Credit Card - Help & Recommendations

[CardsCrusader]

2 minutes ago, KunjanPSD said:

I have preferred banking so (2) is automatically fulfilled. I don't have any loans or autopay. Probably not gonna keep enough money for Imperia yet, maybe in future.

Will make an autopay mandate for minimum amount.

 

Gonna push CC, DCB acceptance might be low but Regalia se toh better hai, yha 1 RP = 0.5 mile dukh de deta hai Regalia par.

Will take a backup Amz ICICI card for where DCB doesn't work.

 

Whats annual spend like? If it's around 6 lac+ you might consider HSBC Visa platinum, you miss out on HDFC 5X but you get 3.3% rertun on all spends. Also you can transfer these points to Singapore KrisFlyer or British Airways Avios. If those are not your cup of tea then transfer to Taj Innercircle which means Tata neu. You can buy almost anything from there

[KunjanPSD]

Just now, hannibal09 said:

 

Whats annual spend like? If it's around 6 lac+ you might consider HSBC Visa platinum, you miss out on HDFC 5X but you get 3.3% rertun on all spends. Also you can transfer these points to Singapore KrisFlyer or British Airways Avios. If those are not your cup of tea then transfer to Taj Innercircle which means Tata neu. You can buy almost anything from there

Yeah 6L+ annual.

I was also looking into HSBC Visa Plat and also SC, they also have 3.3% returns and good options for mainly hotels.

Let me try and push for DCB first otherwise I am getting a new card.

[KunjanPSD]

Just wrote a scathing email to HDFC CC. Enough is enough, either they upgrade or I switch.

[dante77]

You guys talking about rewards. I never checked how many reward points I had till now for Regalia. I don't have any frequent flyer registration. Just points. 

 

Do points expire? I have around 4.5k accrued and 2.5k balance. Don't know what Accrued means. 

[R3D_D3ViL]

It seems HDFC have their own criteria or something because when I got my Regalia card it came with a credit limit of 8L (my RM couldnt get me the card and when i applied through website, these people happily came to me and done the processing for LTF). Over time it has now increased to 13L where the bank themselves sent messages for credit limit upgrades from time to time. I hardly spend an avg of 30k per month on this card. I am looking for an infinia upgrade but the RM is not bothered again. 
 

Probably either you have to have a sizeable bank balance or business with them through multiple products or have a hefty spending on the card for them to consider upgrading. But isnt it true for all the banks though?
 

 

Edited June 1, 2022 by R3D_D3ViL

[KunjanPSD]

1 hour ago, dante77 said:

You guys talking about rewards. I never checked how many reward points I had till now for Regalia. I don't have any frequent flyer registration. Just points. 

 

Do points expire? I have around 4.5k accrued and 2.5k balance. Don't know what Accrued means. 

Accrued means the total points you have earned till date and balance means the total points you have earned till last billing date. 

You can only redeem your balance points.

 

And they expire, 3 years generally.

[KunjanPSD]

1 hour ago, R3D_D3ViL said:

It seems HDFC have their own criteria or something because when I got my Regalia card it came with a credit limit of 8L (my RM couldnt get me the card and when i applied through website, these people happily came to me and done the processing for LTF). Over time it has now increased to 13L where the bank themselves sent messages for credit limit upgrades from time to time. I hardly spend an avg of 30k per month on this card. I am looking for an infinia upgrade but the RM is not bothered again. 
 

Probably either you have to have a sizeable bank balance or business with them through multiple products or have a hefty spending on the card for them to consider upgrading. But isnt it true for all the banks though?
 

 

For Infinia generally 8L limit and 7.5L spend in last 6 months. 

Still give it a try, send cc support and grievance cc a mail and tell them you want the Infinia Metal or else you are switching.

[CardsCrusader]

9 hours ago, dante77 said:

You guys talking about rewards. I never checked how many reward points I had till now for Regalia. I don't have any frequent flyer registration. Just points. 

 

Do points expire? I have around 4.5k accrued and 2.5k balance. Don't know what Accrued means. 

 

You are missing a lot. Apart providing convenience and bank offers, major use of cards is rewards. People have bought Mac book pro from rewards, Travel in biz or first class for free and myself have done 2 international trip to Singapore & Europe on points. Do regularly check how much reward you have before they expire

[dante77]

11 hours ago, KunjanPSD said:

Accrued means the total points you have earned till date and balance means the total points you have earned till last billing date. 

