To date, BMO has been an exclusive Mastercard issuer. Now, two new Visa credit cards join the BMO Rewards program:
Here are some details of each card, along with our opinion.
With the new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Card, you can earn up to 70,000 BMO Rewards points and theannual fee waiver of $120 for the first year. This is an exclusive offer for you, Milesopedia readers!
You will also receive a $50 statement credit each calendar year to spend however you want.
With the New BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card, you can earn 5x the BMO Rewards points for every $1 spent on:
And 1 BMO Rewards point for every $1 spent on everything else.
Plus, if you add an authorized user to your account, you’ll earn 10% more points.
Regarding insurance, the New BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card includes:
To apply for the new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card, you must have a minimum annual income of $60,000 (individual) or $100,000 (household).
The New BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card is a first-year free card. Besides, it comes with a $50 annual credit with a calendar year cycle.
So, if you sign up for this Card in February 2022, you could have the $50 annual credit for the year 2022, and a new $50 annual credit in January 2023! That’s $100 you can use however you want!
This puts the $120 membership fee for the second year into perspective, in order to benefit from the 30,000 points offered at renewal(a value of $201 by using your points for travel)!
When it comes to earning points, the new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Card focuses on everyday purchases such as groceries, gas, local transportation, restaurants, bars and even home delivery.
All 5x categories (with a Visa credit card accepted almost anywhere)!
If you use your points for travel redemptions, it’s a 3.5% return on those purchases (or 2.5% for the Pay with Points option).
For all other purchases, you’ll earn 1 point per dollar (a lot less than the 2 points per dollar offered by the BMO® World Elite®* Mastercard®*).
Anyway, this New BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card is attractive and could become the everyday card of many members of the milesopedia community! Especially with lower income requirements than the World Elite Mastercard: $60,000 (individual) or $100,000 (household) annual income.
The new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Privilege* Card is a premium metal card !
With this card , you can earn up to 90,000 BMO Rewards points:
You will also receive a $200 statement credit each calendar year to spend however you want. The principle is the same as the BMO eclipse Visa Infinite card .
As well as a Priority Pass membership with 6 airport lounge visits per year.
And that’s not counting other Visa Infinite Privilegebenefits like priority airport security screening, dedicated cab and limousine services, exclusive food and wine experiences, VIP benefits at luxury hotels and more.
With the new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Privilege* Card, you can earn 5x the BMO Rewards points for every $1 spent on:
Plus, if you add an authorized user to your account, you’ll earn 25% more points.
Regarding insurance, the New BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Privilege* Card includes:
To apply for the new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Privilege* Card, you must have a minimum $150,000 (individual) or $200,000 (household) annual income.
The new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Privilege* Card is clearly designed for the travelling and high-spending public.
Note that unlike the New BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card, with the Visa Infinite Privilege version, you can earn 5x the points for every $1 spent on travel and drugstore purchases (in place of the transit category).
Groceries, gasoline, home food delivery, and restaurants and bars are maintained at 5 points per dollar.
If you use your points for travel redemptions, it’s a 3.5% return on those purchases! It’s very unusual for a credit card to offer more than 3% for travel or even drugstore purchases!
Besides, this new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Privilege* Card comes with a $200 lifestyle annual credit with a calendar year cycle.
If you apply for this card in February 2021, you could receive the $200 annual credit for 2021 and earn a new $200 annual credit in January 2022! That’s $400 you can use however you want!
It’s nearly paying for the $499 first-year annual fee. This card also comes with 6 Priority Pass airport lounge passes, which is a value of over $200 per year.
Finally, note the strong insurance, especially for purchases with 120-day purchase insurance and an extended warranty of up to 2 additional years (where most cards offer only 1 year).
These two new credit cards are part of the BMO Rewards program. You can use your BMO Rewards points in many ways:
Let’s analyze the two most common uses of BMO Rewards points.
To redeem your BMO Rewards points, you’ll need to use the BMO Rewards website. You can redeem BMO Rewards points for different types of trips:
Prices are the same as other travel agencies.
Redeeming BMO Rewards points for travel is the best possible use of your points: 140 points = $1. So 40,000 points have a $285 value.
For example, if you spend $1,500 per month in the 5x categories with the new BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card (grocery, dining, food delivery, gas, transit), you will earn 7,500 points per month, or $54 for travel.
Over a year, you can earn almost $650 that way! Enough to pay for a flight or several hotel nights!
And 10% more if you add an authorized user to your account.
You can also redeem your BMO Rewards points for any purchase charged to your card for as little as $1!
Here, 200 points = $1. So 40,000 points have a $200 value.
With these new Visa credit cards, BMO joins the current trend by offering its customers multiple ways to use their points.
If travel redemption remains the best value (140 points = $1), the new Pay with Points Option may be appealing to some (200 points = $1). Especially when you have earned 5x the points on many everyday purchases!
Finally, thanks to an annual statement credit you can use however you want (and not just travel like other credit cards), it’s a way for BMO to “virtually” lower the annual fee for loyal customers.
During the second year, the annual fee is equal to $70 for the BMO eclipse Visa Infinite* Card(after the $50 annual credit) and $299 for the BMO eclipse Visa Infinite Privilege* Card(after the $200 annual credit). This can provide a credit card with solid insurance at a reduced cost.
Savings are here:
