U.S. Bank Smartly™ Visa Signature® Card review: Excellent cash back rates for existing account holders

The Citi Double Cash Card is another 2-percent cash back card: you earn 1 percent cash back when you make a purchase, plus an additional 1 percent when you pay it off. Once again, unlike the Smartly Visa Signature Card, the card offers a welcome bonus of $200 — and you get six months to earn it by spending $1,500 on purchases. 

This card might be a better choice if your plan is to transfer a balance. The Citi Double Cash offers 0 percent intro APR for 18 months on balance transfers from date of account opening — 17.74% - 27.74% (Variable) APR after that. Plus, the intro fee on balance transfers is only 3 percent ($5 minimum) if you complete the transfer within the first four months with the card. If you don’t take advantage of that offer, the standard fee is 5 percent (or $5 minimum).

Like the U.S. Bank Smartly, the Wells Fargo Active Cash earns 2 percent cash back on all eligible purchases. However, it also provides benefits its U.S. Bank’s competitor doesn’t offer. These include up to $600 of cell phone protection, car rental insurance and travel and emergency assistance services.

Additionally, new Wells Fargo Active Cash cardholders can earn a $200 cash rewards bonus after spending $500 in purchases in the first three months with the card.

U.S. Bank doesn’t advertise specific credit score requirements but notes that its credit cards are generally designed for customers with a score in the good to excellent range. On the FICO scale, a good credit score starts at 670.

U.S. Bank ExtendPlay is a payment option available to eligible cardholders. It allows you to break down eligible credit card purchases into monthly payments for a fixed monthly fee. Purchases under this plan don’t trigger interest charges.

You can redeem your cash back into an eligible U.S. Bank account. You have other redemption options as well, such as statement credits and gift cards, but your points might lose some value when redeemed outside of your U.S. Bank account.

The primary criteria for a rewards or cash back card’s rating is its rewards value. This includes the card’s average rewards rate, estimated annual rewards earnings, sign-up bonus value and reward redemption value.

To estimate a card’s average annual rewards earnings, we first calculate its average rewards rate based on how much it earns in different bonus categories and how closely its categories align with the average person’s spending habits, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Based on this data, we determine a “chargeable” spend (which purchases are likely to be put on a credit card and earn rewards). This includes the following spending by category:

• Groceries: $6,000
• Dining out: $3,900
• Entertainment: $2,500
• Gas: $2,400
• Apparel and services: $2,000

Using this data, we assign a weighting to each of a card’s bonus categories. For example, a card’s grocery rewards rate receives a 26 percent weighting based on how much of the average person’s budget is spent on groceries. We also estimate the redemption value of points or miles from various issuer, airline and hotel rewards programs.

This weighting and rewards valuation allows us to estimate a card’s average annual rewards earnings — how many points or miles you’d earn with a given card if your spending was about average and you used the card for all of your purchases, as well as what those points are worth. We also use point valuations to determine a card’s sign-up bonus value

With these calculations complete, we assign each card a score based on how its average rewards earnings, sign-up bonus value, rewards rate and redemption value stack up against other rewards cards.

We also rate cards based on how much it costs to keep them in your wallet or carry a balance.

To start, each rewards or cash back card is scored based on whether it offers an intro APR and how its ongoing APR compares to the rates available on other rewards or cash back cards.

We also score each card based on how its annual fee influences its overall value.

We consider a card’s annual fee in two ways — how it ranks relative to the fees you’ll find on other cards in the category and how it impacts a card’s overall rewards value. Cards with an annual fee will always be at a slight disadvantage in our scoring system since annual fees inherently cut into your rewards value, but if a card offers terrific value via its ongoing rewards and perks, it can earn a high score even if it carries a high annual fee.

With this in mind, we rate a card based primarily on how its ongoing rewards value and ongoing perk value (such as annual credits or bonuses) stack up against other cards in the category when you subtract its annual fee.

We rate each card’s flexibility based on the restrictions it imposes on earning and redeeming rewards and factor this rating into a card’s overall score.

Flexibility factors include whether a card only allows you to earn a high rewards rate on a small amount of spending or requires you to meet a certain earning threshold before you can redeem rewards. We also examine whether your points are worth less when you redeem for some options versus others and whether a card gives you the flexibility to transfer rewards to airline and hotel partners.

We also score each card’s set of features – its perks and benefits — against five tiers of features to provide a rating. We break down these tiers as follows:

• Tier 1 has less-than-standard card features (an ultra-streamlined card that offers basic utility and next to nothing in the way of ancillary benefits.
• Tier 2 includes the benefits you’d expect on standard Visa or Mastercard credit cards, such as free access to your credit score, car rental insurance and $0 liability for fraudulent charges.
• Tier 3 includes “prime card” or better-than-average card features like cellphone insurance, lost luggage insurance, concierge services and purchase protection.
• Tier 4 includes luxury features such as airport lounge access, elite status with an airline or hotel and credits for expedited security screening membership programs.
• Tier 5 includes the sort of exemplary benefits you’ll find on top-tier luxury cards, such as high-value travel credits, cardholder memberships and other unique and valuable perks.