[Poll] HDFC Infinia vs Diners Club Black ( DCB ) if both LTF ?

[NOOBY]

Hypothetical Conditions:

1. Your portfolio will have only 1 HDFC card, nothing else (no axis, sbi, SC, Citibank, etc) and you will use only the chosen one for all/max payments.
2. Both are LTF but you can choose only one of them, can't have both.
3. Your Annual Spend is 10Lakh+ every year, for life.
4. No more devaluation than what it is right now.

What would you do in this case ?

My choice would be DCB... Reasons:
- Wont get Bonus Reward Points in Infinia (as its LTF)
- Would receive Amazon Prime, Swiggy ONE, etc every year (Infinia would give dineout/swiggy only for first year while DCB has spend based benefit)
- Accelerated Reward Capping would affect, but not much (I assume)
- Not an Apple Guy so don't care much about getting newer Iphones each year by paying only 30% if the value (Apple products are 1:1 for Infinia but not for DCB)
- Approx same lounge access for primary and add-on card holders


** Please do comment which card you chose and why so that everyone can have a healthy discussion about choices **


NOTE: Just a fun poll to see what you would choose where you can't put some spendings on other CCs (like Magnus) for benefits which would make one of them less imp than the other..

 

[ltf4ever]

I have DCB LTF, but would like to have infinia ltf.
reasons:

1. 5x smartbuy on amazon vs 3x on dcb. i have heavy usage of amazon so this difference is good enough. it easily exceeds the amazon prime membership fees.

2. IF my spends do not cross a certain value in a particular year (just like lockdown) i will not get amazon prime membership. also if i happen to have high spends in 1-2 months of the year and not crossing 80k in other months, the monthly milestone is of not much use to me.

3. ola, bms, cult, tatacliq milestone benefits on DCB are almost useless for me, as my spends are mostly on myntra and i have 1+1/2+2 bogo for movies ticket on some other cards.

4. i have faced online acceptance issues on dcb. 2 websites in the past 4 months where i wanted to do heavy transactions.

 

[SiddharthR]

Happy Sunday
Abhi tak dcb winner he 57%

Mujhe lagta hai Infinia fans late uthte he
Now Infinia 81% (winner)

 

[thanix]

My choice will be Infinia. My current card is DCB. Forget about all the rewards etc, I don't want to be humiliated when DCB is not working in front of friends and family. Trust me, DCB still has issues even in metro cities like Chennai. My wife teases that her Regalia in Visa works everywhere in comparison to my so called premium diners.

I was in Goa last month. I was with friends and twice the card didn't worked. First was a nice restaurant for a bill of 10K. I offered to pay but didn't worked, so used my wife's Regalia add on. Second was at a Casino where they told they don't accept Amex and Diners point blank. I can't use my add on for obvious reasons 😂 and have to withdraw cash using my debit card.

 

[Wealth is my birth right!]

My choice will be Infinia. My current card is DCB. Forget about all the rewards etc, I don't want to be humiliated when DCB is not working in front of friends and family. Trust me, DCB still has issues even in metro cities like Chennai. My wife teases that her Regalia in Visa works everywhere in comparison to my so called premium diners.

I was in Goa last month. I was with friends and twice the card didn't worked. First was a nice restaurant for a bill of 10K. I offered to pay but didn't worked, so used my wife's Regalia add on. Second was at a Casino where they told they don't accept Amex and Diners point blank. I can't use my add on for obvious reasons 😂 and have to withdraw cash using my debit card.

Lol that ‘reasons’ part is true 😜

 

[Deleted member 5552]

Diners Club Black ❤️❤️❤️

 

[tsj49]

1. Infinia would win hands down due to recent changes on Smartbuy rewards. Infinia offers 15-16% returns on Amazon pay / Amazon shopping vouchers, which can be used to for all kinds of bill payments. DCB return is almost half of that

2. If someone is booking tickers worth more than 16-17K via smartbuy, DCB will be useless due to daily capping of 2500 points. In this case Infinia offers better value. For hotel booking this limit is even less than <10K per day

3. Acceptance issues - while DCB is good, there were few occasions in India where I had to use other cards as DCB was not accepted. In foreign locations, DCB acceptance is even poor (especially Europe)

