Trust Link Credit Card Review: Too many emoji, not enough free rice

Trust Bank 🏦, a joint venture 🤝 between between Standard Chartered Bank 🏧 and NTUC Enterprise 🛒 launched 🚀 yesterday 📅 as Singapore’s 🇸🇬 first digital bank 🙌🎊🎉🥳.

Use code: 2GQEAM81 for bonus S$10 voucher

Did you find that paragraph insufferable to read? If so, Trust Bank might not be right for you, given how employee remuneration seems to be directly correlated to the number of emoji used.

Trust Bank desperately, desperately wants you #fellowkids to know that it’s hip and trendy, so much so its T&Cs are saturated with emoji, as if they were drafted by a team of avuncular boomers who earnestly believe this will help connect with the “cool and radical youth of today yolo”. 

And yet it feels like they’re speaking out of both sides of their mouth, since all the talk during the launch event was about bringing banking to the elderly and less tech-savvy, a commendable goal in and of itself. 

Can you really be all things to all people? Perhaps- if “all people” doesn’t include miles chasers. 

You see, Trust Bank is in a unique position compared to other digital upstarts like GXS in that it offers both a savings account and credit card (versus just saving account for GXS). While I can’t speak to how good the savings account is, (there are other bloggers who will cover that much better), I’m certainly able to weigh in on the Trust Card.

Trust Card
★★
The Trust Card’s ambitions, while noble, are hamstrung by a hopelessly confusing rewards scheme with numerous gotchas. The best thing might be the free rice.
👍 The good	👎 The bad
No FCY fees Where else can you get a sign-up bonus of S$35 FairPrice vouchers and a 1kg bag of rice?	You need a PhD to understand how the rebates system works Miserly earn rate on general spending Promotional earn rates only till 31 December 2022
💳 Full List of Credit Card Reviews

tl;dr: Outside of FairPrice Group spend, the Trust Card is virtually useless. But in order to trigger the FairPrice Group bonuses, you need to spend outside of FairPrice Group! This Penrose stairs model means that the claim of “up to 21% rebates” is nothing more than a marketing gimmick.

Now, I should probably state upfront that I’m well aware I’m not the right target market for Trust Bank (and if you’re reading this, you probably aren’t too). In fact, I’m likely to be their worst possible customer, seeing as how I’m taking the sign-up gifts and running.

That said, we look at things from a rewards perspective here, and if you’re savvy enough to know your credit card alternatives, then there’s very little attractive about the Trust Card.

Well, except for S$35 of free FairPrice vouchers and a 1kg bag of rice.

No, really.

Overview: Trust Card

Trust Card
Download (Android)
Download (iOS)
Use code: 2GQEAM81 for bonus S$10 voucher
Annual Fee (Including GST)	None	FCY Fee	None
Welcome Gift	S$35 FairPrice eVoucher	Transfer Partners	SIA Air Asia Park Hotels
Local Earn	0.22 Lpd	Transfer Fee	None
FCY Earn	0.22 Lpd	Special Earn	Up to 21 Lpd at FPG
Lpd= Linkpoints per S$1 | FPG= FairPrice Group Merchants Cardholder Terms and Conditions | FAQs

The Trust Card has a minimum income requirement of S$30,000 p.a., and no annual fee. It acts as a 2-in-1 solution. You can use it as a credit card, or a debit card if you have a savings account with Trust. The app allows you to instantly toggle between both modes. 

Cardholders will receive both a virtual and physical Trust Card; the latter is numberless for security purposes (if you need to make an online transaction, you can retrieve the card details from the Trust app). The virtual card can be added to both Apple Pay and Google Pay for mobile wallet transactions. 

Do note that there are two types of Trust Cards out there:

Trust Link Credit Card	NTUC Link Credit Card

The default card is the Trust Link Credit Card, but if you’re an NTUC Union member, you will receive an NTUC Link Credit Card instead (your union membership will be automatically reflected on the Trust app). This has a higher earn rate for spend at FairPrice Group merchants, but features are otherwise the same. 

In this review, I will use the term Trust Card when referring to both cards, and individual product names otherwise. 

