How does the HSBC TravelOne card earn points?

The HSBC TravelOne earns 2 reward points for every ₹100 you spend, and 4 points per ₹100 on flights, travel aggregators and foreign-currency spends. Two bigger rates sit on HSBC’s own Travel with Points portal: 8 points per ₹100 on flights booked there (4X) and 12 per ₹100 on hotels (6X). The portal rates share one ceiling of 18,000 points a month.

What a point is worth afterwards depends on where you send it, and that spread is wider than the gap between any two earn rates.

Three rates, and what each one covers

The base rate is 2 points per ₹100, and HSBC’s product page says it has no cap. Two categories earn nothing in the card’s record: fuel and rent. Everything else, from groceries to utilities, earns at the base rate.

The 4-point rate is what HSBC’s page calls double points. It covers flights, travel aggregators and any transaction in a foreign currency. A flight bought directly on an airline’s site earns here, and so does a hotel bill paid in dollars abroad.

The portal rates only apply to bookings made through Travel with Points, which runs on Hopper. A hotel booked there earns 12 points per ₹100. A flight earns 8. The same flight bought on the airline’s website earns 4, and the same hotel booked directly in rupees earns 2.

There is also an annual bonus. Spend ₹12L in a year and HSBC adds 10,000 points. At the base rate, ₹12L of spend earns 24,000 points on its own, so the bonus takes the year to 34,000.

The 18,000-point monthly ceiling

HSBC’s Travel with Points page caps accelerated points at 18,000 a month, and the card record treats that as one ceiling shared by portal hotels and portal flights. Hotels reach it at ₹1,50,000 of portal bookings in a month. Flights alone reach it at ₹2,25,000. A mixed month gets there somewhere in between.

Past the ceiling, portal bookings stop earning the accelerated rate for the rest of that month. A large trip paid for in one cycle can lose most of its portal earning this way. If the booking can be split across two statement months, each half gets its own 18,000-point allowance. Whether the portal lets a booking be split depends on the booking.

The ceiling applies to the portal only. The 4-point rate on flights and foreign-currency spends has no monthly cap in the card record.

Where the fine print cuts in

Portal pricing is the first catch. The card’s record carries a tip that the portal has shown flights and hotels priced above what the airline or another booking site charges for the same thing. The 12-point hotel rate is worth 10.8% of spend if the points go to KrisFlyer at the catalog’s ₹0.90 valuation. That return only holds if the portal price matches what you would pay elsewhere. A room priced higher on the portal eats into it, rupee for rupee.

The foreign-currency markup is the second. The Key Fact Statement puts it at 3.5% of every foreign-currency transaction. At 4 points per ₹100 and ₹0.90 a point, spending abroad earns back 3.6%, which leaves about 0.1% after the markup. On foreign spends, the 4X rate mostly pays back the markup.

What a point is worth depends on the partner

TravelOne points move to 20 airline and hotel programmes, most at 1:1. Krediit’s catalog prices each partner’s point in rupees from what it buys:

• Accor ALL: ₹2.19 a point, because ALL points pay down a hotel bill at a fixed rate.
• Singapore KrisFlyer, British Airways Avios, Qatar Airways Avios and JAL Mileage Bank: ₹0.90.
• Air India Maharaja Club and Etihad Guest: ₹0.50.
• Marriott Bonvoy and IHG One Rewards: ₹0.45, despite the same 1:1 ratio.

A few partners convert at worse ratios. Turkish Miles&Smiles, United MileagePlus and Hainan take 2:1, Shangri-La Circle 5:1, and AirAsia gives 3 of its points for each HSBC point at 1:3.

The partner choice moves the card’s return more than any earn rate does. The base rate of 2 points per ₹100 is worth 4.38% of spend if the points go to Accor, and 0.9% if they go to Marriott. A full month’s 18,000 portal points is roughly ₹39,420 as Accor credit, about ₹16,200 as KrisFlyer miles, and near ₹8,100 as Marriott points. The card record also notes that Accor transfer bonuses have run about twice a year, and that transfers cannot be reversed.

What it costs to hold

The joining fee and the annual fee are both ₹4,999. The annual fee is waived when your spend for the year crosses ₹8,00,000, which the Key Fact Statement and the product page both state. The welcome benefit, worth ₹4,000 as ₹1,000 cashback plus a ₹3,000 Postcard voucher, needs ₹25,000 of spend within 30 days of opening the account and a log-on to HSBC’s mobile banking app. Lounge access is 6 domestic and 4 international visits a year through Priority Pass.

What to check on your own statement

Four lines tell you whether the card is paying what it looks like it pays.

• Where each travel booking was made. Portal, direct on the airline or hotel site, or a travel aggregator each earn a different rate, and the statement’s merchant name shows which one it was.
• How much of the month’s 18,000 portal points you have used. Two big bookings in one statement month can hit the ceiling, and the second one may earn far less than expected.
• The foreign-currency markup line next to each overseas spend. The points on that spend are mostly paying it back.
• Which partner your points are going to. The same balance is worth ₹2.19 or ₹0.45 a point depending on that choice.

The facts table under this guide is the card’s catalog record, with the date it was checked. Krediit tracks the 18,000-point headroom against your own bookings, so you see it before a large booking rather than on the statement, and it prices your balance at every partner.