HSBC Platinum Credit Card Review

I applied for an HSBC Platinum credit card last month and it was a spur of the moment decision without any thought or strategy on how I will maximise the benefits. Here I am, after a month, regretting about missing the welcome offers and realising that this card has a mediocre reward rate too. Reward rates are okay at higher spends only if you transfer the points to Taj Inner Circle or AirMiles (Singapore Airlines and British Airways).

HSBC Platinum Credit Card

Fees and Eligibility

• Nil joining and annual fees. i.e. HSBC Platinum credit card is a LTF credit card.
• Typically offered to salaried folks only.

Rewards and Benefits:

• Joining Benefits:
  • On doing a single transaction of 1000 or more within the first 30 days
    • Amazon Voucher of INR500
    • 3 complimentary airport lounge access at domestic & international lounges or 3 meal-vouchers
  • 10% cashback (up to 2000) on spending 10000 in the first 60 days
• Recurring Benefit:
  • Buy One Get One movie ticket on BMS (up to 250) once every month. The ticket has to be booked on Saturday, but can be for any show of the week.
• Reward Points:
  • 2 reward points for every 150 spent. Translates to 1.33% reward rate if transferred to Taj InnerCircle program.
  • Redemption thru the rewards catalogue fetches a lowly rate of 20p-33p per point.
• Accelerated Reward  Points:
  • 5X rewards on purchases made after crossing spends of INR400,000 with a max of 15,000 accelerated reward points in an anniversary year. This gets maxed out at annual spending of 625,000.

Thoughts on HSBC Platinum Credit Card

As mentioned earlier, I applied for an HSBC Platinum credit card without giving any thought to how I will use it. In the last month, I did a few transactions on the card too, only to realise that I have missed out on joining benefits.  I was supposed to do at least 1 transaction of 1000 or more and I did none.  :(. That’s not all. I applied for this card without going thru the reward structure.

 

The reward rate on this card is very mediocre. You get maximum reward rate only when you convert reward points either into TIC points (1:1 conversion) or into KriFlyer/Avios miles (1:1 conversion).  Otherwise, the reward catalogue option is pathetic and values the points at just 20p-33p.

Moreover, the spend levels to get a maximum benefit of 3.7% is high at 625,000. At reasonable spend levels of 400,000 and below the reward rate is low at 1.3%.

Hotel loyalty and Airmiles conversion

One area this credit card excels in is at miles conversion, but that too only if you manage to spend 625,000 per year on HSBC. At this spending level, you will get more than 23k+ miles on conversion. Higher than Amex and Citi will give on similar spending, adjusted for fees. However, not to forget the other benefits that you get on Amex Platinum Travel and Citi Premiermiles (e.g. lounge access).

 

At more reasonable spend levels of 400,000 per year, the conversion rate of HSBC Platinum is low compared to Amex and Citi cards.  Highlighting that HSBC Platinum credit card is more suited for a very niche category of users who are high spenders and excel at hotel loyalty and air miles.

Having said that, the conversion partners with HSBC are very limited. HSBC has only 4 partners for points conversion. Namely Taj InnerCircle, KrisFlyer, Avios and Intermiles. Amex has 10 airline partners and 2 hotel partners, while Citi has 14 airline partners and 1 hotel partner.

Conclusion

I don’t think HSBC Platinum credit card will be my go-to card in any scenario. Will try to get at least the 10% cashback benefit on this card and then close it after a few months. Also for someone who is into hotel loyalty and air miles game, I don’t think this credit card will be a primary credit card, as apart from miles conversion there is nothing extra this card provides.

What is your view on HSBC Platinum credit card? Do you agree with my conclusions?

Photo by Joshua Lawrence on Unsplash