Sign-up bonus: S$35 FairPrice vouchers (and some rice)

Let’s start with the sign-up bonus, because it’s probably the best thing about the Trust Card:

• All new Trust customers who sign up with the referral code 2GQEAM81 will get a S$10 FairPrice e-voucher (I get the same too)
• A further S$25 FairPrice e-voucher will be awarded upon first transaction of any amount on the Trust Card

The FairPrice e-vouchers have no minimum spend, and are valid for four months. They can be used at any online or offline platforms of FairPrice, FairPrice Finest, FairPrice Xtra, FairPrice Shop, Warehouse Club and Unity (except Changi Airport). 

I made a small donation to charity and got the vouchers credited instantly, and others have reported success buying small items on Qoo10/Shopee etc, even top-ups to Revolut. I’m assuming there’s no exclusion categories for the sign-up bonus (though there are for earning LinkPoints; see below). 

You thought we were done? Not hardly. S$35 of FairPrice e-vouchers is grand and all, but the true gems go unpublished. 

Navigate to the coupon section of the Trust app after registration, and you’ll find:

• A 1kg bag of Fairprice Superior Fragrant Rice (worth S$3.55)
• A free Signature Breakfast Set at Kopitiam (worth S$3.10)

Both yours, absolutely free. Who needs a 100,000 miles sign-up bonus?

Trust Card earn rates

The Trust Link Credit Card earns Linkpoints as its rewards currency. As a reminder:

100 Linkpoints = S$1

Linkpoints can also be converted to a handful of loyalty programmes including KrisFlyer, which I’ll talk about later on.

	Trust Link Credit Card	NTUC Link Credit Card
General Spend	0.22 Lpd	0.22 Lpd
FairPrice Group Spend (until 31 Dec 22)	Up to 15 Lpd	Up to 21 Lpd
FairPrice Group Spend (from 1 Jan 23)	Up to 8 Lpd	Up to 14 Lpd
Lpd= Linkpoints per S$1

All spending on the Trust Card, whether in local or foreign currency, earns a pathetic 0.22 Lpd which is equivalent to a 0.22% rebate (“with no cap!”, the T&Cs say cheerfully).

That’s far worse than your typical general spending cashback card, which earns 1.5-1.7% cashback. In fact, it’s even worse than what specialised spending cashback cards give if you fail to meet their minimum spend (e.g. the Citi Cash Back Card awards 8% cashback on groceries with a min. total spend of S$800/month; otherwise 0.25%- still better than 0.22%!).

So why even bother with the Trust Card? The hook is meant to be FairPrice Group (FPG) merchants, defined as the following:

Spend at FPG merchants earns Linkpoints according to this table:

🛒 Spending at FPG Merchants (till 31 Dec 2022)
	Trust Link Credit Card	NTUC Link Credit Card
Base Rate	0.5 Lpd	2.5 Lpd
Monthly Bonus Rate	7.5 Lpd	8.5 Lpd
Quarterly Bonus Rate	7 Lpd	8 Lpd
FairPrice Annual Member Bonus	N/A	2 Lpd*
Total	Up to 15 Lpd	Up to 21 Lpd
*Subject to approval at the FairPrice annual general meeting, excludes Cheers

I don’t blame you for being confused; it took me a long time to figure this out too.

Let’s use the Trust Link Credit Card as an example. There’s three components to consider: base, monthly bonus, and quarterly bonus.

I hope you see the catch here: Trust Bank doesn’t want people to simply use the Trust Card at FPG merchants, and sock drawer it otherwise. That’s why they’ve built a hurdle condition of S$450 spend at non-FPG merchants to trigger the monthly and quarterly bonuses.

It means your weighted average rebate will be much lower than 21%, since at least S$450 needs to be spent at a measly rebate of 0.22 Lpd (0.22%). 

Here’s a worked example. John spends S$450 per month at non-FPG merchants, and S$600 per month at FPG merchants. After three months, he will receive a total of 22,197 Linkpoints, broken down as follows: 

22,197 Linkpoints (S$221.97) for S$3,150 of spending represents a weighted average 7% rebate. That’s decent, but far from the 21% advertised- the whole equation gets weighted down by the non-FPG spend.

