Hi everyone,
A friend from my country just arrived in Taiwan to catch a concert (she had gone to Japan first for a week and then here to Taiwan). She told me that all her flight tickets were free because she used a credit card where every purchase earned 2% converted into mileage points. She told me that the credit card is affiliated with one specific airline, but she could choose from multiple airlines that are also in cooperation with that airline.
I’m curious, does anyone know if there’s a credit card in Taiwan that offers a similar program (money spent → mileage points)?
you want to play the miles game, eh?
read thread below.
tl;dr: Cathay United and HSBC cards
https://tw.forumosa.com/t/credit-cards-for-foreigners-general-discussion/194325
She told me that all her flight tickets were free because she used a credit card where every purchase earned 2% converted into mileage points.
rookie numbers. depending on her country/card, it can go 3% or 4% on every purchase. welcome to the game.
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May I know what card you use and what the bonus/mileage conversion rate is?
3ish % is also included in your costs, for credit card fees 
Presumably if you want to get air miles from credit cards, you would get a credit card that’s attached to an airline… like Cathay Pacific or something.
Now as to rewards, standard cash back is 1%, and 2 or 3% depending on the card, for certain purchases. Costco card gives 2% costco point for purchases at Costco for example.
If you want to maximize rewards, you really will need multiple credit cards and use that card which gives you the increased rewards (like costco card for costco purchases, or maybe cathay pacific might give out for rewards for buying airline tickets, and such). Some cards give REALLY high rewards, like 5% for certain purchases related to that card.
By the way if you already have a credit card, look up what other cards your bank might offer as there’s no approval process to get those cards once you already have a credit account with your bank (whereas you’d need another approval process to get cards at different banks). So say if you got a Fubon credit card, find out if they have some other airline credit cards. If so, get it and use it to get air miles.
Used to hear about this woman who exploited the hell out of credit card rewards and made money from it. She bought stuff that could then be resold at the same price she paid (transferrable airline tickets for example) and then kept the reward. Credit card companies kinda closed her account for this.
Though to be honest with you it doesn’t seem worth it unless your monthly expenditure is high enough to make the rewards worth it. The Open Possible card for example gives higher cash back for overseas purchases, but it has a 1% overseas transaction fee which basically kills half the reward. It gives the highest reward for using it to pay your phone bill, like 5%.
This appears to be the card to use if you want to earn increased air miles/rewards.
Goes without a saying… don’t keep idle cards around as you’ll get hit with an annual fee… and that could stack up and wreck your credit score if you didn’t know about it.
Not really
cash and credit card (line pay) is almost always same price
which means, if you pay cash, you are paying for my credit card points
Here’s the thing though…
Many mom and pop vendors do not take credit card or line pay at all, but they’ll often be cheaper as they’re tax exempt business due to having low revenue (I think the government allows a monthly revenue of something like 200k before they’re owed tax, there will be a large sticker attesting to this and do not issue receipts). Often making them cash only means they can under declare and thus pass on the savings.
Businesses that takes line pay or cards will be slightly more expensive due to fees and taxes. But it’s getting better. I prefer using cards because at least I get the base line award (1%) for using it. You get nothing for cash and there’s an ATM fee to withdraw money.
They don’t add fees or anything, you pay the same whether using cards or cash, but the fees are all baked in. Vendors take cards because it does cause people to spend more.
Some vendor may give unadvertised discount if you pay cash for large ish purchase.
Nope, credit cards charge a percent on nearly all transactions. Just because the vendors don’t tell you outright doesn’t mean you don’t pay. Like tax. 5% sales tax in Taiwan. It’s added in.
This is so well known it has long been common with small local businesses to give you a cheaper price for using cash. For sure, this is going away and everyone just charges full fee price and pockets the cash. But it is reality. Credit card companies aren’t hiding this fact, we all pay more because of these fees…it’s not even wrong, just a basic fact of paying for a service. One of the many reasons why cash is infinitely better than digital
I’m aware of that.
