Review: DBS Woman’s World Card

In a world fractured by schisms about gender, it’s comforting to know that the DBS Woman’s World Card still retains the ability to unite miles chasers, regardless of chromosomes. Contrary to what its name suggests, this card is available to both men and women, and thanks to its versatility, it’s found its way into many purses, wallets and/or manbags. 

Unfortunately, 2024 got off to a bad start for the DBS Woman’s World Card, with its star attraction — 4 mpd on all online transactions — reduced from S$2,000 per month to S$1,500 per month.

That’s not ideal by any means, but in the cold light of day it still remains an essential part of my card strategy.

DBS Woman’s World Card
🦁 MileLion Verdict
☑ Take It ☐ Take It Or Leave It ☐ Leave It
What do these ratings mean?
Despite a cut to its monthly bonus cap, the gender-neutral DBS Woman’s World Card is still an essential card thanks to its no-questions-asked online spending bonuses.
👍 The good	👎 The bad
4 mpd on all online transactions Open to both genders Points pool with other DBS cards	Monthly bonus cap has been reduced by 25% Bonus points credit one month later Points only valid for one year No points for Amaze transactions
Full List of Credit Card Reviews

Overview: DBS Woman’s World Card

Let’s start this review by looking at the key features of the DBS Woman’s World Card. 

DBS Woman’s World Card
Apply
Income Req.	S$80,000 p.a.	Points Validity	1 year
Annual Fee	S$196.20 (First Year Free)	Min. Transfer	5,000 DBS Points (10,000 miles)
FCY Fee	3.25%	Transfer Fee	S$27.25 (per xfer) S$43.60 (per yr.)
Local Earn	0.4 mpd	Points Pool?	Yes
FCY Earn	1.2 mpd	Lounge Access?	No
Special Earn	4 mpd on online spending	Airport Limo?	No
Cardholder Terms and Conditions

For avoidance of doubt, DBS has two different Woman’s cards:

• DBS Woman’s Platinum Mastercard (left)
• DBS Woman’s World Card (right)

I’ll be focusing on the DBS Woman’s World Card in this post, since there’s really no reason to get the DBS Woman’s Platinum Mastercard (even if you earn less than the income requirement; as we’ll see in the next section, that’s more serving suggestion than cardinal rule).

“I’m a guy,” you say? Good for you. Pump more iron and console yourself that applying for a lady’s card does not make you less of a man in any way shape or form. The DBS Woman’s World Card is open to both men and women; just scroll up and look at the name DBS embossed on the cardface!

How much must I earn to qualify for a DBS Woman’s World Card?

The DBS Woman’s World Card has an S$80,000 annual income requirement, but don’t let that put you off applying. As I’ve laid out before, any income requirement above the MAS-mandated minimum of S$30,000 is essentially arbitrary. 

The fact of the matter is, plenty of people who earn S$30,000 per year get approved for a DBS Woman’s World Card with no drama whatsoever. It helps if you already hold an existing DBS credit card. Click through this link, then select the DBS Woman’s World Card.

Select “Yes” when asked if you already have a DBS card, and login to ibanking. You should then receive an instant decision, and from the data points I’ve seen so far, earning less than S$80,000 has never been an issue.

How much is the DBS Woman’s World Card annual fee?

The DBS Woman’s World Card has an annual fee of S$196.20 for the principal cardholder, and S$98.10 for each supplementary card. This is waived for the first year, and subsequent years’ annual fees can be waived when you spend at least S$25,000 a year. 

Don’t take this as a hard and fast rule. I’ve got my annual fee waived many times before, despite spending nowhere near S$25,000. It’s extremely easy to request an annual fee waiver via DBS’s online channels or hotline, so don’t be afraid to try. 

Credit card annual fee waivers: A bank-by-bank guide

How many miles do I earn?

SGD/FCY Spending

DBS Woman’s World Cardholders earn:

• 1 DBS Point for every S$5 spent in Singapore Dollars (0.4 mpd)
• 3 DBS Points for every S$5 spent in FCY (1.2 mpd)

1 DBS Point is worth 2 airline miles, so that’s an equivalent earn rate of 0.4 mpd for local spending, and 1.2 mpd for FCY spending. 

A 3.25% FCY transaction fee applies to all foreign currency transactions.

Bonus Spending

DBS Woman’s World Cardholders earn:

• 10 DBS Points for every S$5 spent online, whether in Singapore Dollars or FCY (4 mpd)

This is capped at S$1,500 per calendar month, and any spend in excess of this cap earns just 0.4 mpd. 

Some (non-exhaustive) examples of online transactions include:

As you can see, the MCC does not matter (unless it’s on the general exclusions list like insurance or charitable donations).

All that matters is the mode of payment, and this blacklist approach (where all transactions earn bonuses unless they’re explicitly excluded in the T&Cs) makes the DBS Woman’s World Card more versatile than cards with a whitelist approach (where transactions don’t earn bonuses unless they’re explicitly included in the T&Cs) such as the HSBC Revolution or UOB Lady’s Card. 

This comes in particularly handy for MCCs that aren’t excluded, yet don’t feature on the whitelist of other rewards cards. Some examples include teleconsults with DoctorAnywhere or Minmed, hospital bills paid via HealthHub and Health Buddy, and, surprisingly enough, furniture stores like IKEA.

For avoidance of doubt:

When are DBS Points credited?

DBS Points earned on the DBS Woman’s World Card are not all credited at once.