Keep in mind, the above rates are only valid till 31 December 2022, after which they’ll drop as follows:

🛒 Spending at FPG Merchants (from 1 Jan 2023)
	Trust Link Credit Card	NTUC Link Credit Card
Base Rate	0.5 Lpd	2.5 Lpd
Monthly Bonus Rate	3.5 Lpd	4.5 Lpd
Quarterly Bonus Rate	4 Lpd	5 Lpd
FairPrice Annual Member Bonus	N/A	2 Lpd*
Total	Up to 8 Lpd	Up to 14 Lpd
*Subject to approval at the FairPrice annual general meeting, excludes Cheers

While the minimum spend will remain the same, the monthly and quarterly bonuses will be reduced, together with their caps.

Going back to our same example with John; under the revised system he’ll receive a total of 11,497 Linkpoints, broken down as follows:

11,497 Linkpoints for S$3,150 of spending represents a weighted average 3.6% rebate. That may sound better than a 1.5% cashback card, but remember:

• The rebate is given in Linkpoints, which are not as flexible as cold hard cash
• It’s not correct to compare 1.5% and 3.6%, since 1.5% is offered everywhere and 3.6% is a weighted average figure. In fact, the more you spend outside of FPG, the lower your weighted average rebate!

Quite frankly, I think you’d be better off with any of the following:

• CIMB Visa Signature: 10% cashback on groceries with min. S$800 spend, capped at S$20 per month
• Citi Cash Back Card: 8% cashback on groceries with min. S$800 total spend, capped at S$80 per month
• Maybank Family & Friends Card: 8% cashback on groceries with min. S$800 total spend, capped at S$25 per month
• HSBC Revolution: 4 mpd on groceries, no min. spend, capped at S$1,000 per month

It’s also important to highlight that under the revised system, the monthly bonus cap is equal to the quarterly bonus cap. It means that once you hit the monthly bonus cap, there’s nothing further to be earned towards the quarterly bonus!

To its credit, Trust Bank makes tracking your monthly and quarterly bonuses simple. A widget on the Trust app shows your progress towards monthly and quarter bonus minimum spend, as well as the number of bonus points earned so far. 

And perhaps it needs to, with T&Cs this obscure.

Trust Card spending exclusions

The Trust Card’s list of rewards exclusions categories are pretty standard for most banks: 

• Cash advances
• Cancelled or refunded transactions
• AXS, SAM or ATM transactions
• Any fees (late payment fees, finance fees etc)
• Any amounts rolled over from previous month’s statement
• Insurance premiums
• Any top-ups (except Kopitiam top-ups) or payment of funds to any accounts
• Utilities, Rentals and Cleaning Services (MCC 4900, 6513, 7349)
• Financial Institutions, Securities – Brokers, Quasi Cash, Insurance, Stored Value Card Purchase/Load and Wire Transfer (MCC 4829, 5960, 6010, 6011, 6012, 6051, 6211, 6300, 6540)
• Gambling (MCC 7995)
• Educational Institutions (MCC 8211, 8220, 8241, 8244, 8249, 8299)
• Charitable services, political organisations, religious organisations and government payments (MCC 8398, 8651, 8661)
• Government payments (MCC 9211, 9222, 9223, 9311, 9402, 9405)

These transactions will not earn Linkpoints, nor count towards the S$450 minimum spend required at non-FPG merchants to trigger the FPG bonuses.

No cash advance fees (but…)

The Trust Card proudly trumpets the fact it has no cash advance fees, but you need to be very, very careful here.

It’s true that you can use your Trust Card to withdraw money from Standard Chartered or Trust ATMs (located at VivoCity FairPrice) in Singapore with no fees. It’s also true that when overseas, you can use your Trust Card to withdraw cash from an ATM at a foreign exchange rate provided by Visa, and no fee from Trust (the overseas ATM operator may levy a fee).

Alas, Trust Bank is being disingenuous here. While there’s no fees, there is interest. Hidden away in the fine print is this clause:

Effective Interest Rate (EIR): 26.9% per annum (minimum). Interest will be calculated daily at 0.074% on the amount withdrawn from the date of the transaction until the date of full payment.

In other words, cash advances aren’t free; you’ll be paying interest from the day you get the money from the ATM. 

