In one of my previous post, I have shown how I arranged my various bill settlements and expenses across different credit cards in order to maximise cash rebates. I have also introduced the UOB One Card and its benefits. Based on my monthly expenditures, I came to a conclusion that I may or may not be able to reach the minimum spending amount to qualify for cash rebates. So that is why I decided not to use One Card initially.
After some time, I finally decided to apply for the UOB One Card as I am really attracted by the cash rebates. Imagine for a monthly spending of $300, you stand a chance to earn cash rebates of $30 per quarter or $10 per month. Effectively you are earning cash rebates of 3.33% on your spending. So far, I see this to be the highest cash rebates you can receive among various credit cards. Please share if you can find more attractive than that.
So recently I have informed all my billing organisations like Starhub, Singnet, M1 and even EZ-Link to charge future bills and auto top-up under One Card. Towards the end of the month if I am not able to meet the minimum $300 amount, I will just go down to SP Services customer service centre to pay utility bill with One Card. It is a strange thing that you can't setup a recurring instruction to charge your utility bill under One Card but you can still use credit card payment at their customer service centre.
When my spending reaches past $300, I will charge all subsequent transactions under Citibank M1 card which gives me a 0.5% rebate. However the rebate of this card is not in cash. So you can choose to offset M1 bills. I don't really mind as I can still save on my M1 bills.
If any kind soul can suggest a better way to earn cash rebates, please do inform me. I don’t mind giving a small reward for that suggestion. As for now, I am really happy with these arrangements.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
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37 comments:
I read that u have applied for the Standchart Xtra Saver debit card, why not charge the additional amt above $3000 to Xtra Saver card?
You earn a 2% cashback
or you can charge it to Standchart Manhatten card (0.5% cashback if amt spend is below $500 a mth).
0.5% cashback is in cash which is better than non-cash.
note typo error. it shd read as additional amt above $300 (not $3000)
Mike,
You mean EZ-link card auto top-up can charge under UOB one card?
How can i arrange for auto top up to my UOB one card?
thought only Citibank SMRT card allow that kind of arrangement?
yes you can do auto top with your normal ezlink with any visa card. just go to www.ezlink.com.sg i didnt know at first. now im saying goodbye to citibank smrt. note there is a 25cents auto top up fee if im not wrong so choose the max $50 top up. i dont mind this fee as still the potential rebates is higher than citibank.
i dont want to use the xtrasaver because i can reach maximum cash rebates with the "nets transfer" thing. remember? hehe. starting next month i will have 2 xtrasaver accounts to use for the transfer!
oh scb manhattan is 0.5% for < $500? ok thats good. i think i will apply and keep. who knows my spending reach $3000 one day
Mike,
I mean use Xtra Master Card to pay for utilities bill if you are not able to hit the $300 per the mth for your UOB one card. Using Xtra saver give you 2% cashback. (dont use it for Nets which is 0.5% cashback)
Mike
thanks i will now top up my EZ link card with my UOB card. Citibank SMRT card is not good. less than 1% cashback only because of hidden costs (25 cts per top up)
that will solve my problem of hitting the minimum spending of $800 a mth. if not sometimes i've to go down to SP service office to pay up using UOB one just to hit my $800
Mike
the cashback for manhatten card can be found at http://www.wowmanhattan.com.sg/
$1-$500 0.5% cashback
$501-$1,500 1% cashback
$1,501-$3,000 2%
$3,000 and above 5%
this manhatten cashback is valid till 30 June 2008. I hope the bank extend it. it's very helpful if you have big ticket purchase
Verbatin, yes you are right. you mean retail spending for 2% cashback. but the only disadvantage is the money is deducted immediately unlike if you spend by cc. but thats ok. thanks for the suggestion!
wow manhattan looks good! i will sign up soon. i owe you 1 kopi treat as mentioned in my post. hehe
lol $800 a month with UOB one card. you really squeeze maximum rebates!
Guys, just for info, you may pay up your monthly SC/CC charge at Town Councils if you stay in an HDB flat, using your VISA/MasterCard. But you need to go down to the office to personally swipe your card. This may be useful to achieve your monthly spending target for UOB One.
Ku,
Thanks for the information. I am presently using Diners Card to pay for my S&C at AXS station (only some town council can use Diners to pay)
Since i am on Diners card, i would like to highlight something abt this card
You can pay your income tax, road tax, employers CPF, maid levy, property tax with Diners card at AXS.
to be honest, the reward points for Diners are not fantastic - abt 0.3% compared to 3.3% for UOB one and 2% for Xtra Saver. Most credit cards generally do not allow you to pay for your income tax, road tax, employers CPF, maid levy property tax etc. if they do allow, u need to go down personally to the office to swipe the card. For Diners u can just pay at any AXS station. very convenient
Even though reward point is a maagre 0.3%. You can wait till your birthday month to redeem the points at a 50% discount. Hence 0.3% becomes 0.6%.