Depending on the type of transaction you’re doing, some will be credited when the transaction posts, with the rest credited by the end of the calendar month following the transaction. 

How are DBS Points calculated?

Here’s how you can work out the DBS Points earned on the DBS Woman’s World Card:

If you’re an Excel geek, here’s the formulas you need to calculate: 

For the full list of formulas that banks use to calculate credit card points, do refer to these articles:

• General Spending Cards
• Specialised Spending Cards

As with all bonus-earning credit cards, it’s important to periodically check your points and make sure they’re crediting properly. Refer to the article below for more details.

How to check credit card points breakdowns

What transactions aren’t eligible for DBS Points?

Per the DBS Rewards T&Cs (Point 2.6), DBS Points will not be awarded for the following transactions.

The DBS Woman’s World Card T&Cs have some further exclusions (Point 2) as to what counts as online spend.

To summarise, this is not the card to use for CardUp/ipaymy, education, government transactions, insurance, charitable donations, utilities, hospitals or GrabPay top-ups. Even if these are processed online, you won’t earn 4 mpd. 

Amaze transactions have also ceased to earn DBS Points, effective 1 June 2022. 

What do I need to know about DBS Points?

Expiry

While some DBS Points never expire (e.g. those earned on the DBS Altitude Card), those earned on the DBS Woman’s World Card expire after just one year.

This is a relatively short expiry period, and probably the biggest drawback of the card. You’ll want to monitor your points balance closely, and cash them out on a periodic basis.

Pooling

DBS Points earned on different cards pool for the purposes of redemption. If I have a 12,000 points on the DBS Altitude and 8,000 points on the DBS Woman’s World Card, I’ll be able to redeem 20,000 points at one shot, paying a single conversion fee. 

However, DBS Points are not pooled when it comes to card cancellations. If I have a DBS Altitude and DBS Woman’s World Card and decide to cancel the latter, I’ll need to transfer my points out before cancelling or forfeit them. 

Partners and Transfer Fee

DBS partners with the following frequent flyer programmes, and a minimum conversion block of 5,000 points is required (except for airasia, where the block is 500; but really, converting points to airasia is like throwing them away).

Frequent Flyer Programme	Conversion Ratio (DBS Points: Miles)
	5,000: 10,000
	5,000: 10,000
	5,000: 10,000
	500: 1,500

Transfers cost S$27.25 per programme, regardless of how many points are transferred.

For KrisFlyer miles specifically, DBS offers an alternative “auto conversion programme”. This charges a flat fee of S$43.60 per membership year, and automatically converts DBS Points to KrisFlyer miles each calendar quarter in blocks of 500 points. 

How does the DBS KrisFlyer Miles Auto Conversion Programme work?

This programme is only available to DBS Insignia, DBS Black Treasures Elite, and DBS Altitude cardholders.

Even though DBS Woman’s World Cardholders are not eligible, the fact that DBS Points pool means that so long as you have one of the participating cards, you can use it as a conduit to cash out the DBS Points earned on the DBS Woman’s World Card!

Transfer Times

DBS tells customers to expect points to be credited in 1-2 weeks, but in reality it usually takes about 1-3 working days at the very most for KrisFlyer (transfer times to other programmes may be longer)

If you need your points credited instantly, you can do so via Kris+. 100 DBS Points can be instantly transferred to 170 KrisPay miles, which can then be converted to KrisFlyer miles at a 1:1 ratio with no fees. 

S$5 for new Kris+ Users

Get S$5 (in the form of 750 KrisPay miles) when you sign-up with code W644363 and make your first transaction

However, those 100 DBS Points would normally have earned you 200 KrisFlyer miles, so you effectively take a 15% haircut. Therefore I wouldn’t recommend taking this option, unless you need a small top-up to redeem a flight, or have an orphan DBS Points balance (<5,000 points). 

If you choose to do so nonetheless, do remember that it’s a two-step process:

1. Transfer DBS Points to KrisPay miles
2. Transfer KrisPay miles to KrisFlyer miles

Do not forget the second step! If you wait more than seven days, or spend any of the converted KrisPay miles via Kris+, the entire balance will be stuck in the Kris+ app. KrisPay miles expire after six months, and can only be spent at a poor ratio of 150 miles = S$1. 

Other card perks

There’s no lounge or airport limo benefits with the DBS Woman’s World Card, but by virtue of its World Mastercard tier, it’s eligible for certain generic Mastercard benefits. These include:

• GHA DISCOVERY Platinum status
• I Prefer Titanium status
• Swiss-Belexecutive Gold Influencer status
• Wyndham Rewards Platinum status
• HoteLux Elite membership

Otherwise, you’ll have access to the usual generic DBS benefits, which can be found here. 

Terms and Conditions

• DBS Woman’s World Card Terms and Conditions
• DBS Rewards Terms and Conditions

Summary Review: DBS Woman’s World Card

DBS Woman’s World Card

Apply

Given the sheer number of online transactions the average person performs on a daily basis, you absolutely need to have a dedicated online spending card.

With the DBS Woman’s World Card, you’re guaranteed 4 mpd, so long as it doesn’t run afoul of the general exclusions. That’s an easy 72,000 miles per year, with very little effort on your part.

The main drawback here is that this card isn’t nearly as good as it was before, thanks to the nerf of its bonus cap from S$2,000 to S$1,500 per calendar month. Also, the one-year points expiry can be annoying, though paying an extra conversion fee once a year is far from a deal-breaker.

I pump iron, you know.