I just wrote a post about the HSBC Revolution card’s biggest nerf yet, in its 3rd out of 4 planned nerfs for 2024.
What used to be one of the best 4 miles per dollar (mpd) cards is now merely average.
But despite HSBC’s relentless attempts at slaughtering this card, I’ve decided to keep this card around – for the time being, at least.
In this post, I’ll share what led me to this decision, and some points of consideration if you’re also contemplating whether to keep or cancel the card.
Available Bonus Categories
First, let’s recap the remaining bonus categories for the HSBC Revolution card to get a sense of its possible use cases.
- Shopping
- Dining
- Transport (Private Hire Vehicles, excluding SimplyGo)
- Membership clubs (gyms)
- Travel (until 31 Dec 2024 only, direct with airlines/hotels/car rentals/cruises)
Remember that only online payments or in-app mobile payments will be eligible to earn 4 mpd, and the Travel category will be omitted entirely from 1 Jan 2025.
The biggest issue with the HSBC Revolution card now is that its usability is restricted by removing contactless payments as a payment method for earning 4 mpd.
But as far as bonus categories go, it’s not bad at all – shopping and dining are 2 broad categories that everyone spends on.
The only hurdle that remains, and quite a big one at that, is that they now have to be transacted online or in-app.
If you can get past this, then the HSBC Revolution card isn’t completely dead.
Why Am I Keeping The Card?
Next, let’s dive into the reasons that led me to keep the card.
#1: Main Online Shopping Card
The HSBC Revolution card still earns 4 mpd for online shopping, which means it’s still usable on platforms like Shopee, Lazada, Amazon, and Taobao.
Granted, many other cards can be used for this purpose as well – UOB Preferred Platinum Visa (PPV) and Citi Rewards, to name a few.
However, remember that most specialised miles cards that earn 4 mpd only do so on the first ~S$1k of eligible spending.
So having a “main” online shopping card in HSBC Revolution frees up the 4 mpd earning limit of my other cards for other uses.
Normally, this point doesn’t have much ground to stand on as my monthly spending very seldom ever exceeds S$1k (thankfully).
But my current situation is out of the norm.
As some of you may know, I bought a house earlier this year.
I’m doing renovation for my house, which means I’ll need to do a lot of shopping – and I mean a lot.
Furniture, electrical appliances, lights, toilet fittings, kitchen fittings, cookware, utensils, etc.
All these easily add up to tens of thousands of dollars, and I’ll need to buy all of these over these few months.
To maximise the miles I earn while furnishing my home, I’ll need to spread out my spending on as many 4 mpd cards as I can.
This is where having the extra S$1k of spending buffer for online shopping will be extremely useful since there are already things which I plan to buy online.
#2: Convert Offline Spending To Online Spending
Since the nerf, I’ve been able to continue using the HSBC Revolution card in person a fair bit, which surprised me.
There are some ways to convert offline spending to online spending, which means you can continue to use the HSBC Revolution card to earn 4 mpd even for in-person spending.
Let’s take a look at some of these workarounds.
#2.1: QR Payments (Kris+, ShopBack Pay, FavePay)
Through various modes of in-person QR payments like Kris+, ShopBack Pay, and FavePay, we can convert offline spending into online spending.
QR payments are processed as online transactions even though you scan the QR code in person.
While not all shops and restaurants will accept such QR payment methods, there are a fair number which do, which opens up the avenue of using your HSBC Revolution card for offline payments.
This ranges from hawkers and coffee shops, to restaurants and cafes, to apparel and electronics stores.
Even if you don’t need to convert an offline payment into an online payment, you should use these QR payment methods whenever they are available anyway, since they let you double-dip on rewards.
Kris+, ShopBack, and Fave are rewards programmes that let you earn points or cash rebates in addition to your regular credit card rewards.
You can read more about Kris+ here, and you can read more about setting up QR payments here.
#2.2: Online Ordering Systems
Another way to circumvent the online payment requirement for HSBC Revolution is when shops have an online or in-app ordering system that also processes payments.
This is becoming increasingly common in restaurants and eateries.
This means you can use your HSBC Revolution card to earn 4 mpd even when you are dining in at the restaurant.
#2.3: Shopping/Dining Vouchers
Finally, you can also use the HSBC Revolution card to buy shopping or dining vouchers online via HeyMax to clock your 4 mpd spending.
There is a wide range of merchants to buy vouchers from like IKEA, Best Denki, TANGS, Swensens, Toastbox, etc.
By buying physical vouchers for use in-store, you can convert your physical spending into online spending.
Buying online vouchers also has an advantage – by expanding the eligible online spending of the HSBC Revolution card.
This is because HeyMax voucher purchases are eligible to earn 4 mpd.
They offer vouchers for some merchants where the HSBC Revolution card would otherwise not earn 4 mpd.
In this way, buying vouchers helps to widen the usability of the HSBC Revolution card.
Only For The Short-Term
Even though the HSBC Revolution card is still usable to some extent, I don’t intend to keep it for the long term.
As I explained earlier, the main reason I’m keeping the card is as an additional buffer for online spending during this period where I’ll have much higher spending levels than usual.
Once I’m done with my renovation purchases and my spending levels revert to normal, there will be much less need for this buffer, which means much less reason to continue keeping the card.
In other words, from as early as Jan 2025, the HSBC Revolution card might become obsolete for me.
I was planning to cancel the card as soon as this happens to reset my new-to-bank credit card status with HSBC, but this plan will be put on hold.
This is because I’ve recently signed up for the HSBC TravelOne credit card to snag the signup bonus while I’m making my renovation purchases, and the signup bonus has a 12-month-long clawback clause.
This means that I can’t cancel my HSBC TravelOne card until Sep 2025, so there’s no point in cancelling my HSBC Revolution card before that.
Regardless, I don’t foresee myself continuing to use the HSBC Revolution card very much in the next year.
Should You Cancel Your HSBC Revolution Card?
While I won’t be cancelling my HSBC Revolution card due to my current circumstances, I acknowledge that this isn’t the case for most other people.
If you have other specialized miles cards like UOB PPV and Citi Rewards, you might seriously be considering cancelling your HSBC Revolution card.
With both of these cards, you can earn 4 mpd on ~$2k of spending every month on a wide range of transactions for both offline and online spending.
If your monthly expenses are well below that, then you do not need the HSBC Revolution card for an extra $1k capacity to earn 4 mpd.
Cancelling your HSBC Revolution card to reset your new-to-bank status with HSBC credit cards might be a good move to take advantage of sign-up bonuses in the future.
However, something worth thinking about is the selection of transfer partners.
Earlier this year, HSBC widened their selection of transfer partners beyond the usual duo of KrisFlyer and Asia Miles programs.
Notable additions include Eva Air, British Airways, Qantas, Etihad, and Air France.
This gives you more flexibility in routes and availability when redeeming miles, some of which might also cost fewer miles than via KrisFlyer.
In other words, the miles earned from HSBC are more valuable than other banks like UOB and DBS, since those can only be transferred to KrisFlyer and Asia Miles programs.
To summarise,
Despite the nerfs to the HSBC Revolution card, I’m not cancelling mine just yet.
I still have a use-case for it as an online shopping card during this period where I’ll need to do a lot of shopping to furnish my new home.
However, if you have other specialized miles cards and don’t need the additional spending buffer that the HSBC Revolution card provides, you might be better off cancelling it.
Will you cancel your HSBC Revolution card? Let me know in the comments below!