DBS Altitude offering 5 mpd on online travel and foreign currency spend

DBS has launched a new promotion for the DBS Altitude Card, which offers cardholders 5 mpd on online travel and foreign currency (FCY) spend from September to December 2024.

A minimum spend of S$1,000 is required each month, and a monthly bonus cap of S$2,000 applies, so you could earn a total of 40,000 miles over the four-month promo period.

The structure of the promotion, unfortunately, is needlessly complicated, and DBS’s website does a rather poor job of explaining things. I stared at this infographic for a good 10 minutes and ended up none the wiser. 

The tl;dr is that:

• you start by earning 5 mpd on online travel for September and October 2024
• you then switch to 5 mpd on FCY spend for November and December 2024

DBS basically wants you to buy plane tickets and book hotels with your Altitude first, then use your Altitude when overseas for the year-end holidays.

It’s a good, if somewhat convoluted deal, and gives some much-needed oxygen to the DBS Altitude Card (which as I highlighted in my recent review could really use some of that!).

DBS Altitude Card offering 5 mpd on online travel & FCY spend

Campaign Details

From 1 September to 31 December 2024, DBS Altitude AMEX and DBS Altitude Visa Cardholders can enjoy 5 mpd on online travel bookings and FCY spend. There are different eligibility periods for online travel bookings versus FCY spend though, so you won’t enjoy both concurrently- more on that below.

Registration is required, and can be done via the DBS PayLah! app. Look for the campaign banner under the Rewards tab.

A maximum of 10,000 slots are available each calendar month, but don’t worry, a tracker will show you how many slots still remain.

You must re-register each month of the campaign to continue participating. To make matters more confusing, the registration opening date differs from month to month!

Minimum spend and eligible spend will only start accumulating from the time of registration, so do make a point of getting it done sooner rather than later. 

For example, if you register on 15 September 2024, the any spending made from 1-14 September 2024 will neither count towards minimum spend nor eligible spend.

Online travel spend (September & October)

From 1 September to 31 October 2024, registered DBS Altitude Cardholders will enjoy up to 5 mpd for online travel spend, as summarised below.

Bonus for Online Travel Spend
	Base	Bonus	Total
SGD (online)	1.3 mpd	3.7 mpd	5 mpd
FCY (online)	2.2 mpd	2.8 mpd	5 mpd

This is subject to cardholders meeting a minimum retail spend of S$1,000 within each calendar month, and is capped at S$2,000 per calendar month.

Cardholders can choose to meet the minimum spend and enjoy the bonus miles in September, October, or both months together. Therefore, if you max out this promotion in both September and October, you’ll earn a total of 20,000 miles from online travel spend.

DBS defines online travel spend as online transactions made in SGD or FCY in any of the following categories. 

Do note that DBS has only provided the information in the “Category” and “Examples” columns. The “MCC” column is my own addition. It is a best guess, and may not be accurate.

It’s very annoying since the bank recently took a step in the right direction by updating its welcome offer T&Cs to explicitly list eligible MCCs. Why not make this consistent across all T&Cs; shouldn’t we be aiming for less ambiguity and not more?

Remember: the spend must be online, so paying in-person at the front desk of a hotel, or swiping your card at a brick and mortar travel agency won’t count. 

Foreign Currency Spend (November & December)

From 1 November to 31 December 2024, registered DBS Altitude Cardholders will enjoy up to 5 mpd for in-store and online FCY spend, as summarised below.

Bonus for Foreign Currency Spend
	Base	Bonus	Total
FCY (Both in-store and online)	2.2 mpd	2.8 mpd	5 mpd

This is subject to cardholders meeting a minimum retail spend of S$1,000 within each calendar month, and is capped at S$2,000 per calendar month.

Cardholders can choose to meet the minimum spend and enjoy the bonus miles in November, December, or both months together. Therefore, if you max out this promotion in both November and December , you’ll earn a total of 20,000 miles from FCY spend.

