Back in early 2024, DBS launched an upgraded sign-up offer for its Altitude credit cards, with new-to-bank customers eligible to earn up to 43,400 bonus miles when successfully applying and charging retail transactions of S$3,000 in the first 60 days from approval.

That best-ever welcome deal wasn’t going to last, and even though it was extended through to mid-July it has unfortunately now been replaced with a more mundane version.

The latest offer will see you receive only up to 25,000 bonus miles with this card, when applying between now and the end of September 2024, for spending a reduced S$800.

You can still pick up an additional 10,000 bonus miles, for a total of up to 35,000 miles in some cases, by voluntarily paying the card’s annual fee of S$196.20, if you wish.

Beware though, it can take up to seven months from approval before you see any of the bonus miles in your account.

Eligibility (new-to-bank)

To be eligible for the latest sign-up bonus for both DBS Altitude cards, you’ll need to meet the following criteria.

If you are a supplementary DBS/POSB cardholder, but not a primary cardholder on any such account, you will qualify as a new customer.

Unfortunately there is still no sign-up bonus for existing DBS credit card customers applying for the Altitude Amex card, like there was back in 2023.

New customer sign-up bonuses

New-to-bank customers are eligible for the for the following two options when signing up for the DBS Altitude Amex card.

DBS Altitude Amex
(new customers)

Bonus Miles
Promo Code: ALTAW25	Promo Code: ALTA35
↓	↓
Spend: S$800 in 60 days
Fee waiver	Annual Fee: S$196.20
↓	↓
Bonus Miles: 25,000	Bonus Miles: 35,000

As you can see, you’ll need to apply promo code ALTAW25 for the fee-free first year offer with 25,000 bonus miles for spending S$800, or ALTA35 for an additional 10,000 miles (35,000 miles in total), with payment of the S$196.20 fee.

A lower 20,000 miles bonus is available for new-to-bank customers applying for the DBS Altitude Visa card.

DBS Altitude Visa
(new customers)

Bonus Miles
Promo Code: ALTVW20	Promo Code: ALTV30
↓	↓
Spend: S$3k in 60 days
Fee waiver	Annual Fee: S$196.20
↓	↓
Bonus Miles: 20,000	Bonus Miles: 30,000

In this case, promo code ALTVW20 will qualify you for the fee-free first year offer, accruing 20,000 bonus miles for spending S$800, while ALTV30 will net you an additional 10,000 miles (30,000 miles in total), with payment of the S$196.20 fee.

Application process

In all cases, whichever card you choose under the new or existing customer offer, here’s how it works:

Apply online via DBS digibank or Myinfo with Singpass using the relevant promo code by 30th September 2024.
Have your card account approved by 14th October 2024.
Charge at least S$800 of eligible spend to the card within 60 days of your approval date.

  APPLY HERE

The qualifying spend can be online or in-person and can be charged in SGD or foreign currency, or any mixture of these.

Spend exclusions

DBS has retained its recently-adopted new series of excluded spend MCC codes in the terms and conditions for this promotion, when considering the qualifying spend for the S$800 minimum within 60 days to trigger the bonus miles.

Primary exclusions here are for education, insurance, utility bill and government-related spend.

CardUp rental payments code under MCC 6513, and should be eligible for the minimum spend requirement for this DBS Vantage offer, though non-rental CardUp payments (MCC 7399) will not qualify.

Note that ipaymy payments are specifically excluded from the eligible spend list to meet the S$800 minimum, even though they will earn miles through this card.

See section 7 of the T&Cs document for the complete list of spend exclusions for this welcome offer.

When are the bonus miles credited?

Unfortunately, not anytime soon!

Provided you fulfil the spend criteria, bonus miles totalling 25,000 (Amex) or 20,000 (Visa) will be credited to your card account within three to five months of meeting the minimum S$3,000 qualifying spend.

If you have opted to receive the annual fee bonus of 10,000 miles, it will be credited when the annual fee itself of S$196.20 is charged to your card, which also happens within three to five months of meeting the minimum S$3,000 qualifying spend.

This is a whole calendar month longer than the 2023 sign-up bonus offer for these cards.