My point is, vendors increase the menu price by 3%. For most stores, cash payers also pay this 3% “hidden extra fee” despite paying cash.
Cash buyers and myself paid the same price to the store. But I got points, cash buyer did not.
The merchant and bank will increase their prices to maintain their profit margin, so the only loser is the cash buyer.
You could argue the cash buyer is paying 3% for financial privacy…
Also some cards give more than 3%. Unicard gives 7.5% cash back right now. Where do you think it’s coming from? Not the swipe fee charged to merchants.
(yeah yeah it’s promotional marketing expense from other bank revenue sources but my point is not everything is from the swipe fee).
It’s also interest from people doing installments as well as not paying in full every month. Credit card is profitable for banks, believe me.
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no one gives anything for free, anything given means that the issuer has more than enough to turn a profit.
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So does that mean no money for nothing, no flights for free?
Guy
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Considering that airlines make next to no profit, they’re even less incentivized to give anything away for free.
But if you’re already spending 200,000 a month on expenses, it doesn’t seem a stretch that if using the right cards, you might get enough for a few free flights a year.
For example I would love to be able to pay rent with credit cards. That could be a decent amount in rewards.
usual TL BS… MATE DO NOT TALK ABOUT WHAT U HAVE NO CLUE ABOUT.
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actually, airlines these days make a lot of money from giving “free” miles to travelers.
The airline’s profit margin on airline reward miles is near 50%. Whereas actual passenger transportation is single digit %, think, less than NT$300 per passenger for regional asia flights. There’s also cargo revenue.
In reality, the airline is paid by banks to give free miles.
The “free miles” are given to travelers through credit card rewards (e.g., one point per NT$15 spent), sign up bonuses, and frequent flyer loyalty programs.
Large banks pay the airlines, and the airlines market the bank’s credit card to travelers. The bank then uses the travelers financial transaction data for their own analysis and also sell it to third parties. Needless to say, most credit hard holders do not consume their free points, or consume them at a WORSE rate than paying cash.
So the banks get free financial transaction data, and the traveler gets “nothing” since they didn’t consume the points.
There are already third-party services which legally offer this service. The game goes deep.
For example, you can pay your old non-tech savvy Taiwanese landlord with a credit card. The Taiwanese landlord receives a bank transfer as if you paid normally. The third-party will take a small % fee of the monthly rent, which makes it not worth it for 2% or 3% cash back.
However, for credit card sign up bonuses (effective 10%+ cash back), it can be worth it.
Ok I was speaking of paid passengers, their profit is next to nothing. I just didn’t think airline miles works the same way. Thanks for correcting me.
What third party services exist in Taiwan for paying landlords with credit cards, and what cards allow maximum rewards with said service? I know certain cards gives 5% cash back for certain things, and you need different cards for those various things.
Hey guys, after talking to my colleagues, they would recommend getting the HSBC card that gives you cashback instead of mileage points.
They said that you can purchase mileage points, so there’s no need to get a card specifically for that. Now this starts to get a bit OOT, but if anyone can correct my understanding, that’d be great.
So this is the page for EVA’s mileage purchase: https://www.brmile.com/infinity-mileagelands/zh-TW/buy
The lowest exchange is 2000 miles, which is 2480 NTD. I checked the distance between Taoyuan and Tokyo, and it’s 1360 miles. I checked the ticket price to fly from Taoyuan to Narita, and it’s 6100 NTD!!! Am I missing something here? Isn’t it a no-brainer that it’s cheaper (more than half the price!) to buy the mileage instead? 2480 NTD, you get a plane ticket, and you still have 640 miles left! Am I doing the Math wrong?
Now, to keep things on topic: Wouldn’t the (HSBC) cashback card be a better option than the mileage credit card? You purchase the mileage using your own money, fly to a country, spend the money using the cashback card, and then you’ll get the cashback?
You should read more about how millage redemption works.
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no, not at all. I find cashback only cards to give a worse value in general.
Buying miles with your own money is rarely a good deal, almost never unless you are short of a few miles and need to redeem.
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