4. Monthly milestone - Ola voucher, Tata cliq voucher, Cult voucher as part of monthly milestone has not been very useful to me. Many times Uber is cheaper, so voucher difference on Ola with voucher is not really great. Plus I am not a regular user of Cabs. I also struggle to shop on Tata Cliq as Amazon / Flipkart / Myntra trio takes care of all my needs at great price points and service

Having said this, DCB is still a solid card. But considering all of my use cases and some of corner cases, Infinia wins comprehensively

Totally agreeed.
Adding one more point is, if HDFC launches next level luxury card X, holding Infinia will increase the chances of the approval of X. DCB will still be considered the lower level than Infinia based on the current approval process.

 

[Rahul Gupta]

@Nobody I didnt get your point about the bonus for Infinia LTF

You get bonus reward points equivalent to your annual fees in infinia except gst. but if you are getting it as ltf then you will not receive that bonus.

 

[NOOBY]

Sorry everyone.... I am quite late for replying 😛

There are some interesting replies... some I knew while some are totally new to me...

😂 I know, I was just too lazy to type all the details.
Okay so, considering I only get one card for life and its gonna be free, I’d go for Infinia. Firstly, I am not gonna lie, the status of exclusivity matters to me somewhat and you know it is still considered one of the top most cards in India.
I get my amazon prime with my other subscriptions, I live in a city where I don’t have any dineout/swiggy one, but I do get multiple Apple devices a year. Also in a tier-2 city, the offline acceptance might be an issue with Diners as my brother in law holds the card and still faces issues while purchasing offline.

Overall, both are very similar cards and in this scenario where either of them is gonna be LTF, I just see infinia being a better fit for me.
**Just my opinion.

By getting Amazon Prime via other subscriptions, do you mean via Tata Play or something else ?
That's great to hear (but bad if you are paying for it while you could get it for free 😛 )

My preference for DCB since i already have visa master rupay cc so I prefer diner network
Moreover it’s having unlimited free intl lounge access to both primary and secondary card users

Sir, you are missing the point 😛
You would have only ONE card... you dont have visa/master/rupay ccs which you have mentioned xD

mujhe tag nhi kiya😥

Maafi 🙏

Hum entry level cards wale hai sir ji.
Humne toh kabhi super premium cards ke bare me socha tak nahi.
Isle Hume kuch nahi pata kon kyesa hai.

Isliye I am out, but I wish you all the best.

Lol, koi nahi ji... issiliye ""hypothetical** kaha bade bade aksharon mai 😛
Aapka view matter karta hai

I have DCB LTF, but would like to have infinia ltf.
reasons:

1. 5x smartbuy on amazon vs 3x on dcb. i have heavy usage of amazon so this difference is good enough. it easily exceeds the amazon prime membership fees.

2. IF my spends do not cross a certain value in a particular year (just like lockdown) i will not get amazon prime membership. also if i happen to have high spends in 1-2 months of the year and not crossing 80k in other months, the monthly milestone is of not much use to me.

3. ola, bms, cult, tatacliq milestone benefits on DCB are almost useless for me, as my spends are mostly on myntra and i have 1+1/2+2 bogo for movies ticket on some other cards.

4. i have faced online acceptance issues on dcb. 2 websites in the past 4 months where i wanted to do heavy transactions.

Ahhh... got it
you mean Amazon vouchers via Smartbuy.... I forgot that point I was thinking about the 5x that smartbuy was giving for amazon before (just like flipkart) but that has gone now

My amazon shopping is hardly once in a month.. but for someone who has heavy usage, it would make sense... thanks for this info!

My choice will be Infinia. My current card is DCB. Forget about all the rewards etc, I don't want to be humiliated when DCB is not working in front of friends and family. Trust me, DCB still has issues even in metro cities like Chennai. My wife teases that her Regalia in Visa works everywhere in comparison to my so called premium diners.

I was in Goa last month. I was with friends and twice the card didn't worked. First was a nice restaurant for a bill of 10K. I offered to pay but didn't worked, so used my wife's Regalia add on. Second was at a Casino where they told they don't accept Amex and Diners point blank. I can't use my add on for obvious reasons 😂 and have to withdraw cash using my debit card.

