Originally Posted by
jamar
You're forgetting that depending on the bank, you can get discounts of 10% or more when shopping at certain places. This is their alternative to higher cashback rates.
Also, Shinhan Bank China gives 0.8% back on its debit card.
In addition, Discover is very touchy with foreign transactions. My experience was the card got blocked at least once a week even with advance notice.
(one more thing- it works in mainland China only, so buying anything in Hong Kong with it is a no-go)
-from an American who lives in China and has a Discover and a Chinese credit card
It is extremely rare for major banks to give card holders cash back over 0.5% in any circumstances, even there is, there's a cap as well as time and regional limit. Actually there's tons of transactions of Chinese credit card give people no cash back or "points" at all, including payment to schools, agriculture related transaction, boats related transaction, hospitals, cables, cigarettes, cars. I'm not sure about the reason. So it does not really affect using this card.
As for Hong Kong, because there are so many tourists from mainland China these days, so most big merchants there nowadays support China Unionpay channels as well. So Discover card can be used through China Unionpay network.