Bank of America® Customized Cash Rewards credit card: The Complete Guide to Maximizing It

This No Annual Fee Cash Back Card Deserves a Spot in Your Points and Miles Strategy

If you’re deep into points and miles, it’s easy to write off a cash back card as the boring cousin in your wallet. No transfer partners, no award charts, no sweet spots to chase. But I want to make the case for why the Bank of America® Customized Cash Rewards credit card earns a real spot in a family’s strategy, even alongside cards that earn transferable points.

Here’s the thing about points and miles: they’re incredible for flights and hotel stays, but they don’t cover everything. Gas. Groceries. Home improvement projects. The oil change. The random Target run. That’s where a card like this one comes in — it’s built to earn real cash back in whatever category your family actually spends the most in, with no annual fee holding it back.

This guide walks through exactly how the card works, where people leave money on the table, and how to fit it into a bigger points and miles strategy instead of treating it as a separate, unrelated card.

What the Card Actually Offers

The Customized Cash Rewards card earns in three tiers:

• Your choice category — earn 6% cash back for the first year from account opening, then 3%, in one of six eligible categories
• 2% at grocery stores and wholesale clubs — automatic, no picking required
• 1% on everything else

The choice-category rate and 2% grocery store and wholesale club rate apply to the first $2,500 in combined purchases each calendar quarter, then 1%. Additionally, the current welcome offer shifts over time so be sure to check out the offer in the box above.

There’s no annual fee, which is a key advantage of this card — you’re not paying anything to hold onto a card that’s quietly earning in the background.

My take: This card doesn’t try to be flashy. It does one job — flexible cash back with no annual fee to carry — and it does that job well.

How the “Choose Your Category” Mechanic Works

This is the feature that makes the card worth a second look. Instead of a fixed bonus category or a rotating one you have to remember to activate every quarter, you pick your own category and can change it once each calendar month. The choices are:

• Gas and EV charging stations
• Online shopping (including streaming, cable, internet, and phone plans)
• Dining
• Travel
• Drug stores and pharmacies
• Home improvement and furnishings

My take: Most no-fee cash back cards force you into someone else’s idea of what you spend on. This one doesn’t. If your family is mid-renovation this month and heading on a road trip next month, you can actually shift the card to match.

The Quarterly Cap Most People Miss

Here’s the part that trips a lot of people up: the bonus rate (your choice category, plus the 2% grocery/wholesale rate) only applies to the first $2,500 in combined purchases each quarter. After that, everything drops to the standard 1% rate until the next quarter starts.

That combined cap matters — it’s not $2,500 for your choice category and a separate $2,500 for groceries. It’s one shared bucket for both.

How to work around it:

• Once you reach the shared $2,500 quarterly cap, consider using another card that earns a higher return on those purchases until the next calendar quarter begins. Changing your choice category does not reset the cap.
• Big one-time purchases (furniture, a home improvement project, a trip you’re paying for outright) are worth timing deliberately. If you know a big expense is coming, that’s the month to point your category at it — ahead of time, since the change takes effect going forward, not retroactively.

My take: The cap is the card’s biggest limitation, full stop. It’s genuinely a great card for moderate, steady spenders. It’s a much weaker pick if your family runs $4,000+ a month through one category, since a big chunk of that spend falls back to 1%.

Where This Card Fits in a Points and Miles Strategy

Here’s the mindset shift: not every card in your wallet needs to earn transferable points to be worth having. A card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card or a premium American Express card like the American Express® Gold Card is what turns spending into flights and hotel stays. A card like the Customized Cash Rewards is what covers the parts of family travel — and family life — that points were never going to touch anyway: gas for the drive to the airport, groceries the week before a trip, the home improvement project you’re paying off before you book anything.

Real cash back, deposited straight to your account, is flexible in a way points aren’t. It doesn’t care about award availability or transfer ratios. It just works.

My take: I’d never tell a family to build their whole strategy around a cash back card. But as the card that quietly handles the categories your travel-focused cards don’t reward well, it’s genuinely useful — not a consolation prize.

The BofA Rewards Bonus (If You Bank With Bank of America)

BofA Rewards™ is free to join for customers with an eligible personal Bank of America checking account, with no minimum balance required for the Member tier. Enrolled members can receive a 10% to 75% rewards bonus on this card’s standard 3%, 2% and 1% cash-back rates, depending on their tier. Note: the bonus does not apply to the additional 3% first-year choice-category bonus.

Here’s how the tiers break down, confirmed against Bank of America’s own program page. Higher tiers generally depend on your three-month average combined balance across qualifying Bank of America deposit and Merrill investment accounts:

So on this card’s ongoing 3% choice-category rate, a Preferred Honors member earns 4.5% cash back. During the first year, the additional 3% choice-category bonus brings that total to 7.5%. Both rates remain subject to the shared $2,500 quarterly spending cap.

My take: If you’re not already a Bank of America customer, this alone isn’t a reason to become one. But if you already bank there, it’s worth checking what tier you qualify for — it can meaningfully change what this card is worth to you.

How to Pick Your Category

A few minutes with your last two or three months of bank statements will tell you more than any list of suggestions. Here’s the exercise:

1. Pull up your last two or three months of spending.
2. Add up what you spent in each of the six eligible categories (remember, groceries and wholesale clubs already earn 2% automatically, so don’t count those toward this).
3. Whichever category comes out highest — that’s your starting point.
4. Revisit it monthly, especially around big seasonal shifts: home improvement before a renovation, travel before a big trip, dining during the holidays.

My take: Don’t overthink this. Pick the category where you’re already spending the most, and let the card do its job. You can always change it next month if your spending shifts.

Who This Card Is Good For (and Who It’s Not)

Good for:

• Families who want flexible cash back without an annual fee
• Households whose spending shifts month to month or season to season
• Anyone building a mixed strategy of points-earning cards plus cash back
• Enrolled BofA Rewards members who qualify for a rewards bonus

Not the best fit for:

• High spenders who’ll blow past the $2,500 quarterly cap quickly in one category
• Anyone hoping to eventually convert the cash back into transferable travel points — this card earns straight cash back, not a points currency
• Families who’d rather set a category once and never think about it again (the flexibility here only pays off if you actually use it, but mind the quarterly caps)

Our bottom line

The Customized Cash Rewards card isn’t going to book your family’s next flight. But, it’s a card with no annual fee that can complement a points-focused strategy, especially for enrolled BofA Rewards members who qualify for a rewards bonus. Pick your category based on where you actually spend, keep an eye on that quarterly cap, and let it quietly do its job alongside the cards that are working toward your next trip.

Bank of America® Customized Cash Rewards credit card: The Complete Guide to Maximizing It