblue’s website it says “15,000 bonus points are only awarded to members who qualify for Mosaic by earning 15,000 base flight points or 12,000 base flight points + flying 30 segments on JetBlue flights within a calendar year.”

Although in theory thats just excluding status match etc. And that could also be pre barclay jetblue cards. I had one rep tell me I would earn it. If you do earn the 15k bonus it changes the value proposition slightly.

Strugglin

@12Hrs: thanks, applied and received initial approval. Thanks, Dan.

Noam

Do you get the miles up front or after you spend $1000 in 3 months – I assume would be hard to argue for the refund of the annual fee after you already spent the $99 in the first month to pay for the card?

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