HSBC Star Alliance Credit Card

Pauline Hatch

Pauline is a personal finance expert at CreditCard.com.au, with 8 years in money, budgeting and property reporting under her belt. Ask Pauline a Question about this card.

The HSBC Star Alliance Credit Card

Kudos to HSBC for launching something a little bit different. The HSBC Star Alliance card sees the plight of travellers and does a good job of addressing all the pain points of frequent flyers. Be prepared for a lot of glares as you essentially queue-jump your way around the world. As long as you’re ok with travelling the Star Alliance airline network and don’t mind a high-tier annual fee, this card is a decent traveller's companion.

Being the first to affiliate itself with a flock of airlines and a variety of programs, this card does redeem points differently. Let’s take a look.

What we love...

I think the way HSBC has identified all the ‘perky’ things people like about travel and flaunted them is pretty smart. For instance, once you’ve reached a status, you can get these bonuses that make travel easier:

Gold Status:

• Extra baggage allowance. You can take an extra 20kg where there is a weight allowance, or an extra piece of baggage if there is a limit to the number of items you can take. Extra baggage is not offered on all airlines.
• Gold Track priority lanes. Move through security and Immigration faster using dedicated lanes.
• Airport lounge access. You and a guest can visit over 1000 lounge locations within the Star Alliance network of airlines.
• Priority boarding. Board alongside First and Business class passengers.
• Priority baggage handling. First on, first off when it comes to your bags.
• Priority reservations waitlist. Get higher priority on the waitlist for seats in the class you wanted but may have been unavailable when you booked.
• Priority airport stand-by. Get higher priority if your preferred flight is booked out.

Silver Status:

• Priority reservations waitlist. Get higher priority on the waitlist for seats in the class you wanted but may have been unavailable when you booked.
• Priority airport stand-by. Get higher priority if your preferred flight is booked out.

HSBC teases you with Gold Status by giving it to you in the first year if you spend $4000 on the card within the first 90 days. To keep your Gold Status (after you’re quite used to outranking your fellow status-less passengers, thank you very much) you’ll need to spend $60,000 on your card each year. Silver Status requires that you spend $30,000 each year.

Let me explain how the points work for this card.

You’ll earn Star Alliance Points when you use the card to buy eligible purchases. Your points are stored in the Star Alliance Rewards portal, from which you can manage your points and redeem them for flights with any of the affiliated airlines.

Note: you can spend your points with any airline, but you have to nominate an airline to associate your Status with. You can only switch your Status airline once per year, when your status renews.

Eligible purchases: HSBC says you can’t earn points on interest-free and other promotions, balance transfers, business expenses, cash advances, fees and charges, disputed transactions, BPAY and any government fee or charge.

Converting your points to Star Alliance airlines: Your points convert at different rates. For instance, here’s what Star Alliance Points look like in different airline miles:

The card’s T&Cs say (proving it’s worth reading them) that if you reach Gold Status but fail to nominate a Frequent Flyer program, HSBC will instead give you 40,000 Star Alliance Points. That’s not the worst thing if you’d rather have points than street cred.

Other benefits and inclusions

You’ll also get a few extras that reward you as a traveller:

• Complimentary insurances. The insurances include Domestic and International Travel plus Rental Vehicle Excess in Australia, and some cover for pandemic-related illness when travelling overseas. You’ll also get Transit Accident Insurance, Extended Warranty Insurance and Purchase Protection Cover.
• 0% interest on a Balance Transfer for 12 months. Please note that a 2% fee applies, and you can transfer up to 90% of your credit card limit. You can’t transfer from other HSBC-branded products.
• 0% interest on flight bookings for 6 months. This offer is only available when you book your flight directly through the participating Star Alliance member airline.
• Home&Away Privilege Program membership. Free for HSBC cardholders, you’ll get access to over 27,000 offers from partnering businesses around the world on dining, shopping, and travel.
• HSBC Instant Savings Program membership. You can access 4500 discounts at participating restaurants, hotels, entertainment and everyday items, including 5% off your weekly grocery shop.

What’s not so great...

While the HSBC Star Alliance credit card has some interesting points, it also has a few things that have me scratching my head. For one, I’m not sure why they didn’t include a bonus points offer - I can only assume the waived annual fee for the first year is one of the big sign-up incentives.

Speaking of the annual fee, $450 is the kind of price point usually reserved for cards that earn big rewards points. So, to get real value from the card, you'll need to make sure you use all its freebies including the Home&Away Privilege Program and HSBC Instant Savings Program in lieu of a regular rewards program.

Let’s look at points and status again.

You’ll need to weigh up whether you’ll be able to earn the volume of points that will make the card worthwhile. Points are uncapped, but not equally earned. Once you’ve hit $3000 in one statement period your points will drop from 1 point to 0.5 per $1.

Star Alliance Points will expire if you don’t use your card or your points for 14 months. Points transferred to another program are then under that program’s expiry rules (and it’s a one-way street; you can’t transfer points back to Star Alliance Rewards).

And let’s be honest, Silver Status doesn’t get you all that much - just higher priority on standby. Gold is where the money’s at, which means this card works best if you’re sure you can spend $60,000 on the card each year comfortably and safely.

Other features

• Syncs with Apple Pay and Google Pay
• 55 days interest-free
• Additional cards can be issued free to any nominated person 16 years or older

Why should you choose this card?

Without question, this card is designed purely for travellers. Extras like the 0% balance transfer offer sweeten the deal if you need them, but there’s no doubt HSBC are catering to frequent flyers with its Star Alliance card.

You’ll have to do a little homework to see if this card will suit the way you travel. It revolves quite a lot around status, which means you need to be able to maintain Gold Status every year, and earn enough points to really get the most out of the card and make it worth the $450 annual fee.

The HSBC Star Alliance card is navigating uncharted waters and that can be a good thing in an industry that’s seen little change. All told, it provides travellers with a new way to earn and use frequent flyer points, and comes with a carry-on full of exciting priority perks to make travel more interesting.