CIMB isn’t currently a player in the miles game, with all its cards offering cashback instead.
However, it’s just launched an interesting promotion that offers 16,000 Max Miles to cardholders who spend at least S$2,800 on travel and overseas purchases. That works out to an effective earn rate of 5.7 mpd, beating all the usual suspects for overseas spending!
The catch is that there are only 500 rewards available. Today is the third day of the promotion period, and your guess is as good as mine as to whether there’s any quota left. But I want to cover it anyway, since this marks CIMB’s first foray into the miles space — and perhaps hints at more to come?
Earn 16,000 Max Miles with CIMB credit cards
From 1-30 September 2026, the first 500 CIMB credit cardmembers to spend at least S$2,800 on travel and overseas purchases will receive a flat bonus of 16,000 Max Miles, on top of their usual credit card rewards.
This offer is open to all principal cardmembers of CIMB credit cards issued in Singapore, namely the following:
| Card | Income Req. | Annual Fee |
 CIMB Visa InfiniteApply |
S$120K | None |
 CIMB Visa SignatureApply |
S$30K | None |
 CIMB World MastercardApply |
S$30K | None |
 Apply |
S$30K | S$338 (FYF) |
 CIMB AWSM CardApply |
S$30K | None |
Registration for the campaign is required, and can be done via this link.
You can also link your CIMB credit card to the HeyMax app, provided it’s a Visa, and earn bonus miles on spending at JR East and selected merchants in Japan. For the avoidance of doubt, linking the CIMB card to the HeyMax app is not required for the 16,000 Max Miles bonus — and you can’t link Mastercards to the HeyMax app in any case.
What counts as eligible spending?
Cardholders must spend at least S$2,800 on qualifying transactions, defined as offline and online FCY spend, as well as travel-related transactions with the following MCCs.
| MCC | Description |
|---|---|
| MCC 3000 to 3350 | Airlines, Air Carriers |
| MCC 3351 to 3500 | Car Rental Agencies |
| MCC 3501 to 3999 | Lodging – Hotels, Motels, Resorts |
| MCC 4111, 4112 and 4789 | Passenger Transport and Railways |
| MCC 4411 | Cruise Lines |
| MCC 4511 | Airlines, Air Carriers (Not Elsewhere Classified) |
| MCC 4722 to 4723 | Travel Agencies and Tour Operators |
| MCC 5962 | Direct Marketing – Travel-Related Arrangement Services |
| MCC 7011 to 7012 | Lodging – Hotels, Motels, Resorts (Not Elsewhere Classified) |
| MCC 7512 | Car Rental Agencies (Not Elsewhere Classified) |
This basically covers airlines, car rentals, cruises, hotels, railway tickets and travel agencies.
Transactions must be posted to the card account within six days of the end of the promotion period, i.e. 6 October 2026. That said, given the limited quantity of rewards available, you won’t want to leave your spending until the end of the month anyway.
Supplementary cardholder spend will be pooled with principal cardholder spend when calculating total qualifying spend.
What is CIMB’s FCY transaction fee?
FCY transactions made on CIMB credit cards are subject to a 3% FCY transaction fee, which is slightly lower than the industry average of 3.25%.
If you’re thinking about using Amaze to lower the fee to 2% — don’t. CIMB does not offer rewards for Amaze, and these transactions won’t count towards the qualifying transactions for the Max Miles offer either.
Terms & Conditions
The T&Cs of this promotion can be found here.
What can you do with Max Miles?
 |
| Get 200 Max Miles when you open an account and complete your first transaction |
| Get a HeyMax Account |
Max Miles can be converted to more than 20 airline and hotel partners, at a 1:1 ratio for most frequent flyer programmes. There are no conversion fees, and Max Miles never expire.
| ✅ HeyMax Transfer Partners All 1:1 unless otherwise stated |
|
| ✈️ Airlines | |
|
|
| 🏨 Hotels | |
|
|
Alternatively, you can also cash out Max Miles via FlyAnywhere at 1.8 cents per mile, simply by submitting any air ticket booked in the past 30 days.
- Book your air tickets whatever way you like: through the airline’s official website, an OTA, or even a traditional brick-and-mortar travel agency
- Submit a FlyAnywhere redemption request via the HeyMax app
- Get reimbursed for your flight in cash, via PayNow, at a rate of 1.8 cents per Max Mile
Both commercial and award flights are eligible — in the case of the latter, HeyMax will reimburse you for the cash component of the ticket, i.e. taxes and surcharges.
Is CIMB planning to get into the miles game?
As I said earlier, CIMB has historically not offered any miles cards in Singapore, preferring to stick to cashback instead.
Part of me suspects that’s because creating a rewards currency and negotiating partnerships with various airline and hotel programmes is simply too much work, and CIMB doesn’t see the ROI, given the intense competition in this space.
But HeyMax gives CIMB an easy way to diversify its rewards offerings without having to build any new IT infrastructure. If you think about it, the mechanics here are no different from offering luggage or other merchandise: CIMB tracks the spending, tells HeyMax who’s eligible, and HeyMax does the fulfilment.
This makes me wonder whether we might be seeing more Max Miles offers from CIMB soon.
Watch this space!
Conclusion
CIMB cardholders can now earn 16,000 Max Miles when they spend at least S$2,800 on travel and overseas purchases by the end of September.
However, the reward is only available to the first 500 cardmembers to meet the minimum spend, so nothing’s guaranteed (mind you, the promotion was already covered yesterday by my favourite food blogger).
Still, I’m glad to see CIMB experimenting with the miles space, and hopefully this becomes a regular thing.