For example if your card:

• Is approved on 15th August 2024
• You meet the the S$800+ spend criteria by the last permissible date 60 days later – on 14th October 2024
• Bonus miles will be awarded by 14th March 2025
• The annual fee bonus (if applicable) will be awarded when the annual fee is charged (also by 14th March 2025 in this example)

In total you could be waiting for up to seven months from being approved for the card to actually seeing any of the bonus miles in your account. This is definitely not a quick way to recharge your miles balance.

Regular miles earning is in addition

The bonus miles outlined above are awarded in addition to the regular miles you will earn for making the S$800 minimum spend with the Altitude cards, at the following rates:

• 1.3 miles for every $1 spent locally (i.e. transacted in SGD), or
• 2.2 miles for every $1 spent overseas (i.e. transacted in foreign currency)

In reality, you’ll probably be meeting the S$800 spend requirement in local currency, meaning S$800 x 1.3 mpd of additional earning – equivalent to 1,040 additional miles. These will be credited to your account alongside each eligible transaction.

However, do remember these miles are quite irrelevant – you should be earning at least 1.3 mpd for this local spend anyway year-round, and in some cases you may even be taking a hit by diverting spend away from 4 mpd cards to achieve the DBS Altitude spend threshold.

Which FFPs can you transfer into?

You can transfer DBS Points into Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer, Cathay Pacific Asia Miles and Qantas Frequent Flyer Points.

You can also transfer your DBS Points to Air Asia BIG Points, here 500 DBS Points will transfer into 1,500 BIG Points (a 3:1 ratio), though it won’t be much interest to our readers – BIG Points are worth only about $0.0034 each (0.34 cents), or about a fifth of the value of a KrisFlyer mile / Asia Mile.

Since Air Asia BIG Points is effectively a cashback programme, this is even worse value than cashing out your DBS Points for shopping vouchers!

Terms and conditions

Here are the full terms and conditions applicable to these sign-up offers.

 DBS Altitude Sign Up Promo T&C

Further details are also available at the bonus promotion page.

Our review

The DBS Altitude cards have maintained more or less their ‘status quo’ in terms of miles earning, perks and benefits for many years now, but that changed from 1st August 2023.

Without advance notice (except a vague promise of “changes” – never a good sign), the card then:

• Axed 3 mpd earning for online flight and hotel bookings, up to S$5,000 per calendar month
• Increased the local spend earn rate from 1.2 mpd to 1.3 mpd
• Increased the FCY earn rate from 2 mpd to 2.2 mpd

DBS had to roll back on its no-notice removal of the 3 mpd earn rate for online flight and hotel bookings, extending this for transactions made by 31st August 2023, but it did then disappear from 1st September 2023.

Furthermore, from April this year DBS axed 10 mpd earning on Kaligo hotel bookings and 6 mpd earning for hotel bookings and selected flight bookings though Expedia.

These changes have relegated the DBS Altitude cards firmly back into the general spend bracket, with earn rates that are relatively easy to achieve with other cards on the market with similar income requirements, and very few other perks to speak of.

For further details, check out our recently updated full review of the Altitude cards, taking account of these recent changes.

DBS has been offering a welcome bonus of up to 43,400 miles for new-to-bank applicants taking up its Altitude credit cards this year, for a spend of S$3,000, but sadly that deal has come to an end this month.

The new offer is for 25,000 miles (Amex) or 20,000 miles (Visa) when spending a reduced S$800 in the first 60 days, for applications between now and 30th September 2024.

There’s also an additional 10,000 miles on offer if you wish to voluntarily pay the first year annual card fee.

Unlike during some deals for the Altitude card we saw in 2023, there’s no sign-up bonus for existing DBS credit card customers picking up the Amex version in this offer.

Do be aware that a main draw of this card – up to S$5,000 monthly spend at 3 mpd for online flight and hotel bookings – was axed almost a year ago

Furthermore, the card recently stopped offering 10 mpd earning on Kaligo hotel bookings and 6 mpd earning for hotel bookings and selected flight bookings though Expedia, leaving it with precious few remaining perks to speak of.