Credit Cards Deals

CardUp OCBC promos from 1.5% fee – buy miles for 0.92 cents

CardUp has extended its discounted fee promotions for selected OCBC cardholders till December 2024, allowing you to buy miles from 0.92 cents each.

Update: CardUp’s OCBC payment offers have been further extended until 31st March 2025.

In 2023 CardUp began offering selected OCBC cardholders some quite competitive discounted fees for payments made using its platform, for expenses like property rental, education fees, insurance premiums and general invoices, where a credit card wouldn’t normally be accepted.

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The good news is the deals have now been extended right through to the end of 2024 the end of March 2025, allowing new CardUp users to generate miles from 0.92 cents each, while existing users can do so from 1.11 cents each.

If you’re an OCBC Voyage or Premier Visa Infinite cardholder, CardUp’s deal with the bank has been extended until 31st March 2025 and offers a very competitive 1.5% fee on any one-time payment if you haven’t used the service before, allowing you to buy miles from as little as 0.92 cents each.

There’s also a year-round 1.8% fee offer on any number of payments between now and 31st March 2025 for existing CardUp users holding these cards.

These promotional codes are valid for any supported payment type via the CardUp platform, making this a very flexible way to generate miles at a reasonable cost over the next six months.

Maximise your rewards with CardUp! Earn miles when you pay for bills that do not offer rewards such as income taxes, insurance, school fees, car loans and more. Earn up to 1.6 VOYAGE Miles for every S$1 spent using your VOYAGE Card. Set up recurring payments to enjoy a discount on your admin fee.

OCBC

New users promotion (1.5%)

This offer is available to Voyage or Premier Visa Infinite cardholders who are new CardUp personal account users who have not yet scheduled a payment using the platform.

A 1.5% fee is available for any payment type scheduled between now and 6pm on 31st March 2025.

Payments must be scheduled at least three business days in advance of the due date to allow for processing time. The payment due date is the last date on which the payment must arrive at your recipient, and is therefore 3rd April 2025 for this offer.

The code can be applied to domestic and international payments.

Simply use the promo code OCBC15 at the ‘Amount’ stage, prior to uploading the supporting documents and reviewing the payment.

OCBC15 2.6% 1.5%
New Users: One-time payment with an OCBC Voyage or OCBC Premier Visa Infinite card (no cap). Full terms here.

Remember this is a one-time use promo code, so to maximise the value you should save this for your largest upcoming payment.

The payment amount is unlimited. Each promo code can only be applied once per user.

Here’s how the cost per mile looks for a one-time payment at 1.5% fee.

Card Miles per S$1 Cost per mile
(1.5% fee)
OCBC Premier Voyage
OCBC PPC Voyage
BOS Voyage
1.6 0.92¢
OCBC Voyage 1.3 1.14¢
OCBC Premier VI 1.28 1.15¢

These all represent competitive rates to buy miles, now that travel has returned post-pandemic.

Existing CardUp users offer (1.8%)

CardUp also has a deal running for existing customers holding the OCBC Voyage or Premier Visa Infinite cards, with a 1.8% fee on all payments made over the next six months.

This offer is valid for payments scheduled between now and 6pm on 31st March 2025.

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Payments must be scheduled at least three business days in advance of the due date to allow for processing time. The payment due date is the last date on which the payment must arrive at your recipient, and is therefore 3rd April 2025 for this offer.

The code can be applied to domestic and international payments.

There is no limit to the number of times you can use this promo code, and there is no upper payment cap.

OCBC18 2.6% 1.8%
Existing Users: Unlimited payments with an OCBC Voyage or OCBC Premier Visa Infinite card (no cap). Full terms here.

Here’s how the cost per mile looks for these unlimited payments at a 1.8% fee.

Card Miles per S$1 Cost per mile
(1.8% fee)
OCBC Premier Voyage
OCBC PPC Voyage
BOS Voyage
1.6 1.11¢
OCBC Voyage 1.3 1.36¢
OCBC Premier VI 1.28 1.38¢

If you’re an OCBC 90°N cardholder, CardUp has also extended its 2023 deal through to 31st March 2025, offering a competitive 1.5% fee on any one-time payment of up to S$10,000 if you haven’t used the service before, which allows you to buy miles from as little as 1.14 cents each.

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There’s also a 2% fee offer on payments for existing CardUp users holding the OCBC 90°N cards, allowing you to buy miles at 1.51 cents each, until 31st March 2025.

These promotional codes are valid for any supported payment type via the CardUp platform, making this a very flexible way to generate miles at a reasonable cost for the next six months.

Earn miles when you pay for bills that do not offer rewards such as income taxes, insurance, school fees, car loans, and more. Receive up to 1.3 90°N Miles with every S$1 you spend on your OCBC 90°N Card. You can also set up recurring payments to enjoy discounted admin fees.

OCBC

As you can see, this offer is slightly less generous than the deal for OCBC Voyage cardholders, so do take advantage of that one first if you can.

New users promotion (1.5%)

This offer is available to OCBC 90°N cardholders who are new CardUp personal account users that have not yet scheduled a payment using the platform.

A 1.5% fee is available for any payment type scheduled between now and 6pm on 31st March 2025.

Payments must be scheduled at least three business days in advance of the due date to allow for processing time. The payment due date is the last date on which the payment must arrive at your recipient, and is therefore 3rd April 2025 for this offer.

The code can be applied to domestic and international payments.

Simply use the promo code OCBC90N15 at the ‘Amount’ stage, prior to uploading the supporting documents and reviewing the payment.

OCBC90N15 2.6% 1.5%
New Users: One-time payment with an OCBC 90°N Visa or Mastercard (capped at S$10,000). Full terms here.

Remember this is a one-time use promo code, so to maximise the value you should save this for your largest upcoming payment.

