I’m hoping that regular readers of The Milelion will know by now the drill when it comes to any sort of credit card spending- the first thing you should do is see whether itย falls into a category that attracts bonuses. Unfortunately, a lot of the big ticket items that people will purchase throughout the course of their lives may not fall into a bonus category.ย Examples include
- renovations
- medical bills (technically there’s a bonus for this but the T&C are so restrictive it’s not worth thinking about)
- buying a car (some places let you use your credit card to pay the deposit)
- wedding banquet
- university tuition fees (some overseas institutions take cards)
In these cases, many people would turn to a general spending card, but it does seem a shame to earn a relatively low 1.2-1.4 mpd on such large amounts. And this, to me, is why it’s so important to time your credit card sign ups around important life events (or vice versa, if you’re really into miles…). Big ticket spending might not attract category bonuses, but it can help you achieve a spending threshold for a sign up bonus.
Below I’m going to make a listing of the current sign up bonuses in the market. I’m going to make this a regularly updated feature of the website by addingย a corresponding page to the credit card drop down menu on the home page.
Final point: a sign up bonus is conceptually not the same thing as buying miles through annual fees (although some of the bonuses below will include miles earned from annual fees). Sign up bonus means you spent a certain threshold to get bonus miles. Annual fee miles are yours when you pay the annual fee to the bank. Therefore I won’t be listing cards like the SCB Visa Infinite or HSBC Visa Infinite below. You can read about those offers here.ย
Citibank Premiermiles Visa (42,000 miles with $10,192.60 spend)
Income requirement: $50,000 p.a
Sign up bonus: 42,000 miles
Breakdown:ย Earn 10,000 bonus miles when you pay the annual fee, 5,000 bonus miles with your first spend of any amount, 15,000 bonus miles when you spend $10,000 within first 3 months and 12,000 base miles on the $10,000 spend (assumes local spend @ 1.2 mpd, but overseas spend will still attract 2.0 mpd)
Conditions:ย You must be a first-time Citibank credit cardholder or did not hold any Citibank credit card in the 12 months prior to application. You also need to pay the first year annual fee of $192.60
Full T&C: Click here
Expires: 31 December 2017
Sign up here for the Citibank Premiermiles Visa Bonus
Citibank Prestige (80,000 miles with $20,535 spend)
Income requirement: $120,000 p.a
Sign up bonus:ย 80,000 miles
Breakdown:ย Earn 25,000 bonus miles for paying the annual fee, 29,000 bonus miles when you spend $20,000 in the first 3 months, and 26,000 base miles on the $20,000 spend (assumes local spend @ 1.3 mpd, but overseas spend will still attract 2.0 mpd)
Conditions:ย You need to pay the annual fee of $535, you cannot have held a Citi Prestige card in the 12 month period prior
Full T&C: Click here
Expires: 30 November 2017
Sign up here for the Citibank Prestige Bonus
UOB PRVI Miles AMEX/Visa/Mastercard (17,600 miles with $4,000 spend)
Income requirement: $50,000 p.a for AMEX/Mastercard, $80,000 p.a for Visa
Sign up bonus:ย 17,600 miles
Breakdown:ย Earn 12,000 bonus miles when you spend $4,000 within 60 days of approval, and 5,600 base miles on your $4,000 spend (assumes local spend @ 1.4 mpd, but overseas spend will still attract 2.4 mpd)
Conditions: Valid for first 1,200 members only. Registration required (see T&C document for full details). Only valid if you don’t hold any of the PRVI cards. If you’re an existing UOB credit card holder (of any card other than PRVI), you’ll earn 5,000 miles only. 12,000 mile offer is for people who have never held a UOB card before. Yeah, UOB promos are kinda sucky.
