Rogers Mastercard® Review

Rogers Mastercard Credit Card Review

The Rogers Mastercard is one of the two credit cards offered by Rogers. After Rogers made some recent changes to this card, it is one of the best credit cards to carry in Canada for almost anyone with a Rogers, Fido, or Shaw Service, which we will get into.

Just to let you know, I have this card; all members of Finlywealth have this card, my parents, and many of my friends! So let's go into the details of why this card was voted the best cashback credit card in Canada by Finlywealth!

The Rewards

How You Earn Rewards

The rewards you earn on this card depend on one main factor. Whether you have an eligible Rogers, Fido, or Shaw service, quoting this directly from the Rogers page, an eligible service is:

• Postpaid Rogers-branded consumer mobile plans (which includes wireless home phone and tablet data plans). For these plans, users who have permission to make changes (i.e. a Level 1 Authorized User) are also eligible.

• Postpaid Fido-branded consumer mobile plans – primary account holders only (which includes wireless home phone and tablet data plans)

• Any Rogers, Shaw or Fido-branded internet, TV, home phone, home monitoring or satellite service – primary account holders only

If you have one of these, then great because your rewards earned on this card will be:

• 2% cashback on all eligible purchases if redeemed as cash.

• 3% on all eligible purchases if redeemed for Rogers, Fido, or Shaw services.

But if you don't have one of these services, your rewards earned on this card will be:

• 2% on USD purchases

• 1% cashback on all eligible purchases

In general, while I think this is an excellent card if you have one of these services, it might not be the best card for you if you don't have one of the mentioned services, as there might be other cards that could earn you more rewards. 

As a general rule, you could earn more with points-based cards, so if you are willing to give up the flexibility of getting cash as a reward and use your points for certain redemptions only, like traveling, then check Finlywealth's reward calculator page to find the best credit card for you!

Reward comparison to other popular cashback credit cards

So why do we think the reward rates on this card are great? When compared to the other great cashback cards in Canada, this card will beat them in terms of rewards most of the time. Let's do a quick comparison with some of these cards:

Rogers Mastercard vs SimplyCash® Card from American Express:

SimplyCash gives 2% cash on gas and groceries and 1.25% on other purchases. In addition to a lower overall cashback, American Express is not accepted everywhere, so Rogers Mastercard wins!

Rogers Mastercard vs SimplyCash™ Preferred Card from American Express

SimplyCash gives 4% on gas and groceries and 2% on everything else (With a $1200 cap on the cashback rate on grocery purchases annually). Even though SimplyCash earns more on cash and groceries, it comes with a $120 annual fee, which, for most people, is not worth the extra 2% on these categories. In addition, American Express is not accepted everywhere, so in most cases, Rogers Mastercard wins!

Rogers Mastercard vs Simplii Financial™ Cash Back Visa Card

Simplii Financial earns 4% cashback on food (With a $200 reward annual cap, meaning $5000 spent), 1.5% cashback on gas, groceries, drugstore, recurring payments (With a $225 reward annual cap), and 0.5% on everything else.

The only part that Simplii beats Rogers is on food purchases. Although the 4% is earned only on the first $5000 of food purchases every year, the cashback drops to 0.5%.

For most cardholders that have purchased in many categories, the Rogers Mastercard Wins because there is no cap on rewards earned, and it also has a good all-around reward rate. In contrast, Simplii is only good in one category.

Although it's good to mention that if you want to maximize your cashback rate on restaurants, if you have a good amount of spending on that category, you can possibly pair these two cards together to maximize the rewards earned.

Welcome Bonus

You can earn up to 10% cashback up to $100 in the first three months of your card. So if you spend a total of $1000 in these 3 months, you will be able to get the full $100. It's a pretty straightforward and nice welcome bonus. If you have an eligible service, this is an additional 8% on top of the normal reward rate, meaning that the bonus value would be $80.

2 benefits of Rogers Mastercard

1. Great card to have for most people

Because this card has a high cashback rate with eligible services, it is a great card for people who want to carry around one card or even for those who carry multiple credit cards to maximize rewards.

For people who only want to carry one card, this is a Mastercard, so it is the most widely accepted credit card, and it also offers a good reward rate on only categories, making it a great card.

For people who want to carry multiple cards, this is a great card because if one of your cards is an American Express card, then you would need to have another card as a backup card for times that the merchants don't accept credit cards. In addition, there are many merchants that don't fall into a certain category (Like clothing or department stores), and in these scenarios, using the Rogers Mastercard would maximize your rewards.

2. Unique benefits

The 5-day home-like roaming benefit is a unique benefit only available to this card. If you have traveled abroad, you know how expensive international calls would be. So by using this benefit, which is valued at around ($75), you can save a bit on this fee.

In addition, the card has balance protection, which is nice.

downside of Rogers Mastercard

Very minimal benefits

Although the Rogers Mastercard has a unique benefit and balance protection, it does not offer any other benefits.

Most notably, almost all free credit cards in Canada offer Purchase protection and extended warranty, which this card does not have. Also, some free cards have other benefits in addition to purchase protection and extended warranty.

So, if you are looking for a card with many benefits and don't care as much about rewards, then this card might not be the best for you.

Final Verdict

For the many reasons mentioned throughout this review, whether you want to carry around one card or want to carry multiple to maximize your rewards, this a great card to have.