On some mths, if you are able to charge $5,000 in a mth, u can also redeem free gifts (no need to use your points)
So far i have redeemed a safe box (retail price selling for $148), "zao chye mao" (prosperity cat) and a ice cream maker
Of course it helps that my dad has a small biz and i use Diners card to pay for the worker's CPF. Every mth i can chalk up at least 5k and can redeem free gifts. and they give you up to 60 day credit too.
however i normally do not use Diners card for retail spending
for retail spending, my 1st choice will be UOB one card (3.3% cashback) follow by Standard Xtra Savers debit card (2% cashback). for Big ticket purchases abt 3k, i use standard manhatten card (5% cashback)
Mike,
kopi treat? haha....tks but no need man as i have also benefitted from your sharing of tips on credit card.
previously i am not aware that we can use our DBS credit limit to earn interest from MMF. and i didnt know EZ link can pay by UOB one card.
I can now look forward to reducing my monthly expenses by $15-$25 a mth. it may not be a lot but given compound interest, it can turn out to be a lot over many years
Verbatin, you may want to ask ur Dad to open an XtraSaver account and to keep the cashflow for business transactions in that account, which usually runs in the order of 200k or more for SMEs, I suppose. So you can pay all your purchase using that account with 5% cashback and at the same time getting higher interest than e$aver too. :)
verbatin thanks im sure we learn alot from each others exchange.
regarding the xtrasaver retail spending, you know some shops charge extra for cc payment unless you use cash. does it mean using xtrasaver incurs extra charge also?
Some shops charge us the "merchant fee", which is eaten up by VISA, not the shops. Many big shops can afford to absorb this merchant fee for us (typically at 5% by VISA, I think) so we don't pay extra. The banks issuing the credit cards also get a slice of this merchant fee, I guess, so that's why they can return us with cashbacks or reward points for frequent spending. Correct me if I am wrong.. :P
So XtraSaver debit can return us with cashbacks because we already paid merchant fees when we use our Mastercard. Of course, SCB will pool all of our $6k that we keep in our XtraSaver in a big MMF fund,and they pocket the big difference in interest. With their cashback cap of $300 and NETS cap of $50, they have already minimised their liabilities and set to gain from people who don't know about the AXS NETS trick. :)
come to think of this, just imagine if you go to retail shops and pay in cash. with all these extra charges built in, those people who choose to pay in cash really pays at extra premium ha. i pity those guys who are not financially literate especially some of my family members.
Ku,
too bad my dad dont hv 200k. in fact hiz biz is perenially in overdraft!
only small company charge extra if i wee to use Xtra saver. When the shop tell me they are charging extra for using my Xtra card, i will pay in Nets or Cash
thanks for the tip on xtra saver, really useful.
xtra saver is also an ATM card when link to e$aver. i understand you can pay petrol in malaysia too, i wonder if any have tried it before? the
small prints also says it can only be used on non-EMV compliant Mastercard cards and if petrol station category code is 5541 or 5542. i wonder what that means?
wow! you even have Citibank SMRT too, makes me wonder the used of POSB Everyday except for the credits :)
im not driving so cant comment on that. my instinct tells me you are not entitled in that.
citibank smrt? nothing big deal about this card. i went wow initially too but now i have thrown it 1 side. not useful i realise.
posb everyday credit card is still useful. just imagine if your necessary expenses is big, you can spread your bills on uob one card and everyday card to maximise on the rebates. but depends on upuir expenses. for my case, im better off putting all into one card but i can still use everyday card if i go watsons
do check out my blog regularly for new uupdates. :)
i think you can setup recurring SP charges to Everyday card
if i want to do it via UOB One, i need to undo this grrrrrrr
sorrie but how you actually use Xtrasave to pay DBS? care to enlighten me? i hope it can be done online. thks!
with everyday card you can do recurring with SP no problem. take note you cant do recurring with One card. need to go down their centre. to terminate your SP with everyday, just give a call to SP.
regarding xtrasaver and dbs, you need to use dbs credit card then follow the steps listed in my earlier post. when the dbs bills come, pay by nets using xtrasaver through axs.
lol i hope you are confused. take sometime to read all the posts properly to learn the full benefits. tell me if you still need further help.
i rarely use axs, that's why LOLz
i have never used axs before. this month is the first time i used! luckily i have axs in my company lol
Hi Mike,
Nice blog, thanks for the great tips. is the 9/10digit consumer reference nos the same as your trading ac nos with philips?
it should be 20xxyyyyyy, where xx is your remisier code and yyyyyy is your 6 digits(omit first 0) trading ac no. complicated right? just call poems and they will give you straight away. :)
Thks! For Stanchart internet bill payment you only need to key in your 7 digit trading account,dun have a credit card with them to try thou, . DBS one is confusing because they put 9 OR 10 digit number
yous xtrasaver to make bill payment? are you entitled to any rebates?
just call poems and ask easier
mike, seems like uob one card has raised its min spending to $800/mth for consecutive 3 mths to enjoy rebates of $80.
opps, guess i din finish reading the fine words. :)
Spend over S$800 in each of the 3 consecutive statement periods* and you will receive S$80 cash rebate per quarter to offset your bill. Spend over S$300 in each of the 3 consecutive statement periods* and you will receive S$30 cash rebate per quarter.
I had recently use UOB Credit card recurring payment form to pay for my SC fee from Town council from my UOB one card. I had also set up my Singtel bill on recurring basic from UOB 1 card by just calling up singtel & Starhub. It is so much faster than posting the recurring form back to bank/respective billing organisation
The idea on this post is quite a good idea! We should be able to maximise our credit card debates among our different credit cards.
I'm quite certain that this arrangements is really okay. Stick to it first before trying another. We may not know that your arrangements are far more better than you had ever imagined.
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