Credit Card Satisfaction Stalls, Thanks to Surcharges, Debt, Complicated Rewards
By Steve Cocheo, Senior Executive Editor at The Financial Brand
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Executive Summary
- Satisfaction with credit card programs hardly moved in the latest J.D. Power research, rising by only one point on the firm’s 1,000-point scale.
- Key reasons include the pressure of financial health concerns. More consumers have seen household income fall, and the percentage of revolvers has grown.
- Other factors are also at play. More merchants are adopting surcharges in response to issuers’ interchange fees, hurting consumers’ perception of the cards. Issuers are also losing satisfaction when rewards and benefits programs become harder to use.
Some of the greatest creativity in banking product design goes into credit card features and marketing. But a combination of factors has put a brake on overall cardholder satisfaction in 2025, according to a new J.D. Power study. The ratings firm found that satisfaction across all types of credit cards hit 611, on a 1,000-point scale — up just one point over 2024’s edition.
One key factor is wavering financial health, according to the firm’s 2025 U.S. Credit Card Satisfaction Study.
Among financially healthy cardholders, satisfaction rose by nine points year-over-year. In addition, satisfaction among credit card transactors — users who don’t carry revolving debt — rose by four points.
On the other hand, satisfaction among financially unhealthy users dropped by a point over the previous study. Satisfaction among revolvers — who are now 53% of the cardholder base, up two percentage points over 2024 — likewise dropped by a point.
The company computes financial health based on a combination of creditworthiness, the customer’s ratio of spending to saving, and their use of “safety nets” like insurance. The study found that the percentage of users who are classified as financially unhealthy increased significantly for a second straight year. Fifty-six percent of users now fall into this category, up two percentage points from 2024.
The study found that these trends have developed even while credit card interest rates have stabilized. The research also found that one out of five cardholders have tapped some form of buy now, pay later financing — often with a lender other than their main card’s issuer — an increase over 2024. Revolvers more typically lean this way.
Other factors are influencing cardholder satisfaction as well: Merchant surcharges on the use of credit cards and difficulties that holders of rewards cards have in figuring out how to make the most of their issuer’s benefit program and to actually redeem their rewards.
The two factors actually intertwine, because the rewards programs are substantially paid for by the interchange fees that merchants fork over to accept card payments, and that some merchants, in turn, attempt to recoup credit card costs by charging all card users for the privilege of paying with plastic, literally or digitally.
“In a way, this is the indirect costs of cards coming back to consumers,” says John Cabell, managing director of payments intelligence at J.D. Power. “Consumers want rewards cards where they can get something for nothing. That’s costing all of us in the long run, because small businesses, and not-so-small businesses, are starting to put that burden back on the consumer at the cash register to offset the interchange costs.”
Read more: Will Dizzying Card Fees from Chase, Amex Spark a User Uprising, Create Openings for Other Issuers?
Merchant Surcharges Become More Common, Influencing Satisfaction and Behavior
Across the entire sample, including multiple types of credit cards, 65% of cardholders say they have been charged higher prices when they used their cards. While 25% of the sample say they have never been surcharged, 10% don’t know if they’ve been charged or not. Some merchants are explicit about surcharging and may advise customers at some point in the purchase that switching to a debit card or cash would save them money. Others leave it to the customer to spot the surcharge line on their receipt.
Among the 65% who know they’ve been dinged, satisfaction falls by an average of 39 points solely on that factor, according to J.D. Power. (This was first-time question, so there is no comparative 2024 number.)
The impact of surcharges goes beyond that. The study found that the fees skew cardholders’ perception of ease of use of their cards. Among consumers who have never paid a surcharge, for example, 75% say they have never had difficulty transacting with a card. In contrast, among those who have been charged, only 56% report never having trouble transacting.
Furthermore, when confronted with a potential surcharge, it’s not unusual for consumers to try to avoid it. You can see this in restaurants when patrons begin pooling cash to settle the bill without a card.
The study found that 81% of those told about surcharges have at some point tried to avoid them via an alternative form of payment — which eats into card issuers’ transaction volume. Merchants, of course, assess the fees to claw back income otherwise lost to card fees.
In the long run, Cabell speculates, the longstanding structure of rewards supported by interchange may not continue to be a supportable model.
On the other hand, people who don’t earn any rewards on their cards are subsidizing those who do. In this year’s The Power of Cash, author Jay Zagorsky, a professor at Boston University, argues this point.
“Businesses end up paying about 2% of their sales to handle electronic payments like credit cards,” Zagorsky writes. To cover that, he says, “many merchants simply raise the price of what they are selling by 2%.”
“Now 2% might not seem like much when talking about buying one apple or a cup of coffee,” the author continues. “However, the average U.S. family spends about $75,000 a year. A 2% reduction in the prices families pay means a savings of over $1,500 a year.”
The J.D. Power report found that the segment of consumers whose household income is $100,000 or more ticked down by one percentage point to 24%, compared to 2024. Its analysts consider this a significant one-year shift.
Read more:
How Easily Can Consumers Obtain the Rewards They’ve Earned?
Credit card rewards enjoyed some extra attention earlier this year when JPMorgan Chase unveiled a substantially refreshed Chase Sapphire Reserve Card (albeit with a hike of almost 45% in the annual fee, to $795). Since then, tips and leaks concerning a major refresh of the competitive American Express Platinum Card have stirred discussion, with a formal announcement about features and fees expected in mid-September.
J.D. Power’s study looks at both rewards cards with annual fees and those not charging annual fees, as well as at co-branded cards. The latter typically offer targeted rewards.
A top-line recommendation from the firm, based on findings, is that issuers cut the rigmarole often associated with rewards and perks programs.
“Offer simple, clear benefits and rewards programs with limited restrictions to boost card value perception,” says the study report.
The study found decreases of a percentage point or two in four key metrics of rewards program satisfaction. These include:
- Completely understand how to earn rewards: 67%, down one point.
- Rewards don’t expire: 55%, down one point.
- No maximum on rewards allowed to earn annually: 46%, down a point.
- Card use always maximizes earning rewards: 30%, down two points.
“It’s a challenge for issuers to create programs that can be customized to fit a variety of consumers but that are also easy to understand,” says Cabell. He says this is one reason that cash back card programs continue to be popular — they tend to be more straightforward.
The research found that co-brand card programs took a hit to card satisfaction in 2025, dropping eight points on the 1,000 point scale. This was credited to less ease of understanding of how to earn rewards and the perception that the amount of rewards earned per dollar spent was slipping. Cardholders also broadly see co-branded programs having limits, such as point expirations and annual maximums.
On the other hand, satisfaction with benefits associated with cards improved for the second year in a row. The study indicates that issuers are doing better in showing users what those benefits are. Factors that especially improve cardholder satisfaction are financial services benefits, fraud and identity benefits, and shopping benefits.
Improvement in satisfaction in this regard was three times as high for cards with annual fees versus cards without annual charges.
“The overall packages, including rewards and benefits, feels more valuable in the end,” says Cabell, “so consumers are holding their noses and paying the annual fees.”
Read more: Inside Synchrony’s Home Brewed, Six-Second Credit Approval Process
