J.D. Power survey: Can you guess Canada’s favourite credit card?

J.D. Power published a study Monday that investigated customers’ satisfaction with their credit cards. Financial Post reveals that “Canada’s biggest grocery chain is beating the banks at their own game.”

PC Financial, owned by Loblaw, came in at the top of the credit card class with a score of 788 on a 1,000-point scale. The President’s Choice Financial credit card ranks the highest for customer satisfaction, while American Express cards ranked second with 780 points, and Canadian Tire ranked third with 774 points. All of these card brands were rated as “better than most”.

This is all to say that none of the major Canadian banks cracked the top three. Toronto-Dominion Bank, Canada’s biggest card issuer actually “trails the pack” according to the Post.

“Canadian bank credit cards are in the middle of the pack, with Bank of Montreal and Royal Bank of Canada scoring the industry average of 758, followed by Bank of Nova Scotia at 756 and National Bank of Canada at 751.”

Though still in the 700’s, the lowest ranked cards come by way of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and MBNA Canada, at 741, followed by Toronto-Dominion below, at 739.

Last year, Toronto-Dominion had the highest amount of outstanding balances in 2017 and was, therefore, the largest credit-card issuer, according to a report from payments-industry publisher Nilson.

J.D. Power’s study looked at customer satisfaction based categories of client-provider communication and interaction, card benefits, terms, “key moments” and rewards. In May of this year, over 6,000 responses were collected for the survey.

The biggest value for Canadian cardholders comes in the form of rewards programs, and how attainable those rewards actually are. This value is apparent when you realize that nearly half of those who “switched their primary card in the past year did so for better perks” according to J.D. Power’s study.

“Understanding how to redeem rewards – and having redeemed rewards recently – has a significant effect on satisfaction and loyalty levels,” said Jim Miller, J.D. Power vice president for banking and credit card practices.

Aeroplan uncertainty, which is connected to rewards offerings from both Toronto-Dominion and CIBC banks, could have negatively impacted customer satisfaction as of late.