Explained: Which MCCs are included in the UOB Lady’s Card “Travel” category

As you no doubt know by now, the UOB Lady’s Cards received one heck of an enhancement earlier this month, with UOB Lady’s Card and UOB Lady’s Solitaire Cardholders now earning 6 mpd on their choice of one and two bonus categories respectively, capped at S$1,000 and S$3,000 per calendar month. 

Bonus categories can be rotated every calendar quarter if desired, and there are seven different categories to choose from.

While most categories are defined explicitly, there’s one that’s very poorly defined: travel.

How does UOB define “travel”?

In the UOB Lady’s Card T&Cs, travel is defined as:

Credit card retail transaction(s) made at major airlines and/or hotels with their main business activity classified as flights and/or hotels only. (including card not-present transactions like ecommerce/mail/phone order transactions)

That’s not very illuminating, to say the least. Unlike the other categories, no specific MCCs are provided.

To make matters more confusing, the UOB Lady’s Card website defines travel as:

Travel comprises of airlines, hotels & resorts bookings and duty-free stores.

Note the addition of duty-free stores, which don’t appear in the T&Cs. 

The landing page goes on to provide some specific merchant names:

Note how all of a sudden cruise liners and travel agencies pop up too! I’m not complaining — it’s certainly good that the net is growing wider — but it makes the scanty T&Cs all the more frustrating. 

Obviously, UOB does have an MCC list to refer to on their backend (how else would they award bonuses?), but for whatever reason, they’ve decided against publishing it.

However, they have shown me the actual list (which I can’t publish, sorry), and based on that I’ve been able to piece together the following.

✔ Included in Travel category

Airlines (MCC 3000-3299, 4511, 4582)

Airlines code as MCC 3000-3299, 4511, 4582, and UOB says that all “major airlines” will qualify for bonuses.

What is a “major airline”? Based on the MCC list I’ve seen, I can confirm it’s pretty much any airline you can book a ticket with.

The excluded MCCs in this range are mostly companies that no longer exist (and that I’m really surprised still have MCCs), such as:

• MCC 3002 Pan American (ceased operations 1991)
• MCC 3061 Continental Airlines (ceased operations 2012- merged into United)
• MCC 3071 Air British Columbia (ceased operations 2002)

There are a few excluded airlines that still operate, but I highly doubt you’ll ever set foot on:

• MCC 3094 Zambia Airways 
• MCC 3135 Sudan Airways

So I can’t think of any realistic scenario (short of booking a charter flight maybe?) where you’d buy an air ticket and not earn bonus points.

Cruise Liners (MCC 4411)

Cruise liners code as MCC 4411, and are included as part of the UOB Lady’s Card Travel category.

This includes Royal Caribbean International (mentioned explicitly on the UOB Lady’s Card website), Carnival Cruises, Celebrity Cruises, Holland America, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Resorts World Cruises, Virgin Cruises etc.

Duty-free Stores (MCC 5309)

Duty-free stores code as MCC 5309, and are included as part of the UOB Lady’s Card Travel category.

This would include DFS, Dufry, Heinemann, KrisShop, Lotte, The Shilla Duty Free etc.

Hotels (MCC 3500-3999, 7011)

Hotels code as MCC 3500-3999 & 7011, and UOB says that all “major hotels” will qualify for bonuses.

Again, making reference to the MCC list I’ve seen, I can say you have nothing to worry about as the excluded MCCs mostly refer to chains that have gone out of business, or have been acquired by larger ones.

Perhaps the only exclusion worth flagging is MCC 3627 Extended Stay America, a budget chain with 650 locations across the USA and Canada. 

Do note that Airbnb is explicitly mentioned on the UOB Lady’s Card website. These transactions can code under two different MCCs (4722 or 7011), but both are included for the Travel category.

Online Travel Agencies (MCC 4722)

Online travel agencies code as MCC 4722, and are included as part of the UOB Lady’s Card Travel category.

This includes Agoda, Expedia, Hotels.com and Klook (mentioned explicitly on the UOB Lady’s Card website), Booking.com, Trip.com, Kayak, Traveloka etc.

Regular Travel Agencies (MCC 4722)

Offline travel agencies also code as MCC 4722, and are included as part of the UOB Lady’s Card Travel category.

This includes Chan Brothers & EU Holidays (mentioned explicitly on the UOB Lady’s Card website), CTC Travel, Dynasty Travel, Nam Ho, New Shan Travel, SA Travel, WTS Travel etc.

✖ Not included in Travel category

Airport Transfers, Private Hire Cars, Taxis (MCC 4121)

Airport transfers, private hire cars and taxis code under MCC 4121, and are not included as part of the UOB Lady’s Card Travel category

4121 is already covered under the Transport category for the UOB Lady’s Card. 

Bus Liners (MCC 4131)

Bus liners code under MCC 4131, and are not included as part of the UOB Lady’s Card Travel category (e.g. BoltBus, Greyhound, MegaBus, Peter Pan).

Rental Cars (MCC 3000-3499)

Rental car providers code as MCC 3000-3499, and are not included as part of the UOB Lady’s Card Travel category (e.g. Avis, Enterprise, Europcar, Hertz, Sixt).

Trains (MCC 4111/4112)

Trains fall into two main MCCs:

• 4111 (Transportation-Suburban and Local Commuter Passenger)
• 4112 (Passenger Railways)

MCC 4111 is typically used for intra-city public transport (e.g. riding the local bus/MRT equivalent), and is not included under the UOB Lady’s Card’s Travel category (it falls under the Transport category instead).

MCC 4112 is typically used for inter-city trains (e.g. Shinkasen, Trenitalia, Eurostar), and is not included under the UOB Lady’s Card’s Travel category. 

How do you check the MCC?

When dealing with a big-ticket expense like travel, it might be a good idea to check the MCC before spending.

If you’re uncertain about the MCC, here’s three ways you can check it before making a purchase.

For a detailed guide, refer to the following article.

How to check Merchant Category Codes (MCCs) before making a purchase

Conclusion

UOB does not provide an explicit MCC range for the Travel category, but hopefully this article helps shed some light on what transactions do and do not earn bonuses. 

The tl;dr is:

Final note: while I welcome comments, there’s not much point asking “will merchant X earn bonuses”, because you can assume my answer will be “yes, if it falls under the relevant MCC”.

Most of the time, MCCs will code exactly the way you suspect they will, but there can be the odd occasion when they go haywire. When in doubt, always check via the method I described above.