UPDATE: Discover Bank has discontinued their “Gas” card featured in this review. You can get 5% back on gas up to $1,500 using their latest card. Read about it here…
Discover Card has changed their gas card to reflect double cashback on gas purchases. My favorite places to use the Discover Card are at Sam’s Club, gas stations, and if I forget my other credit cards. Once you earn $20 in cash back you can log-in to the Discover Card website and get the check mailed to your home, credited to your account, or use it towards Hyatt* or partner purchases and save even more. This card gives back double on gas just like some other top rated cards and they only make you wait until you reach a $20 minimum in cash back to get your check sent to you instead of $50 in most programs. One disadvantage of the The Discover® Open Road Card formerly the Discover Gas Card is that it only lets you earn up to 1% cash back compared to a full 1% cash back of other cards. However, you have choice of various cash back redemptions. One example of a great benefit I noticed was turning a $20 Cashback Bonus into a $25 restaurant gift card at a restaurant such as The Olive Garden, which gave me more for my cash back. You do not see some of these ways to multiply your cash back with some of the other card offers.
Redeem for Partner gift cards, merchandise, Discover® gift cards, credit to your Discover card account or an electronic deposit to your bank account
Turn your Cashback Bonus into bigger rewards by redeeming for gift cards or eCertificates from over 100 brand-name Partners such as Bed, Bath & Beyond®, Red Lobster® and Lands’ End®
Benefits Added to Discover® Open Road Card
Discover recently rebranded their cash back gas card to The Open Road Card. What do you think about this new name? Write us ask@rewardscards.com.
Update 2010: The Discover Open Road Card (for gas and restaurants) is now paying double cashback instead of the 5% on the previous card.
The older program: The Discover Gas Card starting as of last September 2006 (October for existing Discover cardholders) will give a full 5% Cashback Bonus on gas and auto maintenance purchases. This includes car washes, auto paint, auto supplies, and body shops. For example, if you have Toyota and bring your car into the dealership then you would get this extra cash back for using your Discover Card. This would come in handy if you had to have your car repaired after a wreck and you got the chance to earn back 5%.
Compare to other top gas cards
Compared to the Chase Perfect Card: Chase recently put out a brochure in the mail that claimed they give you the opportunity to earn more rewards than the Discover Platinum Gas Card. This is partially true for two reasons. They offer a limit of $15 a month ($180 a year) in gas rebates compared to Discover limiting the gas purchases to the first $1200 making it only $60 a year. The other reason is that they offer a 6% rebate to start out with for three months.
The Bottom Line: Most gas guzzling Americans (like myself) will not meet their limits. The best thing to do is switch off between gas credit cards with the highest payouts.
Gas Credit Card Review | BP Gas Credit Card | More Discover Card Reviews
Discover Balance Transfer Offers
* See the online credit card application for details about terms and conditions. Reasonable efforts are made to maintain accurate information. However all credit card information is presented without warranty. When you click on the “Apply Here” button, you can review the credit card terms and conditions on the issuers website.
