GEICO credit card earns rewards which could be used to help pay for your car insurance. But how much do you truly know about the GEICO Platinum MasterCard?

GEICO Insurance is a subsidy of Berkshire-Hathaway (Warren Buffett’s company). GEICO is actually an acronym for Government Employees Insurance Company. Originally, they only sold car insurance to government employees, but since the seventies they’ve been selling to everyone. Their gecko mascot says “fifteen minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance” but will the credit card also save you money?

GEICO Credit Card Review
As you may already be aware, there’s not that much information floating around online about this credit card. In fact, their website for the card doesn’t really have anything on it except a login box (for current users). I didn’t see any advertisements for it, not even GEICO credit card application. However, I was able to find a terms & conditions document which was help in revealing how this credit card’s rewards actually work…

Rewards:
The GEICO Platinum MasterCard gives its cardmembers “Gecko Dollars” for their spending. Here’s what they normally give:

• 3% on the first $150 in gas purchases per billing cycle (and 1% after that)
• 1% on all other spending

When the accumulated Gecko Dollars are $25.00 or more, they can be converted into a statement credit on your GEICO Platinum MasterCard.

Annual Fee:
The GEICO credit card charges a $48.00 annual fee. This is extremely disappointing. The rewards are only average to begin with, so to be slapped an annual fee on top of that only adds insult to injury. When you think about it, if you’re only getting 1% on your spending, that means you have to spend $4,800 just to pay for the annual fee on the card (or in other words, you aren’t making a penny until you spend at least $4,800).

Customer Service:
I don’t have the card myself, but I did check with an affiliate I work with to find reviews. The result? I saw one negative complaint after another about the GEICO credit card. Reportedly, many people are extremely unhappy with their customer service. One person even said they were surprised that GEICO would even want to be associated with such a card, some others feel it's a "scam." Many other complaints talked about alleged interest rate and credit limit problems. Whatever the case, the general consensus seemed to be clear: allegedly the GEICO Platinum MasterCard has poor customer service.

Conclusion:
I am a huge fan of Warren Buffett and his companies, but this credit card really puzzles me. Warren aims to deliver value to his customers, and I don’t see how the GEICO credit card does that at all. First of all, it has a pitiful rewards program that isn’t really any better than every other credit card on the market. Secondly, they charge nearly fifty dollars for an annual fee. Considering the sub-par rewards and alleged poor customer service, I don’t know who would pay for this card.

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