Live: HSBC credit card points pooling

HSBC has started the rollout of its new rewards platform, with points pooling and free transfers to 21 airline and hotel partners, most of them instant.

Last month, HSBC announced that it would finally add credit card points pooling from late May, reducing the issue of orphan points and allowing Revolution and Visa Infinite cardholders to access the TravelOne’s 21 airline and hotel transfer partners.

While the update was scheduled to be completed by 28 May 2024, it looks like HSBC is rolling this out early- at least for selected customers. I’m already able to see my HSBC Revolution and TravelOne Card points pooled in the HSBC app, though unfortunately its overly paranoid security protocols prevent me from taking screenshots.ย 

From my poking around, it looks like everything works exactly as promised, with no nasty surprises. All 21 partners are accounted for, transfer blocks are just two miles after the first 10,000 miles, there’s no conversion fees,ย and conversions to most programmes are instant.ย 

HSBC points pooling now live

HSBC cardholders can now transfer their combined points balance to 17 airline and four hotel transfer partners, at the ratios shown below.

โœˆ๏ธ HSBC TravelOne Airline Partners
Frequent Flyer Programme Conversion Ratio
(HSBC : Partner)
50,000 : 10,000
40,000 : 10,000
35,000 : 10,000
35,000 : 10,000
35,000 : 10,000
35,000 : 10,000
35,000 : 10,000
30,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000
asia miles logo 25,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000
krisflyer logo 25,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000
๐Ÿจ HSBC TravelOne Hotel Partners
Hotel Programme Conversion Ratio
(HSBC : Partner)
30,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 5,000
25,000 : 10,000
25,000 : 10,000

All conversions are freeย until 31 January 2025, and all conversions are instant except for:

  • Club Vistara (5 working days)
  • Hainan Airlines Fortune Wings Club (5 working days)
  • JAL Mileage Bank (10 working days)

While the minimum transfer block is 10,000 miles/points (Accor: 5,000 points), the subsequent block is just 2 miles (Accor: 1 point). In other words, you could choose to transfer 10,002 miles or 20,958 miles, which is a great way of avoiding orphan points.ย 

The new rewards platform is exclusive to the HSBC SG mobile app, with redemptions no longer available via phone banking or online banking.ย 

Watch the ratios!

Do remember that not all partners share the same ratio, so your effective mpd depends on which partner you choose.ย 

For example the HSBC Revolution earns 10 points per S$1 on its bonus categories, but that only works out to 4 mpd if you pick a partner with a 25,000 points = 10,000 miles transfer ratio.ย 

Transfer Ratio
(Points : Miles)
HSBC T1
(Local)*
HSBC T1
(FCY)^
HSBC Revo
(Bonus)#
25,000 : 10,000 1.2 mpd 2.4 mpd 4 mpd
30,000 : 10,000 1 mpd 2 mpd 3.33 mpd
35,000 : 10,000 0.86 mpd 1.71 mpd 2.86 mpd
40,000 : 10,000 0.75 mpd 1.5 mpd 2.5 mpd
50,000 : 10,000 0.6 mpd 1.2 mpd 2 mpd
*3 points per S$1 on local spend
^6 points per S$1 on FCY spend
#10 points per S$1 on bonus categories

Depending on which partner you pick, the earn rate could go as low as 2 mpd, so choose wisely.ย 

There’s also one quirk that needs to be highlighted: it makes no sense at all to convert HSBC points to Qatar Privilege Club. The ratio for these transfers is 3.5 points = 1 mile ratio, but you could instead convert points to British Airways Avios at 2.5 points = 1 mile, and then convert British Airways Avios to Qatar Avios at a 1:1 ratio.

HSBC is refunding Mileage Programme fees

With the shift to the new rewards platform, the previous HSBC Mileage Programme is now defunct. If you paid your membership fee from June 2023 onwards, you will be eligible for a full refund, which will be credited to your card account by 31 July 2024.

For more on this, refer to the article below.

HSBC offering full refund of Mileage Programme annual fee

HSBC’s boasts the most transfer partners in Singapore

HSBC’s list of transfer partners now dwarfs the competition, with its next closest competitor Citibank having “only” 11 to choose from.

Of course, there’s quantity of partners, and then there’s quality.ย Some of HSBC’s partners are programmes no serious miles chaser should consider (Club Vistara, Hainan Fortune Wings, Malaysia Airlines Enrich and Airasia Rewards to name a few), and keep in mind that all of Citi’s partners share the same transfer ratio, unlike HSBC.

Still, I’m all for more choice, and hopefully this motivates other banks to play catch up.ย 

Conclusion

HSBC’s new rewards platform is being rolled out ahead of schedule, bringing points pooling across all cards and new transfer partners for Revolution and Visa Infinite cardholders.ย 

This is probably being done in stages, so if you don’t see the option on your HSBC app yet, give it a couple of days (the official implementation date is not until Tuesday 28 May anyway).

It’s just a shame that the HSBC Revolution Card has been on the receiving end of multiple nerfs this year, because it’s the only realistic way of earning HSBC points at a reasonable pace.ย 

Aaron Wong
Aaron Wong
Aaron founded The Milelion to help people travel better for less and impress chiobu. He was 50% successful.

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D K

Hi do you know why I cant see my rewards points in the app anymore?

3981nim

They took it away for the time being. Once the update is done on 28th May it’ll come back up. I was shocked st first when mine went missing few days back, so that’s what the officer told me when I contacted them

chk

No wonder. I just checked and all my points also cannot be viewed in the app anymore

Joe

are the conversion ratios for the hotel chains worth it?

UK_Ship

How do you choose which card to redeem from? I am trying to cash out the pints for my Infinite card but when I did a redemption it didn’t let me choose which card to take them from and it just defaulted to T1

UK_Ship

I think it does, but unfortunately for me that was my revolution points as ive never redeemed them . I wanted to burn the Infinite points as cancelling the card after the nerf but in the end I just had to cash them all out to clear Infinite to zero