What is ABT and who’s giving away what?

ABT stands for Account-Based Ticketing. It’s a new initiative that allows you to use your contactless enabled Mastercard to pay for your bus/MRT rides. Simply put, your fares are billed to your credit card every time you ride, and there’s no need to top up and carry around a separate EZ-link card. There are no additional charges involved.

You can read more details about the scheme here, suffice to say that the pilot has launched today. Some of you may have received an SMS from your bank inviting you to participate, but if not you can try to manually register here, subject to availability. If your card has this symbol, you’re potentially eligible

There is a general promotion being run by Mastercard that applies to all users of ABT.

The 200 Mastercard holders with the highest number of ABT transactions during each qualifying period (see below) will get a rebate of S$80. There are a total of 1,200 travel rebates of S$80 to give away from now till 19 Sept 2017.

Full T&C can be found here.

Apart from that, the banks have launched various promotions to encourage people to sign up. Here’s the rundown

UOB

UOB has said that ABT transactions will not earn rewards or rebates. However, they are running 2 launch promotions as shown below.

You’re probably not going to win the S$1,000 of free rides (11 winners), but you might fare (HAHAHAHAHAHA) a bit better with the S$15 rebate. The first 20,000 cardmembers who use ABT for at least one transaction per month will get a $5 rebate for each of the 3 months (March, April, May) promotional period. Full T&C can be found here.

DBS/POSB

DBS/POSB’s offer is a 100% cashback on the first 3 rides between 20 March and 20 April. Full T&C can be found here. This offer isn’t capped, but it’s fairly weak compared to what other banks have.

OCBC

OCBC is offering up to S$15 cashback for cardholders using ABT. This promotion runs from 20th March to 19th June 2017, and a maximum of S$5 can be earned each month. This is open to the first 3,000 cardmembers per month. Full T&C can be found here.

CIMB

CIMB is offering a 10% cash credit (up to S$8 per month) when you use CIMB Mastercard with your ABT from now till 19 Sept 2017. Full T&C can be found here.

EDIT: An earlier version of the article said that there was a minimum spend per month of S$80 required. This was based on this line in the webpage

However, the T&C do not specify any minimum spend of S$80 required. 

My reading of this is that if you want to get S$8 per month you need to spend a min of S$80 (@ 10% rebate). But any spending <S$80 should still net you the 10% rebate.

Maybank

(Thanks to Kindsoul) Maybank’s version of this promo is similar to CIMB- 8% cash rebate with the Family and Friends card. You can read the T&C here.

Standard Chartered

(Thanks Yiwei) Standard Chartered is offering S$10 cashback each month with a minimum spend of S$10 on ABT. This promotion is capped to S$30 per cardholder during the period of 20 March to 19 Sept 2017. The full T&C can be found here. 

Summary

If UOB is any example to go by, it appears that banks will not give miles on ABT transactions. Therefore, unless you’re gunning for some (limited) free money, you might be better off topping up your Ez-link card with the HSBC Visa Advance (until the end of this month at least) to earn 10X points on $200 each month.