Amaze adds 1% fee for selected SGD transactions; lowers fee for GrabPay top-ups

Instarem has announced some upcoming changes to the Amaze Card, which take effect from Friday, 13 October 2023. 

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T&Cs

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💳 tl;dr: Amaze Card

Link up to five Mastercard credit/debit cards Overseas transactions are converted into SGD (no FCY transaction fees, but subject to FX spread) and charged to the underlying credit/debit card Transaction MCC remains the same, offline transactions charged to Amaze become online transactions for the underlying credit/debit card Earn 0.5 InstaPoints (linked card) or 1 InstaPoint (wallet) per S$1 spent on FCY transactions of at least S$10 (except exclusion categories), capped at 500 InstaPoints per transaction Redeem InstaPoints for cashback in blocks of 2,000 InstaPoints= S$20

A new transaction fee of 1% will be added to selected payments such as education, insurance and healthcare, made in SGD and charged to a linked card. Amaze will also cut the transaction fee for e-wallet top-ups from 2% to 1%.

While there have been some unpleasant nerfs to Amaze in recent memory, this latest development shouldn’t cause too much distress. Though we will be losing a couple of Amaze use cases, the vast majority remain untouched.

1% transaction fee for selected SGD transactions

From 13 October 2023, Amaze will add a 1% transaction fee (with a minimum fee of S$0.50) for selected payments made in SGD with a linked card.

The affected MCCs can be found below:

Here’s the thing: from the list above, government services, education and insurance are already excluded from earning rewards by almost every card in Singapore. Therefore, there’s no real reason why you’d be using Amaze to pay in the first place. 

The bigger losses are healthcare and car dealers. These aren’t on the Citibank exclusions list, which means you can currently use the Citi Rewards + Amaze combo to turn them into 4 mpd opportunities (because Amaze converts all transactions into online ones)- something that won’t be possible (at least not without a 1% fee) from 13 October onwards.

But it’s still possible to earn 4 mpd at car dealers and most private clinics with the UOB Preferred Platinum Visa or UOB Visa Signature by using mobile payments (UOB excludes hospitals, but hospitals ≠ clinics).

So there’s still alternatives here, not to mention it should be fairly easy to max out the Citi Reward’s monthly 4 mpd cap (S$1,000) via other Amaze transactions anyway.

Transaction fee for GrabPay/e-wallet top-ups reduced from 2% to 1%

Amaze Wallet balances cannot be withdrawn to a bank account. If you wish to cash them out, your only option is to use the Amaze Card (with the funding sources set as Amaze Wallet) to top-up an e-wallet such as GrabPay, then transfer the GrabPay balance to your bank account.

However, back in February 2023 Amaze added a 2% transaction fee on GrabPay and other e-wallet top-ups. Initially this fee only applied if a linked card was used, but was later extended to the Amaze Wallet in July 2023.

Some good news on this front: from 13 October 2023, the e-wallet fee will be reduced from 2% to 1% (with a minimum fee of S$0.50) for both linked card and Amaze Wallet transactions. 

The upshot is that it’ll be cheaper to cash out your Amaze Wallet balance, so take note if you have a stash of InstaPoints from spending or referrals.

This doesn’t really change much 

No one likes to see more restrictions, but some of the panic I’ve been reading online really makes me shake my head.

For me (and I imagine most readers), the impact is going to be minimal. You can still use Amaze to earn 4-6 mpd on overseas transactions with a ~2% FCY fee. The Citi Rewards + Amaze combo still works for local and overseas spend. In short, if you’re using Amaze for retail spend like shopping, dining, air tickets, hotels, attractions, supermarkets etc., there really isn’t any cause for gnashing of teeth. 

How long this continues is anyone’s guess, and it’s probably only a matter of time before other banks join DBS in shutting down the Amaze party. But like I said in my Amaze Card review, it’s a simple matter of “keep on dancin’ till the world ends”.

If you need a refresher on the best cards to use with Amaze, check out the article below.

What’s the best card to use with Amaze?

Conclusion

From 13 October 2023, Amaze will add a 1% transaction fee for selected SGD payments made with a linked card, and reduce the transaction fee for e-wallet top-ups from 2% to 1%.

This means you won’t be able to use the Citi Rewards + Amaze combo for things like car down payments and hospital bills (unless you’re willing to pay a 1% fee, which for 4 mpd I suppose some people wouldn’t mind), but otherwise it’s business-as-usual for most Amaze cardholders.