Now, to some of you this might be obvious- how could Trust Bank be handing out interest-free loans? But remember that Trust is meant to cater to older users and the less tech-savvy. This means transparency is paramount, and plastering “no cash advance fee” over your website and marketing materials isn’t what I’d call a best practice. 

If you need to withdraw cash, skip the cash advance feature and switch the Trust Card to debit card mode, which draws from the cash in your account. 

No FCY fees

One unique feature about the Trust Card is that it’s the first in Singapore not to levy a foreign currency transaction fee of any sort- neither from the bank side, nor the card network (i.e. Visa). 

To test this out, I paid a A$1 transaction, which came up to S$0.96; exactly what the Visa Currency Converter says it should be for a card with zero FCY fees. 

Here’s the thing though: given the miserable general spend earn rate of the Trust Card (and the fact there’s no FPG spend to be done in foreign currency), I wager you’d be better off using the Amaze + Citi Rewards Mastercard for 4 mpd and no FCY fees (apart from the spread that Amaze charges).

And even if you were simply looking to minimise the cost of your transaction, or spend on something that doesn’t earn rewards (e.g. overseas school fees), you’d do better with the Revolut or YouTrip, which let you lock in a favourable exchange rate in advance. With Trust, you’re subject to whatever the prevailing rate is at the time of the transaction. 

Linkpoint partner conversions

Here’s where things could potentially get interesting for miles collectors.

Back in April 2022, KrisFlyer added Link Rewards as a two-way conversion partner, allowing members to transfer miles and points between the two programmes. 1 Linkpoint is worth anywhere from 0.5 to 0.536 miles, depending on how many you transfer at one go. 

Linkpoints	KrisFlyer Miles
100	50
200	100
1,000	500
2,000	1,070
5,000	2,680

What this effectively means is that the Trust Card could be viewed as a miles card with earn rates of:

• 0.118 mpd for general spending
• Up to 8.0 mpd for FPG spending (but note all the minimum spend shenanigans and caps, which means your effective rate will be much lower) during the promotion period, and 4.3 mpd afterwards

However, given that 100 Linkpoints are worth a S$1 rebate, you’re effectively buying KrisFlyer miles at:

• 2 cents per mile, for transfers of 100-1,000 Linkpoints
• 1.87 cents per mile, for transfers of 2,000 Linkpoints and above

That’s on the high side, and I’d prefer to use Linkpoints for rebates instead.

Linkpoints can also be transferred to airasia rewards (formerly known as BIG) and Park Rewards at the following rates:

• 1,000 Linkpoints = 420 airasia points / 2,000 Linkpoints= 880 airasia points
• 1,000 Linkpoints= 300 Park$ / 2,000 Linkpoints= 650 Park$

Neither ratio is particularly appealing. 

Linkpoints could previously be transferred to Asia Miles and GrabRewards points as well, but these partnerships have been indefinitely suspended, with “no plans to continue them in the near future” (as quoted to me by a customer service officer). 

Conclusion

Trust Card

Download (Android)

Download (iOS)

Use code: 2GQEAM81 for bonus S$10 voucher

Does the Trust Card have its use cases? 

It most certainly does. I kind of think of it as an auntie card, suitable for retirees who do the bulk of their spending within the FairPrice ecosystem (and are hopefully aware of the need to spend at least S$450 outside of it). The fact that they’re planning to set up a “customer experience centre” at VivoCity FairPrice to help the less technically-inclined setup an account suggests the type of clientele they’re looking at.

Moreover, they’ve built an app that delivers an idiot-proof sign-up process. My approval came instantly, and other banks could learn from how smooth and seamless the experience feels. 

As a tool for rewards optimisers, however, the Trust Card is virtually irrelevant. I’m struggling to think of a role for it, because even from a groceries perspective, you could do much better with other cards on the market (not to mention spare yourself the cognitive load of navigating all the gotchas).

Again, this suggests it’s a me problem more than anything else. I’m sure the Trust Card will find its niche; I mean, the erstwhile Plus! card did very well for OCBC even though it never came across my radar at all.

And if it wants to do so while utilising every emoji in the world, who am I to say 💩?