You can only redeem your balance points.

 

And they expire, 3 years generally.

 

4 hours ago, hannibal09 said:

 

You are missing a lot. Apart providing convenience and bank offers, major use of cards is rewards. People have bought Mac book pro from rewards, Travel in biz or first class for free and myself have done 2 international trip to Singapore & Europe on points. Do regularly check how much reward you have before they expire

Thanks. I am planning to. Just that I am learning how to leverage points. 

[LordSpymaster]

7 hours ago, hannibal09 said:

Travel in biz or first class for free and myself have done 2 international trip to Singapore & Europe on points

Which card, how many points and how'd you get this? (ie points transfer to airline, etc?) 

[KunjanPSD]

11 minutes ago, LordSpymaster said:

Which card, how many points and how'd you get this? (ie points transfer to airline, etc?) 

Infinia or DCB works well.

For Infinia, 40k points gets a business class international travel ticket to somewhere close like Singapore.

50-60k for somewhere in Europe, depends on the taxes.

 

On Infinia, to accrue 40k points, you will need to spend 1L/month for 12 months via regular rewards or 20k/month for 12 months via accelerated rewards via Smartbuy.

On DCB, 1L/month remains the same but for accelerated since the cap is lower you can do 25k/month on smartbuy + some regular spending.

 

You can transfer these to Singapore Airline's Krisflyer program and book from them or any of the Star Alliance partners.

 

Amex also works well, but generally better for stay redemptions rather than travel.

For stay, Standard Chartered Ultimate is a good option too.

Edited June 2, 2022 by KunjanPSD

[Krazyniks]

3 hours ago, KunjanPSD said:

Infinia or DCB works well.

For Infinia, 40k points gets a business class international travel ticket to somewhere close like Singapore.

50-60k for somewhere in Europe, depends on the taxes.

 

On Infinia, to accrue 40k points, you will need to spend 1L/month for 12 months via regular rewards or 20k/month for 12 months via accelerated rewards via Smartbuy.

On DCB, 1L/month remains the same but for accelerated since the cap is lower you can do 25k/month on smartbuy + some regular spending.

 

You can transfer these to Singapore Airline's Krisflyer program and book from them or any of the Star Alliance partners.

 

Amex also works well, but generally better for stay redemptions rather than travel.

For stay, Standard Chartered Ultimate is a good option too.

What about Regalia  . And for those with annual spends of around 3L ?

I understand i won't get business class or international trips . What's the next best thing to save your points for ? Have currently 15k points .

Edited June 2, 2022 by Krazyniks

[KunjanPSD]

27 minutes ago, Krazyniks said:

What about Regalia  . And for those with annual spends of around 3L ?

I understand i won't get business class or international trips . What's the next best thing to save your points for ? Have currently 15k points .

For Regalia, sit tight and save for 2 years.

Using points for economy tickets doesn't make sense because redemption ratio is not attractive but it's better than paying.

Rewards are best to use for stay redemptions or for experiencing luxury travels.

You can try for Club Vistra redemption, economy tickets. But Regalia's points are worth 0.5 re so you will need a lot of points for something meaningful.

That will be your best bet, you can try for Amazon vouchers but redemption ratio won't be attractive.

 

While DCB and Infinia points are worth 1RE.

 

For 3L spends, I guess move all of your Amazon purchases to Smartbuy and take advantage of Blinkit/Bookmyshow vouchers but Regalia has a 2000/day and 4000/monthly cap of bonus rewards so you can only earn so many points.

Edited June 2, 2022 by KunjanPSD

[LordSpymaster]

I have 20K points on Amex, plan to keep accruing it for this year and probably use them in Dec. Should hopefully be near 30K points by then. 

 

Amex charges ₹99 to transfer points to airline or hotel partners as well...

[R3D_D3ViL]

22 hours ago, KunjanPSD said:

For Infinia generally 8L limit and 7.5L spend in last 6 months. 

Still give it a try, send cc support and grievance cc a mail and tell them you want the Infinia Metal or else you are switching.

Worth a try

[CardsCrusader]

10 hours ago, dante77 said:

 

Thanks. I am planning to. Just that I am learning how to leverage points. 

