UOB Krisflyer offering double miles on all SQ/MI revenue tickets

The UOB Krisflyer account is running a promotion that offers account holders double miles on air tickets booked with SQ/MI between 7 Dec 2017- 15 Jan 2018 and flown between 1 Jan-31 March 2018.

Here’s the illustrative table provided for flights to London (distances are shown as round trip)

The immediate question that popped into my mind was how this compared to the miles you’d earn if you put your SQ/MI tickets onto a regular credit card instead. So I looked at the same route given in the table of Singapore to London across all cabins. Apologies about the color for First/Suites, SQ’s website seems to have a mind of its own.

Reading from left to right, those are fare buckets K, N, W, E, P, D, U and A. Here’s how much they cost and how many miles you’d earn with different cards

It seems that the UOB Krisflyer debit card comes out ahead on the more expensive economy fare buckets. It’s more or less on par with the DBS Altitude for business class fares (that the DBS Altitude earns 3 mpd only up to $5K each month), but behind both the KF cobranded AMEXes and DBS Altitude for First Class fares (who even buys first class tickets?).

Remember that the above Krisflyer UOB figure in the table refers to the bonus miles only. Presumably, you’d also earn 1.4-5.4 mpd on the base amount paid in addition to this (do recall, however, that although 5.4 mpd sounds out of this world, you only get that if you park >$350K(!) in a 0 interest earning account, plus the bonus miles you can earn are capped at 5% of your monthly average balance).

A few other points to note about this promo:

• you only earn double miles on round trip itineraries that originate and end in Singapore
• if you make changes to your booking after the stipulated booking period (15 Jan 2018), your booking will not be eligible for the double miles promotion notwithstanding the fact your travel dates are still within the promo period. This seems unnecessarily harsh to me

If for whatever reason you do have a Krisflyer UOB account, this is a good promotion for you. But it certainly shouldn’t be an enticement to go out and sign up for one if you don’t already have it.

[HT: Travelcene]