Review: OCBC Premier Visa Infinite

Here’s The MileLion’s review of the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite, launched in July 2020 as a fee-free alternative to the VOYAGE for OCBC Premier Banking customers.

At the time, this card felt like a natural companion for the OCBC Rewards Card. Since both cards earned OCBC$, and the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite waived miles conversion fees, you could convert the OCBC$ earned on the OCBC Rewards Card into miles at no cost.

Unfortunately, OCBC nerfed free miles conversions in February 2023, but even so, this remains a passable — if unremarkable — priority banking card.

OCBC Premier Visa Infinite
🦁 MileLion Verdict
☐ Take It ☑ Take It Or Leave It ☐ Leave It
What do these ratings mean?
If you’re an OCBC Premier customer, there’s no harm in getting this free card for its lounge visits and Visa Infinite perks — unless you want to reset your NTB status.
👍 The Good	👎 The Bad
A fee-free Visa Infinite Two complimentary lounge visits per year	S$5 earning blocks Poor transfer ratios for most airline and hotel partners

Overview: OCBC Premier Visa Infinite

Let’s start this review by looking at the key features of the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite.

Apply
Income Req.	S$30,000 p.a.	Points Validity	2 years
Annual Fee	None	Min. Transfer	25,000 OCBC$* (10,000 miles)
Miles with AF	None	Transfer Partners	9
FCY Fee	3.25%	Transfer Fee	S$25
Local Earn	1.28 mpd	Points Pool?	Yes
FCY Earn	2.24 mpd	Lounge Access?	No
Special Earn	N/A	Airport Limo?	No
Cardholder Terms and Conditions

The OCBC Premier Visa Infinite is one of two cards that are exclusively reserved for OCBC Premier customers, the other being the OCBC Premier VOYAGE.

	OCBC Premier Visa Infinite	OCBC Premier VOYAGE
Annual Fee	Free	S$498 Waived with min. S$30K annual spend
Local Earn	1.28 mpd	1.6 mpd
FCY Earn	2.24 mpd	2.3 mpd
Lounge Visits	2x per year	Unlimited
Airport Limo	None	8x per year S$12K quarterly spend for 2x rides

The VOYAGE is no doubt the more “full-fat” option, with better earn rates, unlimited lounge visits, and complimentary airport limo transfers. However, unlike the Premier Visa Infinite, it carries a S$498 annual fee — though it can be waived with a minimum spend of S$30,000 in a membership year.

You can read a review of the OCBC VOYAGE here.

How much must I earn to qualify for an OCBC Premier Visa Infinite?

The OCBC Premier Visa Infinite has a minimum income requirement of just S$30,000 p.a.

The real barrier to entry isn’t the income requirement per se, but rather the requirement to have an OCBC Premier relationship, which requires a minimum AUM of S$350,000. 

How much is the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite’s annual fee?

The OCBC Premier Visa Infinite has no annual fee for principal or supplementary cards.

However, cardholders have the option to pay an “annual service fee upgrade”, which is basically an opportunity to buy miles.

While this is convenient, the cost per mile is unattractively high. There are plenty of ways to buy miles for less, such as CardUp, SC EasyBill, or even paying the annual fee on your OCBC 90°N Card (1.92¢)!

I’d pass on this, if I were you.

How many miles do I earn?

SGD/FCY Spend

The OCBC Premier Visa Infinite earns:

• 16 OCBC$ per S$5 spent in SGD (1.28 mpd)
• 28 OCBC$ per S$5 spent in FCY (2.24 mpd)

These are actually fairly solid rates for a general spending card, though OCBC’s policy of rounding transactions down to the nearest S$5 will result in a lower effective mpd, especially on smaller-sized transactions.

