About those DBS Woman’s card changes…

Well color me confused. About a week ago it was all ashes and sackcloth as DBS stealthily uploaded a new set of T&C to its website. You can find a summary of the changes here, but long story short itย added a lot of exceptions for what types of transactions could earn the additional 9X points (ie 3.6 miles) for a grand total of 0.4+3.6 (1X +9X)=4 miles per $1.

Now DBS’s rep has gone on the record on the HWZ forums as saying everything’s fine, nothing’s changed. Here’s the quote in full and the screenshots below in case it gets removed

Yes, there was an update to the T&Cs on our website on 7 June, however we have not made any changes to how additional bonus points for online purchases are awarded, the update was meant to provide greater clarity to all. As such, there was no need to send out service eDMs or SMS.

It’s an update to provide better clarity, but the way points are awarded for online purchases have not been changed.

Online purchases – the updated version leaves less room for misinterpretation

DBS positions this as a clarification rather than a policy change, but it’s quite clear from reading the T&C before and after that by the letter of the law, under the new T&C many of the transactions that traditionally qualified for the bonus 9X no longer qualify

DBS says that the way points are awarded for online transactions have not changed. Indeed, people on HWZ are reporting that their 9X for May is successfully posting (bonus points are posted on the 16th of the following month, remember). So it seems that if there was any effect, it will only be prospective, not retroactive.

So it’s prima facieย reassuring that DBS says nothing has changed, but I don’t think you can really hold them to that if on 16th July your 9X bonus for June doesn’t post properly. I’m trying to figure out what DBS is doing here- why add these new terms if you don’t want to change anything?

My take: the only way to be sure is to see what happens on the 16th of July. That’s when the bonus points (or lack thereof) will come in for June’s transactions. Until then all this is speculation.

Aaron Wong
Aaron Wong
Aaron founded The Milelion to help people travel better for less and impress chiobu. He was 50% successful.

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JT

Their HWZ “clarification” about their t&c “clarification” makes no sense if they are expressly excluding what you now get points for…. as you say, time will tell…

Anonymous

hi aaron, does it mean i should continue to load $4000 per month to my fevo card? i won’t want to waste $40 if i can’t get the 5x and 10x points. sianz.

Anonymous

Maybe try $10/20 first?

Timothy

I guess to play safe, don’t use the card yet until 16th July. Based on what DBS is saying, they are following existing t n c s. If 16th July, we still see the 9X points given , then it will then be safe to use WWMC for fevo top ups. That probably don’t make sense still as the t n cs are there for a reason. Have decided to change my spending habits a little. Use WWMC as mentioned by Aaron for online purchases. Started to use the spreadsheet for UOB paywave purchases more often now. Also as my… Read more »

Frederick

Sounds great then

Nick

My guess is they want to keep it consistent across all cards that earns rewards for online purchases (I.e. Live Fresh 5% vs WWMC 10x points).

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[…] Woman’s World MasterCard (men also can). This week DBS have tried to placate customers by insisting the changes are just a clarification and their backend is not changing. Time will […]

Mark
Merlion

Base pt awarded. Hope it’s still the same

Ethan

Haha, what are the chances?

Anonymous

Anybody’s guess. My wife’s statement also indicates based points awarded. Wait until next month.