There are not many blogs on India but you can read beginners guide on Frequentmiler.com, Onemileatatime.com etc. You can also check twitter as lot many people are sharing about miles now days. 

8 hours ago, LordSpymaster said:

Which card, how many points and how'd you get this? (ie points transfer to airline, etc?) 

Combination of HDFC DCB/Infinia, Citi Premiermiles/Prestige, Amex Platinum Charge/Travel/MRCC

At the time of Singapore, I had enough miles in Jet Airways but it got closed during Europe trip. So used other ways. Stayed were mostly on Marriott properties

4 hours ago, Krazyniks said:

What about Regalia  . And for those with annual spends of around 3L ?

I understand i won't get business class or international trips . What's the next best thing to save your points for ? Have currently 15k points .

Keep Regalia just so that you can upgrade to higher category cards from HDFC

You can take Citi Premiermiles now as they are running promotion of cashback of 3k/4k on spending some amount within 2-3 months. You will get 10000 Premiermiles as signup bonus, which can be transferred to airlines as 5000miles.

If you profile is good, you can try upgrading to Citi Prestige and thses 10000 Premiermiles converts to 4500 Prestige points which are equal to 18000 airmiles. With 2000 more miles you can have retrun economy ticket to Honkong, London, Sri Lanka and few other countries for these much miles. 

 

It may be overwhelming and confusing at start, but not so difficult to understand. 

[psinide]

On 6/1/2022 at 4:45 PM, KunjanPSD said:

Bro, if you meet the criteria of 8L limit on a current HDFC card and have 7.5L spends in last 2 months on it then send CC a mail. It should go through, people are easily getting it via this route. Push CC on mail.

I don't have a HDFC CC unfortunately. I recently got my salary account in HDFC and I get called at least 3-4 times a month with them offering Regalia, I tell them I want Infinia, and they say they'll get back to me. 

Axis Magnus imo has better rewards compared to Regalia, so I went for that instead. The Grab deals will frequently have 10x 15x for FK and Amazon. I use my ICICI Amazon where ever the 5% cashback is higher than the Axis rewards equivalent or if I'm going for EMIs (ICIC Amazon has no rewards for EMI purchases)

[Krazyniks]

Got a call from my HDFC Bank relationship manager today . The usual stuff I am your new relationship manager and you can contact me for any banking needs.

 

I asked her about upgrading my CC to infinia from Regalia . She said you need an ITR of 40L ( for Self employed people ) and annual spends of 8L . I have neither so i m not eligible.

I asked if there was any other way to get the card . She said if I make a FDR of 10L with them I can get Infinia card . No need to meet the other criteria . The card can be used as long as i maintain FDR with them.  Also they are offering 5.75% interest on a 5 year FD of 10L .

 

[KunjanPSD]

44 minutes ago, Krazyniks said:

Got a call from my HDFC Bank relationship manager today . The usual stuff I am your new relationship manager and you can contact me for any banking needs.

 

I asked her about upgrading my CC to infinia from Regalia . She said you need an ITR of 40L ( for Self employed people ) and annual spends of 8L . I have neither so i m not eligible.

I asked if there was any other way to get the card . She said if I make a FDR of 10L with them I can get Infinia card . No need to meet the other criteria . The card can be used as long as i maintain FDR with them.  Also they are offering 5.75% interest on a 5 year FD of 10L .

 

FDR wala option is always there.

That ITR return is stupid, 8L limit on existing HDFC CC and 7.5L spends in last 6 months or even 12 months is the best criteria.

They can't cancel your Infinia if you don't continue your FDR, you know.

And always get card first, they morons will go back on their words and make you take the early exit penalty on FDR.

Edited June 3, 2022 by KunjanPSD

[Krazyniks]

4 minutes ago, KunjanPSD said:

FDR wala option is always there.

That ITR return is stupid, 8L limit on existing HDFC CC and 7.5L spends in last 6 months or even 12 months is the best criteria.

They can't cancel your Infinia if you don't continue your FDR, you know.

And always get card first, they morons will go back on their words and make you take the early exit penalty on FDR.

Okay thanks . Good to know they can't cancel card if don't continue my FDR. 

Also i didn't know about FDR option earlier.  And they didn't say i have to take an FDR of 5 years only. Said I could 1/2 years Fdr also . Just that they offer best interest on 5 year one. 

Anyway will just stick to Regalia for now and upgrade few months later.