💳 Earn Rates for S$30K General Spending Cards (Sorted by Sum of Local + FCY Earn Rates)
Cards	Local Spend	FCY Spend
UOB PRVI Miles Card AMEX Mastercard Visa	1.4 mpd	3 mpd IDR, MYR, THB, VND 2.4 mpd All Others
BOC Elite Miles Card Apply	1.4 mpd	2.8 mpd
HSBC TravelOne Card Apply	1.2 mpd	2.4 mpd
OCBC Premier Visa Infinite Apply	1.28 mpd	2.24 mpd
DBS Altitude Card AMEX Visa	1.3 mpd	2.2 mpd
OCBC 90°N Card Mastercard Visa	1.3 mpd	2.1 mpd
Citi PremierMiles Card Apply	1.2 mpd	2.2 mpd
StanChart Journey Card Apply	1.2 mpd	2 mpd
AMEX KrisFlyer Ascend Apply	1.2 mpd	1.2 mpd
KrisFlyer UOB Credit Card Apply	1.2 mpd	1.2 mpd
AMEX KrisFlyer Credit Card Apply	1.1 mpd	1.1 mpd

If we narrow the competitor set to just priority banking cards without annual fees, the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite is roughly middle of the road.

💳 Earn Rates for No-Fee Priority Banking Cards (Sorted by Sum of Local + FCY Earn Rates)
Cards	Local Spend	FCY Spend
HSBC Premier Mastercard Apply	1.68 mpd	2.76 mpd
DBS Treasures AMEX No longer available for application	1.2 mpd	2.4 mpd
Maybank Premier World Mastercard Apply	0.4 mpd	Up to 3.2 mpd
OCBC Premier Visa Infinite Apply	1.28mpd	2.24 mpd
UOB Privilege Banking Card Apply	1.2 mpd	1.2 mpd
StanChart Priority Visa Infinite Apply	1 mpd	1 mpd

What is the FCY fee?

All FCY transactions on the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite are subject to a 3.25% FCY fee, which is on par with the market.

Using the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite overseas is therefore equivalent to buying miles at1.43 cents each (3.25%/2.28 mpd).

When are OCBC$ credited?

OCBC$ are awarded when the transaction posts (typically in 1-3 working days).

How are OCBC$ calculated?

Here’s how you can work out the OCBC$ earned on your OCBC Premier Visa Infinite.

From 1 June 2020, OCBC awards credit card points in blocks of S$5. This means you’ll be penalised should your transaction not be in a block of S$5. For example, a S$9.90 transaction will earn the same number of points as a S$5 transaction, and a S$4.99 transaction will earn zero points. In other words, the minimum spend necessary to earn points is S$5.

Here’s how this policy affects the miles you earn on the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite, compared to the Citi PremierMiles Card — which has a lower earn rate, but a more favourable rounding policy.

	OCBC Premier Visa Infinite 1.28 mpd	Citi PremierMiles 1.2 mpd
S$5	6.4 miles	6 miles
S$9.99	6.4 miles	11 miles
S$15	19.2 miles	18 miles
S$19.99	19.2 miles	23 miles
S$25	32 miles	30 miles
S$29.99	32 miles	35 miles

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

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

OCBC provides a breakdown of points earned, though this is somewhat poorly executed since reference numbers are used for tracking, instead of merchant names. You’ll need to cross-reference with your card statement to figure out which transaction is which.

Full instructions are provided below. 

How to check credit card points breakdowns

What transactions aren’t eligible for OCBC$?

A full list of transactions that do not earn OCBC$ can be found in the T&Cs at point 2(d).

I’ve highlighted a few noteworthy categories below:

• Charitable donations
• Education
• Government services
• GrabPay top-ups
• Insurance premiums
• Public hospitals
• Real estate agents and managers

The OCBC Premier Visa Infinite will earn points for spending at private hospitals, as well as CardUp transactions. 

What do I need to know about OCBC$?

Expiry

OCBC$ earned on the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite expire after 2 years.

For example, OCBC$ earned from 1-30 November 2023 will expire on 30 November 2025.

Pooling

OCBC uses three different rewards currencies:

• 90°N Miles
• OCBC$
• VOYAGE Miles

Rewards of the same currency pool together. For example, if you have 20,000 OCBC$ on the OCBC Rewards Card and 30,000 OCBC$ on the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite, you can redeem all 50,000 OCBC$ in a single transfer and pay just one conversion fee.

However, different rewards currencies cannot be combined. For instance, you cannot redeem OCBC$ together with 90°N Miles or VOYAGE Miles in a single transfer.

Since OCBC$ pool, there is no need to transfer them out before cancelling your OCBC Premier Visa Infinite, provided you still hold at least one other OCBC$-earning card.

