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Universal Premium Mastercard® review
- Get this card if you need a fuel card for your business, but have poor credit.
- Pick something else if you want a better rewards structure and fewer fees.
- Apply with a fair credit score of 580 or higher.
Up to 6x
Cents off
Up to $120
Annual fee
29.24%
Purchase APR (variable)
580
Recommended credit score
Details
| Product Name | Universal Premium Mastercard® |
|---|---|
| Card type | Mastercard |
| Annual fee | Up to $120 |
| Purchase APR | 29.24% variable |
| Balance transfer APR | N/A |
| Late payment fee | Up to $150 |
| Late payment fee conditions | 10.99% of the new balance or $150 late fee, whichever is greater |
| Returned payment fee | Up to $50 |
The basics
The Universal Premium Mastercard® is a fleet credit card designed to help you save money on fuel purchases and streamline your company finances. But any benefit the card might seem to offer is outweighed by its incredibly high fees for almost anything, including simple transactions.
For that reason, you might want to reconsider choosing this card. There are better cards on the market to serve your business needs.
What to watch out for
- Fees.
The card comes with many fees. Here’s a breakdown of what you could be charged with:
- Late payment fees of 10.99% of the balance or $150, whichever is greater
- Up to $10 monthly card fee; this could end up being $120 for one card each year or $1,200 for ten cards
- Up to 10 cents per gallon minimum program admission fee; this cancels out the potential 6 cents off per gallon deal
- Up to $15 for each optional fleet report
- Up to $15 check by phone fee
- Up to $50 one-time EFT payment method set-up, and up to $5 every time you pay via this method
- Up to $50 fee for processing each client initiated EFT/ACH/Wire payment
- Up to 0.9% foreign transaction fee and up to 0.2% currency conversion assessment fee
- High risk credit account fees.
If your account is deemed high risk, you’ll pay $5 per transaction or 2% of your account’s spend limit per billing cycle, whichever is greater.
- Security deposit.
If your account is deemed high risk, you may need to make a secured deposit, which will act as your credit line for 80% of the amount. So if you deposit $10,000, your credit line will be $8,000. - Fuel discounts exclusions.
You won’t get volume rebates on aviation, bulk fuel, propane or natural gas purchases. - Fuel discounts.
Get 3 cents off per gallon on volume rebates and 3 cents off per gallon when fueling at the Retail Savings Network. Combining the two discounts can get you a maximum of 6 cents off per gallon. To get the 3 cents volume rebate, however, you need to buy 30,000 or more gallons in a month, making this hard to get. - Maintenance rebates.
Get 5% rebate on purchases at Firestone and Tires Plus retail locations through the Mastercard Easy Savings Network - Card customization.
Customize each card based on driver or vehicle and set up spending controls. You can set fueling controls for certain types of vehicles in your fleet or limit the types of purchases per card so you know exactly where the company’s money is going. - Online account access.
Log in to your online account and get detailed reporting, including driver and vehicle listings, transactions, fuel summary and more. Download the data and integrate it with other company software.
Card benefits
How to apply for Universal Premium Mastercard®
- Visit the Universal Premium Mastercard® website and click Apply for this card.
- Fill out the application form with the required information.
- Review your application and submit.
What credit score do I need?
Apply with a fair credit score of 580 or higher.
Compare Business credit cards with gas rewards
Bottom line
The Universal Premium Mastercard® comes with so many obnoxious fees that you’ll likely incur some each billing cycle. Also, the threshold to get 3 cents per gallon rebates is three times higher than with other fleet credit cards. There are better business cards with up to 3% cash back on gas purchases or fleet cards with 6 cents off per gallon, making it easier to get.
Consider any other business credit card as an alternative and you likely won’t be wrong.