Full T&C: Click here
Expires: 31 December 2017
Sign up here for the UOB PRVI Miles AMEX Bonus
Sign up here for UOB PRVI Miles Visa Bonus
Sign up here for UOB PRVI Miles Mastercard Bonus
American Express Krisflyer Blue Card (15,250 miles with $2,500 spend)
Income requirement: $30,000 p.a
Sign up bonus:ย 15,250 miles
Breakdown:ย Earn 5,000 miles with your first spend of any amount, 7,500 bonus miles when you spend $2,500 in your first 3 months, 2,750 base miles with your $2,500 spend (assumes local spend @ 1.1 mpd, but overseas spend in June and Dec (lol) will still attract 2.0 mpd)
Conditions:ย ย 5,000 mile first spend gift only for cardmembers who have never held any AMEX Krisflyer cobrand card before
Full T&C: Click here
Expires: 31 December 2017
Sign up here for the AMEX Krisflyer Blue bonus
American Express Krisflyer Ascend Card (27,200 miles with $6,000 spend)
Income requirement: $50,000 p.a
Sign up bonus:ย 27,200 miles
Breakdown:ย Earn 5,000 miles with first spend of any amount, 15,000 bonus miles when you spend $6,000 miles within 3 months of approval, 7,200 base miles on your $6,000 spend (assumes local spend @ 1.2 mpd but overseas spend in June and Dec (lol again) will still attract 2.0 mpd)
Conditions:ย 5,000 mile first spend gift only for cardmembers who have never held any AMEX Krisflyer cobrand card before
Full T&C: Click here
Expires: 31 December 2017
Sign up here for the AMEX Krisflyer Ascend bonus
American Express Rewards Card (13,333 miles with $1,553.50 spend)
Income requirement: $30,000 p.a
Sign up bonus:ย 13,333 miles
Breakdown:ย Earn 11,666 bonus miles when you spend $1,500 in the first 3 months after approval and pay the annual fee, and 1,666 base miles (base points doubled for first 3 months) on your $1,500 spend
Conditions: You need to pay the annual fee of $53.50
Full T&C: Click the T&C link at the bottom of this page
Expires:ย No expiry
Hi Aaron, thanks for the update, been following your site for some time ๐ I’m wondering if there is any miles cards that are good for tuition fees payment to local universities? – DBS recently updated their T&C to exclude miles accrual on education fees payment, that affects ALL cards (including Altitude and WC). – UOB PPV doesn’t consider paying tuition fees as online transaction – I’m still checking with HSBC Revolution, but the answer I get from different CSO is different? I’ve read your post regarding best entry level credit card, considering the annual income of <50k, what would… Read more »
i didn’t know local unis take credit cards. which one are you talking about? there’s no card that will earn a bonus for tuition fee payment, so i guess i’d go with whatever card i’m trying to hit minimum spend on. maybe consider citibank premiermiles @ 50k income requirement?
what quantum tuition fees are we talking about? any chance they’d let you split onto diff cards eg amex ascend + amex rewards?
Hi Aaron, Iโve even paying NUS with my KF Amex blue card and earning 1.1 mpd. Itโs possible to split the payment on different cards so long as the total amount is paid within 1 month after the sem starts. The tuition fees are around 10k per year. My annual income is close to 50k but not there yet, maybe itโs a good idea to try Citi Premiermiles. I called HSBC regarding their revo card and tuition fees payment is eligible for earning 5x rewards (2mpd), not sure if ipaymy is eligible too. What combination would you recommend if split… Read more »
Why not amex rewards card?
Hi GJ, I believe Amex rewards card is only good for the first 3 months with the 24000 bonus points. Even if you spent more than 5k per year, and given extra 50% points, the redemption rate is only 0.83mpd, there are way better cards out there.
How about amex rewards plus HSBC revolution?
you should try for premiermiles, the worst thing they can say is no. it’s especially a good deal if you’re a first time citibank customer as 42k miles is a big reward. you should get the amex rewards if you don’t already have it, if only to take advantage of the sign up bonus (don’t use it subsequently of course).
Thanks Aaron, I agree amex rewards should never be used after the sign up bonus, will go for premiermiles!
Great stuff!! Just got married so I made use of some of these stuff here. Just one thing for everyone, might want to make it clearer that you can’t get the Amex blue card and Ascend card at the same time. I applied for both and they auto cancelled one of them.
I think you can hold both cards no?
i’ve never held both cards at the same time. can someone confirm this?
Yup, confirmed that you can only hold 1 SIA co-branded card at any one point of time, and max of 3 AMEX cards in your overall portfolio
Minor typo for Amex rewards total spending required (shld read $1,553.50)
thank you! fixed.
Some of the above essentially involves buying miles, so would be good to see a cents per marginal mile factoring in unavoidable costs (e.g. non-waivable or hard to waive annual fees) for additional miles that would be earned in excess of the standard 1.4mpd on PRVI.
So for example, Citi Prestige 80k miles on $20,535 spend with $535 annual fee.
Spending that amount on PRVI would equal 28,749 miles (ignoring UOB’s absurd rounding rubbish).
Therefore the Citi Prestige would net you an additional 51,251 miles at a cost of $535, which works out to be 1.044cpm.
That was how I originally looked at it as well, but there’re some additional savings to be had from the Prestige through the 4th night free benefit. I should be able to recoup the entire $535 through 3 free nights for my 2 upcoming trips.
My comment applies to any AMex that doesn’t waive first year fees automatically. I am very curious about the Prestige, I am about to pull the trigger on it for the sign up bonus and the 4th night free benefit. The Priority Pass benefit doesn’t interest me – I have PP unlimited + guest already from Amex Platinum Card. If Citi could issue the PP in someone else’s name (like family or relative), then I would see that as an additional benefit. On top of all those 2 visits free PP cards, I am having problems tracking all my PP… Read more »
there’s a promotion going on for an additional 3000 miles if you sign up via this link: http://amexoffers.sg/sia-additional-welcome-bonus-kfs/
and you can get an additional 1500 miles per supplementary card owner (2 card owners max = 3000 miles). so you’re looking at up to 21,500 miles