Transfer Partners & Fee

OCBC has a total of nine airline and hotel transfer partners.

Frequent Flyer Programme	Conversion Ratio (OCBC$ : Miles)
	25,000 : 10,000
	10,000 : 4,000
	10,000 : 4,000
	10,000 : 4,000
	10,000 : 3,600
	10,000 : 3,600
	10,000 : 2,900
	10,000 : 2,800
	10,000 : 2,000

Unfortunately, the conversion ratios for most partners eliminate them as viable options.

Transfers to Asia Miles receive 27.5% fewer miles than KrisFlyer, while transfers to British Airways and Etihad Guest receive 10% fewer miles than KrisFlyer. As for hotel partners, IHG and Marriott Bonvoy aren’t that appealing when you factor in the opportunity cost — you’re forgoing 1 KrisFlyer mile (~1.5 cents) for every IHG (~0.64 cents) or Bonvoy (~0.90 cents) point.

The only non-KrisFlyer programmes I might consider would be Air France-KLM Flying Blue and Accor Live Limitless (ALL). Flying Blue has transfer parity with KrisFlyer, and Business Class awards from Singapore to Europe start at 85,000 miles. With ALL, 2,000 points = €40, so there is an opportunity cost of 1.5 cents per KrisFlyer mile, roughly what I’d deem acceptable.

OCBC used to offer periodic transfer bonuses, but we haven’t seen one for some time now.

• November 2024: ~20% transfer bonus to Asia Miles
• July 2024: 70% transfer bonus to Marriott Bonvoy
• June 2024: 15% transfer bonus to British Airways Executive Club
• November 2023: 15% transfer bonus to Asia Miles
• October 2023: 20% transfer bonus to Flying Blue
• October 2023: 50% transfer bonus to IHG One Rewards

 Regarding minimum conversion blocks:

• Transfers for KrisFlyer miles must be in blocks of 25,000 OCBC$ (10,000 miles)
• Transfers for all other programmes must be a minimum of 10,000 OCBC$ (2,000-4,000 miles/points), but subsequent conversions can be in blocks of 1,000 OCBC$ (200-400 miles/points)

A S$25 fee applies to all conversions. 

Transfer Times

Points transfers are made through the OCBC app, under Rewards > Points Exchange.

Transfers to KrisFlyer are usually processed within 24 hours, while transfers to all other airline and hotel programmes should be more or less instant.

Other card perks

Two airport lounge visits

Principal OCBC Premier Visa Infinite Cardmembers enjoy two complimentary DragonPass lounge visits per membership year.

Access is through the DragonPass app. Cardholders will need to create an account, using the membership ID that will be sent via SMS from OCBC per the following schedule: 

• Card approved 1-15th of the month: Membership code sent between 22nd and 25th of that month
• Card approved 16th to last day of the month: Membership code sent between 7th and 10th of that month

These lounge visits cannot be shared with guests, who will incur a US$32 fee per visit. Also, these visits cannot be used for non-lounge experiences such as restaurants or spas.

There is no lounge benefit for supplementary cardholders.

Visa Infinite benefits

As a Visa Infinite card, the OCBC Premier Visa Infinite enjoys the following additional perks, provided by Visa.

For more information on how these perks work, refer to the post below.

What are the benefits of a Visa Infinite card?

Terms and Conditions

• OCBC Premier Visa Infinite
• OCBC$ Rewards Programme Terms and Conditions

Summary Review: OCBC Premier Visa Infinite

OCBC Premier Visa Infinite

🦁 MileLion Verdict

☐ Take It ☑ Take It Or Leave It ☐ Leave It

The OCBC Premier Visa Infinite feels entirely unobjectionable for what it is. Is it going to set the world on fire? No. Is it a free credit card with two lounge visits and Visa Infinite privileges? Yes.

If you’ve decided to bank with OCBC Premier, there’s really no reason not to get this card — unless you’re hoping to reset your new-to-bank status to secure even more lucrative welcome offers (SingSaver is offering gifts like S$420 cash or 25,000 Max Miles for new-to-bank OCBC customers).

For those who need a bit more oomph, the OCBC Premier VOYAGE offers significantly better benefits, though those do come at a S$488 price point.