gtag

Thank God it is vanished. Looks like HDFC still unsure about 5x or 10x like we saw last year.
Edit: The link is live again.

PiperAtGatesofDawn

Argghhhh.... now this hurts twice as much. Not only has the 10x limits been halved but so has the Amazon and Flipkart accelerators!!!

vishalgupta22

The link has changed but the details are accurate. Here is the new link:
https://offers.smartbuy.hdfcbank.com..._details/15282

Only thing we can really do on Smart buy for now is buy Instant Vouchers. I don't have any tickets to book for now, but even if I did, I won't involve a OTA right now.

PiperAtGatesofDawn

And the news from HDFC keeps getting worse and worse. I thought that the 10x cut was maybe just a temp thing... but it looks like HDFC is more than half way to making DCB a middling average card.

Here’s what they’ve done now -
For flight, hotels & travel experiences, HDFC Bank Diners Black Credit Card members can redeem up to maximum of 70% of booking value through Reward Points. Rest will have to be paid via Credit Card where you earn 10 times Reward Points. This will be effective from 25 JULY 2020 Earn up to 7,500 Reward Points per calendar month under the up to 10X Reward Points program- June'20 onwards For flight bookings, convenience fee to be paid will now be dynamic, depending upon the number of passenger tickets, domestic or international sector and single/two-way journey. To know more, click here


So in the past month here’s all the things that HDFC has cut:
1. Major 10x reductions including Smartbuy caps and Amazon & Flipkart accelerators
2. Dining accelerator capped @ 30k / day (this isn’t going to affect a whole lot of people though)
3. Removal of 10x partners from DCB
4. Caps on paying airline & hotel bookings through reward points (why!!!!)
5. “Dynamic” convenience fees for tickets!
6. I’m sure there is one more that I’m forgetting

I strongly suspect the dude or dudette responsible for the DCB rewards program is incredibly unhappy and miserable staying at home (and also maybe has revenue targets aka bonuses that they know they can’t hit this year) and has decided to unleash their frustration on us!

vishalgupta22

I had completely missed it in thr email. Coz the email subject was: 'You’ve unlocked savings on Shopping & Travel @SmartBuy'

I had to back and dig this email out of trash to find this towards the end of the email.

I don't see Infinia mentioned in the email, does this apply to Infinia also or can we avoid this for now by upgrading?

Can anyone who has Infinia card please comment?

gtag

It is applicable on Infinia too.

https://www.hdfcbank.com/content/api...-9694b9555a73?

PiperAtGatesofDawn

HDFC, Citi (and I'm sure others) have all started this awful practice of hiding "bad" news at the bottom of some email with a completely different subject line. I think some complaints to RBI are in order.

And yes applies to Infinia and DCB. And these devaluations have been in the works for some time because this practice had already been introduced to the other Diners variants. The thing is that one can understand that the CC business has taken a tremendous hit right now... but I'm pretty sure they won't offer these benefits again when business picks up.

vishalgupta22

Yea, is terrible rather boundary line unethical, but atleast they gave some notice. Unfortunately, at this point I don't want to book tickets even 1 year out and have to deal with 3 entities (airline, ota and smartbuy) if something goes bad.

off topic, Yes Bank also did a 40% devaluation effective today (July 1) on GV redemption.

I totally agree that the benefits are probably gone for good.

PiperAtGatesofDawn

Almost every card has done it - either deval or benefit cuts etc. - SBI, Axis, RBL, YesBank, Amex and who else have you.

SuperFlyBoy

Did Citi Prestige do a devaluation??

PiperAtGatesofDawn

Ssshhh.... don't remind them.... they haven't as yet. But they did some benefits cuts just before COVID at the beginning of the year. I'm glad they haven't done anything post that. Citi and StanC are probably the only two that haven't done anything yet.

Separately... is the new Citi Prestige card a metal card? It's quite heavy but doesn't feel like metal. Also doesn't look quite as impressive as the pics.

SuperFlyBoy

Maybe - the wife's is heavier with the new (USA) design. Cannot verify now as not with me.

I have the old one.

PiperAtGatesofDawn

Is everyone's 9x accelerator posting? I don't think mine have been for the past 3-4 months at least. Am I the only one?

gtag

Same here. I am expecting few thousand pending points.
Confirmed from CC, they are pretty sure that for Jan, Feb 2020, 9x have been posted already.

PiperAtGatesofDawn

Glad to see I'm not the only one. Yeah I think I got my Jan, Feb points (need to check though). But I think Mar or Apr onwards the 9x points haven't been posted.