Key Points

• Bank of America has officially launched three new features for cardholders: Refer-a-Friend, Custom Pay Plan, and My Credit, bringing it closer to what Chase, Amex, and Citi have offered for years.
• The Refer-a-Friend program is currently limited to three specific cash-back and travel rewards cards, with an annual earnings cap of $500 or 50,000 points depending on which card you hold.
• Custom Pay Plan and My Credit are the most broadly useful additions, but both require you to do a little math before committing — the fee structure on installment plans isn't automatically a better deal than paying off your balance.

Bank of America cardholders woke up to a small but meaningful upgrade this week. The issuer has formally announced three new tools rolling out across its credit card and banking products: a referral program, an installment payment feature, and a revamped credit monitoring dashboard.

None of this is groundbreaking by industry standards. American Express has had Pay It Plan It since 2017, Chase has had My Chase Plan for nearly as long, and free FICO score access has been table stakes at most major issuers for years. But for BofA cardholders, these are real improvements, and at least one of them is worth checking on right now.

Here's what you need to know about each feature and whether it's actually worth using.

Refer-a-Friend: Earn Up to $500 or 50,000 Points Per Year

This one has technically been live for about two months, just without any official acknowledgment from the bank. If you've seen a referral link in your account over the past few weeks, that wasn't a glitch.

Eligible cards right now:

• Bank of America® Customized Cash Rewards credit card
• Bank of America® Unlimited Cash Rewards credit card
• Bank of America® Travel Rewards Credit Card

More products are coming throughout the rest of 2026, according to BofA. For now, if you hold any of those three, log into your account or the mobile app to see if you have access.

How it works: You generate a personalized referral link and share it. When someone applies through your link and gets approved, you earn a bonus. Cash-back cardholders earn $100 per approval; Travel Rewards cardholders earn 10,000 points per approval. The annual cap is $500 or 50,000 points.

That's not going to fund a business-class flight to Tokyo, but if you have three or four friends who need a decent starter card, you could clear $300 to $500 without much effort. The Bank of America® Travel Rewards credit card is a particularly easy sell because it has no annual fee, making referrals a low-friction conversation.

Bottom line on referrals: Check if you have access today. It's free money sitting in your account.

Custom Pay Plan: BofA Enters the Buy Now, Pay Later Space

Custom Pay Plan is Bank of America's answer to installment features that competitors have offered for years. The concept is straightforward: convert an eligible purchase of $100 or more into a fixed monthly payment plan, anywhere from 3 to 18 months, through the app or online banking.

Instead of paying your card's standard interest rate on that balance, you pay a disclosed fixed monthly fee. Rewards earned at purchase are preserved. Purchase protections stay intact.

What to know before you use it:

This is where people get tripped up with every installment feature, not just BofA's. A fixed fee sounds cleaner than an interest rate, but that doesn't mean it's cheaper. You need to do a quick comparison.

Here's a simple example: if Custom Pay Plan charges a $15 monthly fee on a $600 purchase spread over 6 months, that's $90 in fees total on top of your principal. If your card's APR is 24%, carrying that $600 balance for 6 months would cost you roughly $72 in interest. In that scenario, the plan actually costs more.

Run that math every time. For some purchases, particularly large ones you're genuinely going to carry for a year or more, the fixed fee can come out ahead. For shorter windows, it often doesn't. If you're not sure how annual fees and interest charges stack up on your cards overall, our guide on how to pay attention to credit card annual fees is a good place to start.

The feature also doesn't help if you're carrying revolving debt across multiple purchases. Custom Pay Plan works purchase by purchase, so it's best suited for one-off large expenses you want to isolate, like a flight or a home appliance.

My Credit: A Better Free Credit Dashboard

My Credit replaces BofA's existing FICO Score program, which is being retired. The new version offers more than just a number.

What's included:

• Your FICO Score
• Full credit report access
• Personalized insights and score improvement suggestions
• Alerts for score changes and suspicious activity
• Integration with Erica, BofA's AI assistant, for on-demand credit profile summaries

To enroll, log in and select "View your FICO Score," then follow the setup prompts. It's free for eligible clients across both the app and the website.

Bonus features for BofA Rewards members: If you're enrolled in BofA Rewards, the new loyalty program that launched in May 2026, you unlock three additional protections: dark web monitoring, Social Security Number monitoring, and full-service identity restoration. If you're already in the program, make sure you're getting all of that by activating My Credit.

For most cardholders, My Credit is the most straightforward win of the three announcements. Free credit monitoring with real-time alerts is genuinely useful regardless of where you are in your credit journey. If you're working on improving your score at the same time, pair it with our 5 strategies to build credit fast — the two tools complement each other well.

How BofA Stacks Up Against Competitors

It's worth being direct about context here. These tools are table stakes at competing issuers.

American Express offers Pay It Plan It with transparent fee disclosures, a referral program across most of its card lineup, and free FICO access bundled into its account dashboards. If you're considering Amex, the American Express® Gold Card and The Platinum Card® from American Express both come with robust account management tools that have set the standard for years. Chase offers My Chase Plan with a clean fee calculator, regular referral bonuses that historically include its premium travel cards, and credit score monitoring through Credit Journey.

What BofA is doing now is catching up, not leading. The more interesting story is the BofA Rewards loyalty program launched last month. The combination of that program plus these new tools suggests the bank is making a sustained push to improve retention and compete more directly with Chase and Amex on the full cardholder experience, not just rates.

Whether that strategy succeeds depends on execution over the next 12 to 18 months. For now, if you're a current BofA cardholder, you have three new features to explore. If you're evaluating whether BofA is worth your wallet space at all, check out our full roundup of the best Bank of America credit cards and how the lineup compares against Bank of America credit cards across different spending profiles.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which Bank of America cards have the Refer-a-Friend feature right now?As of June 2026, Refer-a-Friend is live for the Bank of America® Customized Cash Rewards credit card, the Bank of America® Unlimited Cash Rewards credit card, and the Bank of America® Travel Rewards credit card. BofA has confirmed more cards will be added throughout 2026.

How much can I earn from BofA referrals?Cash-back cardholders earn $100 per approved referral, up to $500 per year. Travel Rewards cardholders earn 10,000 points per approved referral, up to 50,000 points per year.

Is Custom Pay Plan worth it?It depends entirely on the math for your specific purchase, plan length, and APR. The fixed monthly fee is transparent, but it isn't automatically cheaper than carrying a balance at your standard interest rate. Compare the total cost before opting in.

What replaced BofA's FICO Score program?My Credit is the replacement. It includes your FICO Score, full credit report, personalized insights, score change alerts, suspicious activity monitoring, and integration with the Erica assistant. BofA Rewards members also get dark web monitoring and SSN monitoring.

Do I need to be a BofA Rewards member to use these features?No. Refer-a-Friend, Custom Pay Plan, and the core My Credit features are available to eligible cardholders regardless of BofA Rewards membership. The program does unlock additional identity protection features within My Credit, however.

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