DBS defines FCY spend as any online or in-person spend made in foreign currency, excluding the following:

1. any transaction made overseas but effected or charged in Singapore dollars;
2. payments made with the Merchant Category Codes (“MCC”) listed in Table 1 and transactions matching the terms listed in Table 2 in accordance with the DBS Rewards Terms and Conditions;
3. posted 0% interest-free instalment plan monthly transactions (“IPP”);
4. posted My Preferred Payment instalment plan monthly transactions (“MP3”);
5. interest, finance charges, cash advance, cash withdrawal, balance transfer, smart cash, AXS
   payments (except Pay+Earn), SAM online bill payments, bill payments via internet banking and all fees charged by DBS;
6. any transaction that is subsequently cancelled, voided, refunded, or reversed (“Refunded
   Transactions”) for any reason; and
7. any other transactions determined by DBS from time to time

This would exclude the usual suspects, like charitable donations, education and insurance.

Is it worth it?

For SGD spending, it’s a no-brainer because 5 mpd beats the current maximum of 4 mpd available through other cards for airline, hotel and travel agent bookings.

For FCY spending, the DBS Altitude AMEX and DBS Altitude Visa have an FCY transaction fee of 3% and 3.25% respectively, so there’s a bit of math to be done.

Card	Earn Rate	FCY Fee	Cost Per Mile
DBS Altitude AMEX	5 mpd	3%	0.6 cents
DBS Altitude Visa	5 mpd	3.25%	0.65 cents

With a 5 mpd earn rate, your cost per mile is 0.6 and 0.65 cents respectively. Assuming your alternative is a 4 mpd card + Amaze (which has an implicit FCY fee of 2%), then Amaze is marginally better with a cost per mile of 0.5 cents. 

But remember that usefulness of Amaze is limited by the bonus caps of your paired cards, and when it comes to general foreign currency spending, that cap will be a mere S$1,000 (with the Citi Rewards). Having an extra S$2,000 to play with, thanks to the Altitude, will be useful indeed.

What counts as minimum spend?

The minimum spend requirement refers to all retail transactions charged to the card, excluding the following:

1. posted 0% interest-free instalment plan monthly transactions (“IPP”);
2. posted My Preferred Payment instalment plan monthly transactions (“MP3”);
3. interest, finance charges, cash advance, cash withdrawal, balance transfer, smart cash, AXS
   payments (except Pay+Earn), SAM online bill payments, bill payments via internet banking and all fees charged by DBS; and
4. any transaction that is subsequently cancelled, voided, refunded, or reversed (“Refunded
   Transactions”) for any reason.

Retail spend can include your eligible spend, so your spend on air tickets/hotels (September/October) or FCY (November/December) would count too. 

For avoidance of doubt, supplementary cardholder spend will count towards the minimum spend requirement, and be eligible to earn 5 mpd provided the principal cardholder successfully registers for the campaign.

However, supplementary cardholders do not have a bonus cap of their own.

What if I have both the DBS Altitude AMEX and Visa?

If you have both a DBS Altitude AMEX and DBS Altitude Visa, I’ve confirmed with a DBS spokesperson that you can take advantage of the deal on both cards.

In this case, you would need to meet the minimum spend of S$1,000 on each Altitude card to enjoy the 5 mpd rate, with the same S$2,000 monthly cap per card. 

For avoidance of doubt, there is no “cross accumulation”. If you spend S$600 on the Altitude AMEX and S$400 on the Altitude Visa, for instance, you won’t meet the minimum spend requirement notwithstanding the fact you’ve spent S$1,000 in total. 

When will bonus miles be credited?

Cardholders will initially earn the DBS Altitude’s usual earn rate of 1.3 mpd for local spend, or 2.2 mpd for FCY spend. 

Bonus miles will be awarded (in the form of DBS Points) by the 16th of the following calendar month.

Terms and Conditions/FAQs

The T&Cs for this campaign, as well as FAQs can be found via the links below:

• DBS Altitude 5 mpd Promo T&Cs
• DBS Altitude 5 mpd Promo FAQs

What can you do with DBS Points? 

DBS Points earned on the Altitude Card never expire, and can be converted to any of the following frequent flyer programmes with a S$27.25 admin fee. 

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

Conclusion

The DBS Altitude Cards are offering 5 mpd on online travel spending for September and October, and 5 mpd for foreign currency spending for November and December, with a minimum spend of S$1,000 and cap of S$2,000 per month. 

Do remember that you’ll need to register for each month of the promotion, and the registration opening date changes each month (seriously, guys?). Only the first 10,000 registrations are eligible, and minimum/eligible spend won’t count until registration is done, so do it sooner rather than later.

For a detailed rundown of the DBS Altitude Card, refer to my review below.

Review: DBS Altitude Card