How to Tell the Cash Back Rewards Level for a Specific Store

How to Tell the Cash Back Rewards Level for a Specific Store

Here's a tip for how you can determine a store's rewards level for cash back credit cards. It's not a very good tip IMO, but it's a tip. ;-)

But before we get to that, let's review the situation:

Some cards, like the card I currently have listed as the best cash back credit card, the Chase Freedom card (FYI, $200 cash back bonus still available here: Chase FreedomR Visa - $200 Bonus Cash Back), offer increased cash back percentages for charges in certain categories.
As I wrote in How to Determine a Store's Classification for Cash Back Credit Card Rewards, making a "test charge" and seeing how a specific store's charges are accounted for is (or at least I thought) the only way to determine what percentage cash back you'd get by charging there.
But this seems like a huge waste. With the Chase Freedom card this means you'd make charges then wait a month to see what they yield. Since their bonus levels are only three months long, you're effectively wasting 1/3 of the bonus time simply waiting to see if a particular store gets you the bonus levels. What a pain!

Not one to be satisfied with this situation, I logged on to my Chase account (my bank and credit card accounts are all tied together here) and sent their customer service people this email:

As you know, I have a Chase Freedom card. As you also know, the card rotates 5 percent cash back categories every quarter. I would like to be able to know whether or not a particular store/business qualifies for the 5 percent cash back PRIOR TO charging any money there. Is there a website or any other resource I can go to in order to see this in advance? Otherwise, I need to wait a month to see what sorts out as a 5 percent category. This effectively negates 1/3 of my bonus time each quarter and makes me less likely to use my Chase Freedom card.

Any help you can give me would be most appreciated. Thank you.

Here's their response:

I am writing in response to your email about the 5% cash back rewards for your Chase Freedom credit card.

The categories for this third quarter are Airlines, hotels and Gas.

When a merchant accepts VISA or MasterCard as a form of payment, the merchant must select a category that will identify the business type. This category is used when determining if the transaction is eligible for rewards. If a merchant is not a specialty store and provides a variety of products, the merchant may choose a general category descriptor rather than a specific category. For example, a store that sells clothes, gas, automotive parts, and groceries may choose the category "Superstores" rather than "Groceries" or "Gas."

When a transaction is authorized to your account, rewards are automatically determined based on the category that has been designated by the merchant.

Most card members call or speak to a store attendant to determine the merchant category (MCC) code. Once you find the MCC code and name of the merchant kindly contact us we will then be able to provide you with the information you have asked for.

I thank you for choosing Chase for your credit card needs.

If you have any further questions, please reply using the Secure Message Center.

My comments on this message:

I know what the categories are -- I didn't ask that.
I know that merchants select a code that describes their store type and that this code is used to determine cash back rewards.
I didn't know that it was called an MCC code -- good to know. For a list of all MCC codes, check out this summary from the IRS (the codes are at the end).
"Most card members call or speak to a store attendant to determine the merchant category (MCC) code." Really? Do most card members really do this? I doubt it.
I left out the sales pitch they included at the end of the email.

This response wasn't really satisfactory, so here's my reply:

Is there a place (like a website) where I can put in the MCC code and it can give me the answer immediately? It's pretty inconvenient to have to call each time...

So I was thinking I could go to a website, put in a retailers name and address, and the MCC code would spit out. Foolish me! Here's their response:

I understand that you wish to have access to MCC code on the rewards website.

I would like to inform you that currently, there is no place on the rewards website wherein you can put in the MCC code and it can give you the answer immediately you are looking for. However, I really appreciate you took your precious time to let us know this. Please be assured your precious feedback is always welcome as it helps us to identify opportunities for improvement.

Because your feedback suggests issues that need to be taken care as quickly as possible, hence your suggestion is escalated to Internet Group for review. As a result of comments such as yours, we gain more insight as to how well we are servicing our online customers.

Your views are extremely important to us and help us in making things better for our CardMembers. If you have any further questions, please reply using the Secure Message Center.

Thank you.

So, the Chase rewards website doesn't have the feature I'm looking for, but perhaps it's somewhere else on the web. I searched for some time but couldn't find anything like it. Any of you know a source for this sort of information?

BTW, at least Chase realizes that both my time and feedback are "precious" (anyone thinking of Lord of the Rings?) Perhaps my question will get this solution put on a list somewhere and Chase will come out with it in 20 years or so.

So there you have it: if you want to ask the store for their MCC code and then call/email Chase, Chase will tell you how it will fall in their rewards allocations (I assume other banks will do the same). It's not a great tip since it requires a good amount of work, but it is better than the test charge suggestion, right? At least it's faster...

View the original article here