Migros Cumulus or Coop Supercard

Which credit card is better: Migros Cumulus of Coop Supercard? What are the differences? Which would you recommend?

Greetings,

Both cards in similar in that they combine a loyalty card for a Swiss retailer (Migros or Coop) with a no-annual-fee credit card. The fee schedules are also similar.

What the Migros Cumulus credit card and the Coop Supercardplus credit cards have in common:

No annual fee
9.9% effective interest rate
CHF 1.50 paper statement fee
CHF 20 card replacement fee
1 supplementary card at no annual fee
1.5% foreign transaction fee
1.5% fee for CHF transactions charged by foreign merchants
3.75% (minimum CHF 5.00) ATM withdrawal fee
Both cards are only available as credit cards - not as prepaid cards

Differences between Migros Cumulus credit card and Coop Supercardplus credit card:

Card issuer: The Migros Cumulus MasterCard is issued by Cembra Money Bank. The Coop Supercardplus credit cards are issued by Swisscard AECS.
Credit card networks: The Migros Cumulus credit card is only available as a MasterCard. The Coop Supercardplus is available as a MasterCard or a Visa card.
Line of credit: The Migros Cumulus MasterCard has a maximum credit line of CHF 15,000. The Coop Supercardplus has a maximum credit line of CHF 10,000.
Foreign currency exchange rate: The exchange rate used by the Migros Cumulus MasterCard is set by Cembra Money Bank. The rate used by the Coop Supercardplus is set by Swisscard.
Rewards programs: The Migros Cumulus MasterCard lets you earn 1 Cumulus point for every 1 Swiss franc of purchases charged at Migros stores and 1 Cumulus point per 2 francs of purchases from other merchants. The Coop Supercardplus lets you earn 1 Superpoint per 1 franc of purchases at Coop stores and 1 Superpoint per 3 francs of purchases from other retailers.

Both cards are included in the interactive credit card comparison on moneyland.ch.

Best regards from Moneyguru

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Migros Cumulus MasterCard: Details and ratings
Coop Supercardplus MasterCard: Details and ratings
Coop Supercardplus Visa: Details and ratings

Hello. Would I earn double the Cumulus or Supercard points twice by using a Cumulus or Supercard credit card to pay as opposed to presenting my normal Cumulus or Supercard loyalty card? As in, would I earn 1 point per 1 franc as my loyalty reward and another 1 point per 1 franc as my credit card reward? Thanks.

Hi there,

You do not earn double points by using a Cumulus or Supercard credit card at Migros or Coop respectively instead of the regular loyalty cards.

This is a common misunderstanding which is fueled, in part, by unclear advertising of credit card benefits.

The Migros Cumulus Mastercard from Cembra Money Bank combines a credit card with a Migros Cumulus loyalty card and the Coop Supercard credit card from Topcard combines a credit card with a Coop Supercard loyalty card. The loyalty card information is printed on the back side of the credit card.

When you make a purchase at Migros or Coop, you earn points as you would with the regular loyalty card. You do not earn extra points by charging purchases to the credit card. If you want to earn credit card rewards in addition to the Cumulus or Supercard loyalty points you receive through your loyalty card, you can do this by using a third-party rewards credit card (such as the Swisscard Cashback credit card) to pay.

The primary benefit of using a Migros Cumulus or Coop Superpoint credit card as opposed to using a regular rewards card is that you can earn Cumulus or Superpoint points when you charge purchases from other merchants to your card.

For example, when you use a Migros Cumulus Mastercard to pay for purchases from merchants which do not participate in the Cumulus rewards program (i.e. airlines, Coop, small merchants, etc.), you earn Cumulus points for those purchases – albeit at a lower rate than what you get for Migros purchases with your Cumulus loyalty card.

The same applies when you use the Coop Supercard credit card to make purchase from merchants which do not participate in the Coop Supercard loyalty program.

If you shop in both Migros and Coop and hold both credit cards, you can technically earn both Supercard points and Cumulus points on purchases from both by using your Migros Cumulus Mastercard to pay at Coop in combination with a Coop Supercard loyalty card, and your Coop Supercard credit card to pay at Migros in combination with a Migros Cumulus loyalty card.

Best regards from Moneyguru

More on this topic:
Popular Swiss reward programs compared

A few points on my user experience with the new Coop Supercard credit card from Topcard. Ok, I know I may sound like a spoiled brat, but hear me out.

Design

Topcard’s online portal more closely resembles a sleazy site for male visitors than a financial service. The only thing missing are the pinups. The onboarding process in which you have to enter your contract number comes across as pretentious rather than as an important security feature.

Service

After paying my second paper statement (they each cost 1.95 francs), I finally phoned the call center (which I also had to pay for) to get them to stop sending and charging me for paper statements I don’t need. You would think that this could be done directly on their online portal, but it can’t.

Now they say that even phoning is not enough to get them to stop sending me paper statements. I have to install an Android app in order to cancel paper statements. Apparently, that is written somewhere, from what they said. Interesting.

The mobile apps are dodgy

Ok, I figure that yeah, the call center operators are probably poorly paid part-time employees and may not know all there is to know about banking. So I go the extra mile and install their app. Before I can do that, I have to install a suspicious-looking prep app called TC Security (no, it isn’t a Russian mafia syndicate).

To install the app, I had to enter my contract number again. Again, I have to wait on a letter by snail mail – this time with a QR code. Wow, I feel so secure.

When I finally get that, all I can do with it is install yet another app – this one called TC mobile. This app shows transactions online and installing it effectively cancels paper statements – permanently! If you want to get paper statements at a later point, tough luck. There is no option which lets you choose whether or not you want paper statements.

Oh, and one more thing: when I installed the app, the online portal was CLOSED! Being able to access my account in the app AND online would be asking a lot, wouldn’t it? So you have to choose whether you want to use the app, or the online portal. One or the other.

If you happen to have issues or need help – well, you’re back to paying for the call center.

My verdict:

The miserly 0.3% rewards (Coop Superpoints) I earn on non-Coop spending just isn’t a tempting enough bait for this fish. The 4000 bonus points I got as a new card holder just barely covered the time I spent sorting out the basics. Thank you and goodbye, TopCard.

It’s difficult for me to imagine how that kind of company managed to become Coop’s new credit card issuer.

My advice to Coop customers is: just use the plain old Supercard membership card to collect points and get the free Cashback credit card instead.

I completely agree with you about the new Supercard credit card.

My app was deactivated twice for this (hardly believable) reason: I changed the background image on my phone. I couldn’t believe it either. So I had to pay to phone that call center only to find out it was a programming error.

I’m ditching this half-baked credit card service.