Compare the Features and Benefits of Capital One Spark Miles for Business and
Chase Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card

The Spark Miles is a uniquely simple small business credit card.

With 2X Capital One Miles earned per dollar spent on all eligible purchases (plus the option to earn 5X miles on hotels and rental cars booked through Capital One Travel), you can really rack up the miles fast.

And while Capital One Miles used to simply be worth a penny each towards travel, that’s changed entirely since Capital One made their miles transferable.

Many small business owners don’t worry about bonus categories, but they do want as many rewards points for their business spend as possible. And they want, on top of that simplicity, to know they are getting a top end rate of return on spend.

The Spark Miles accomplishes both goals. 2X miles on everything with no limit is among the best options among all small business credit cards. While the Blue Business® Plus Credit Card from American Express also earns 2X points on purchases, it is capped at $50,000 in spend per year whereas the Capital One Spark Miles has no limit.

And then for redeeming your points, you can simply spend them for travel at a penny a point, or you can use the airline and hotel transfer partners.

As for card benefits, the card comes with Primary Car Rental CDW coverage, as long as you are renting for business purposes and also carries extended warranty and purchase protection benefits, provided by Visa Business Signature. Some of these benefits don’t even display on the Capital One marketing pages, but they are on the guide to benefits.

Overall, it’s a super simple card that is an excellent choice for small business owners that love to travel on their time off.

Need to Know: Capital One generally will make an credit inquiry with all three credit bureaus. Your card and revolving balance will also be reported to your personal credit file. That likely doesn’t bother you unless you’re maxing out the card, but if it does, you can browse other credit cards that do not report the credit line to your personal credit profile.

The Chase Ink Business Preferred credit card is a staple credit card for any business owner than understands the power of Chase Ultimate Rewards, one of my favorite rewards currencies (See the feature entitled “Earns Transferable Points” above for more on why.)

The Ink Preferred has two distinctions among the Chase Ink business credit card lineup with also includes the Chase Ink Business Unlimited® and Chase Ink Business Cash®.

1) While those cards have no annual fee, they also do not have the power, on their own, to transfer points to Chase’s airline and hotel partners – and that is where you get the most value. The Chase Ink Preferred, with its small annual fee, gives it the distinction of being able to transfer the points to partners like World of Hyatt.

So, for instance, you can earn 5X on office supply stores with the Ink Cash and 1.5X on spend categories that don’t otherwise have a bonus multiplier and then combine them all to your Chase Ink Preferred. In addition to being able to transfer to air and hotel partner programs, you also have the option to simply book travel on the Chase Travel site with each point worth 1.25 cents. Comparatively, the Ink Cash and Ink Unlimited would have points worth just 1 cent there – unless you also had an Ink Preferred to combine the points to.

2) The Ink Business Preferred has the highest bonus offer of any card, with 100,000 bonus points on offer when you meet the minimum spend in the allotted time from account opening. (See current offer above in “Key Facts.”)

But beyond that, the Chase Ink Business Preferred is a super powerful credit card for small business owners that spend a lot on select business categories like travel, internet, cable, and phone services, search engines/social media and shipping purchases, where you will earn 3X Ultimate Rewards points per dollar spent – up to a combined maximum of $150,000 per year. (You would earn 1 point per dollar over that limit.)

That’s some amazing earning power! If you max that out in a year, you are earning 600,000 points which we would value (at 1.75 cents a point) as worth over $10,000 in rewards value. Like I said – it’s a powerhouse of a card all on its own!

Even if you had no interest in travel and treated these points as cash back (which I certainly don’t think is the best way to use these points!), you are still earning 3% cash back on this spend.

And then there’s the benefits. This card absolutely rocks the benefits.

My favorite benefit is its included primary rental car insurance when you book for business purposes, put the entire rental cost on your Ink card and decline the rental company’s collision insurance. That means that you can decline the expensive collision insurance that your rental car company offers and, if there is damage or theft, Chase’s insurance will cover you on most rentals without involving your personal insurance. That could save you on future premiums.

Note: The list of credit cards that offer primary rental car insurance is extremely limited, so take advantage of this one.

But that’s far from the only benefit worth mentioning. Other notable card benefits include:

• Trip cancellation/interruption insurance, up to $5,000, for non-refundable passenger fares, hotels and tours.
• Up to $1,000 per incident for cell phone protection. The insurance covers you and your listed employees on the cell phone bill, when you pay your monthly cell phone bill with your Chase Ink Business card. You can make up to 3 claims per year with a $100 deductible.
• Extended warranty. For a manufacturer’s warranty of 3 years or less, Chase will add an additional year.
• Purchase Protection. Chase covers your new purchases for 120 days against damage or theft up to $10,000 per claim and $50,000 per account.
• No foreign transaction fees. Feel free to pay for goods abroad with the Chase Ink Business Preferred card and you won’t have to worry about foreign transaction fees.
• Of course, it comes with expected fraud protection and real time fraud monitoring with zero liability for you if you are a victim of fraud.

Note: You will only be approved for a Chase business credit card if you have applied for fewer than 5 personal credit cards within the last 24 months from any issuer. (Business credit cards do not count against the total, except for Capital One and Discover, but are subject to the policy).

Lastly, you will only be approved for (at most) one Chase business card every 30 days so please do not apply for two at once.

If you have applied for a Chase credit card and don’t get an instant approval, you may want to phone the Chase reconsideration line.