The payment amount is capped at S$10,000. If your payment exceeds S$10,000, any remaining amount over and above S$10,000 will attract the regular CardUp 2.6% fee.

Each promo code can only be applied once per user.

Here’s how the cost per mile looks for a one-time payment at 1.5% fee.

Card Miles per S$1 Cost per mile
(1.5% fee)
OCBC 90°N Visa
OCBC 90°N Mastercard
1.3 1.14¢

Existing CardUp users offer (2%)

Here are the details of the CardUp OCBC offer that is ending this month – a 2% fee for OCBC 90°N cardholders on all payments made between now and 6pm on 31st March 2025.

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Payments must be scheduled at least three business days in advance of the due date to allow for processing time. The payment due date is the last date on which the payment must arrive at your recipient, and is therefore 3rd April 2025 for this offer.

The code can be applied to domestic and international payments.

There is no limit to the number of times you can use this promo code, but each payment is subject to a maximum amount of S$10,000, withe CardUp’s standard 2.6% fee applicable for amounts greater than that.

OCBC90NV   2.6% 2%
Existing Users: Unlimited payments with an OCBC 90°N Visa (up to S$10,000 per month). Full terms here.
OCBC90NMC   2.6% 2%
Existing Users: Unlimited payments with an OCBC 90°N Mastercard (up to S$10,000 per month). Full terms here.

Here’s how the cost per mile looks for these payments.

Card Miles per S$1 Cost per mile
(2% fee)
OCBC 90°N Visa
OCBC 90°N Mastercard
1.3 1.51¢

How to unlock the discounted fee

CardUp’s user interface makes it quite logical to set up a new payment and apply one of these promo codes.

Set up your payment as normal on CardUp and at the stage where you enter your payment amount and bill reference there is a ‘Promo Code’ field, just before the applicable fee is quoted.

This is where you can enter the OCBC15, OCBC18, OCBC90N15, OCBC90NV or OCBC90NMC code, depending on which offer you are using.

Note that entering the code at this stage will not change the fee, you’ll have to click ‘Continue’ to see the discount reflected.

The usual 2.6% fee is then reduced to the applicable offer fee once the code is entered, before you confirm and submit the payment.

OCBC now has 9 transfer partners

In 2022 OCBC revealed it would be dragging itself out of the dark ages when it comes to airline and hotel transfer partners in Singapore, by improving its offering from a single programme (Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer) to an eight-partner repertoire, from December 2022.

In the end it took until mid-2023 for the new partners to come on board, and unfortunately the conversion ratios for most of them are disappointing.

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Let’s say you have sufficient points on your OCBC credit card to transfer them into 10,000 KrisFlyer miles, which would be 10,000 90°N Miles / Voyage Miles, or 25,000 OCBC$.

Here’s what you’ll get instead with an identical transfer into these newly added partner programmes.

Existing Option Miles or Points
Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer 10,000
New Partner Programme Miles or Points
Air France-KLM Flying Blue 10,000
IHG One Rewards 10,000
Marriott Bonvoy 10,000
British Airways Executive Club 9,000
Etihad Guest 9,000
Cathay Pacific Asia Miles 7,500
United MileagePlus 7,000
Accor Live Limitless 5,000

Unfortunately the transfer ratios for most useful partners are very disappointing, especially for Asia Miles where OCBC cardholders take a surprising 25% hit, compared to a KrisFlyer transfer.

While it’s always good to have additional options, most of our readers will simply want to continue to transfer from OCBC into KrisFlyer, for the best value.

Other CardUp offers

CardUp also still has some ongoing offers for other personal payment types, as shown below:

  • General Payments: 2.6% 2.25% until 31st January 2025 (code GET225)
  • Rent: 2.6% 1.79% until 31st January 2025 (code SAVERENT179)
  • Recurring Payments: 2.6% 1.85% (Visa-only) until 31st January 2025 (code RECURRING185)
  • International Payments: 2.6% 1.85% (Visa-only) until 31st January 2025 (code GLOBE185)

There are also some promotional rates for business users, including a 1.4% fee deal for new business payments.

See CardUp’s pricing page for further details.

Citi PayAll is an alternative

If you’re a Citi cardholder, the bank’s PayAll facility has an ongoing deal running from now until 31st July 2024, offering a 1.6 mpd award rate for non-tax payments, allowing you to buy miles for 1.63 cents each, which then unlocks the option to make tax payments at 2 mpd (buying miles for 1.3 cents each).

This allows those with the following cards to buy miles at 1.3 cents each during the promotion, which in some cases is better than these extended OCBC x CardUp offers.

Citi PayAll Promotion
Tax Payments

Card Earn rate Cost per mile
(2.6% fee)
Citi Ultima Small 2Citi ULTIMA
1.6 mpd
2 mpd
1.3¢
Card2019 SmallCiti Prestige
1.3 mpd
2 mpd
CardMC2019 smallCiti PremierMiles
1.2 mpd
2 mpd
Citi Rewards
0.4 mpd
2 mpd

The downside is that you’ll need to have at least S$5,000 in non-tax payments to make by the end of July 2024 to benefit, while these CardUp OCBC deals are good for smaller payment amounts too, right through to the end of the year in most cases.



 


 

Summary

CardUp has extended most of its promotional fee rates for selected OCBC cardholders until 31st March 2025, allowing you to buy miles from as little as 0.92 cents each over the next six months.

Even existing CardUp customers get a good deal, with a year-round 1.8% rate for Voyage cardholders and a 2% rate for 90°N cardholders.

Existing cardholders can generate miles from 1.11 to 1.51 cents each, competitive rates now that pre-pandemic travel is back in full force.

Sign Up HERE

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(Cover Photo: CardUp)

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