That's bad... I thought Diners would work everywhere via Rupay Network...
someone had shared news link about the tie-up... but its interesting as you faced it last month... thanks for the inputs!

Totally agreeed.
Adding one more point is, if HDFC launches next level luxury card X, holding Infinia will increase the chances of the approval of X. DCB will still be considered the lower level than Infinia based on the current approval process.

you are missing the point.... you would have this card for life 😛
no upgrades xD

 

[Rahul Gupta]

Sorry everyone.... I am quite late for replying 😛

There are some interesting replies... some I knew while some are totally new to me...



By getting Amazon Prime via other subscriptions, do you mean via Tata Play or something else ?
That's great to hear (but bad if you are paying for it while you could get it for free 😛 )

My preference for DCB since i already have visa master rupay cc so I prefer diner network
Moreover it’s having unlimited free intl lounge access to both primary and secondary card users

Sir, you are missing the point 😛
You would have only ONE card... you dont have visa/master/rupay ccs which you have mentioned xD

mujhe tag nhi kiya😥

Maafi 🙏

Hum entry level cards wale hai sir ji.
Humne toh kabhi super premium cards ke bare me socha tak nahi.
Isle Hume kuch nahi pata kon kyesa hai.

Isliye I am out, but I wish you all the best.

Lol, koi nahi ji... issiliye ""hypothetical** kaha bade bade aksharon mai 😛
Aapka view matter karta hai

I have DCB LTF, but would like to have infinia ltf.
reasons:

1. 5x smartbuy on amazon vs 3x on dcb. i have heavy usage of amazon so this difference is good enough. it easily exceeds the amazon prime membership fees.

2. IF my spends do not cross a certain value in a particular year (just like lockdown) i will not get amazon prime membership. also if i happen to have high spends in 1-2 months of the year and not crossing 80k in other months, the monthly milestone is of not much use to me.

3. ola, bms, cult, tatacliq milestone benefits on DCB are almost useless for me, as my spends are mostly on myntra and i have 1+1/2+2 bogo for movies ticket on some other cards.

4. i have faced online acceptance issues on dcb. 2 websites in the past 4 months where i wanted to do heavy transactions.

Ahhh... got it
you mean Amazon vouchers via Smartbuy.... I forgot that point I was thinking about the 5x that smartbuy was giving for amazon before (just like flipkart) but that has gone now

My amazon shopping is hardly once in a month.. but for someone who has heavy usage, it would make sense... thanks for this info!

My choice will be Infinia. My current card is DCB. Forget about all the rewards etc, I don't want to be humiliated when DCB is not working in front of friends and family. Trust me, DCB still has issues even in metro cities like Chennai. My wife teases that her Regalia in Visa works everywhere in comparison to my so called premium diners.

I was in Goa last month. I was with friends and twice the card didn't worked. First was a nice restaurant for a bill of 10K. I offered to pay but didn't worked, so used my wife's Regalia add on. Second was at a Casino where they told they don't accept Amex and Diners point blank. I can't use my add on for obvious reasons 😂 and have to withdraw cash using my debit card.

That's bad... I thought Diners would work everywhere via Rupay Network...
someone had shared news link about the tie-up... but its interesting as you faced it last month... thanks for the inputs!

Totally agreeed.
Adding one more point is, if HDFC launches next level luxury card X, holding Infinia will increase the chances of the approval of X. DCB will still be considered the lower level than Infinia based on the current approval process.

you are missing the point.... you would have this card for life 😛
no upgrades xD

Jao bachha humne shma kiya tumhe😜

 

[NOOBY]

I didnt get your point about the bonus for Infinia LTF

Basically, If you are not able to spend 10L in a year on Infinia and have to pay renewal fee which is Rs.12500+GST, you get 12500 as Bonus Points. The Bonus points are not credited if you get fee waiver (spent more than 10L in the year) or if the card is LTF.

Reward rate of Infinia for Tanishq and Apple vouchers is 1:1. This means, if you pay the renewal fee and then buy Gold from tanishq (or apply product), you technically pay those 12500 (renewal fee) towards gold/product, which makes the card fees = only the GST paid.

Above is not the same with DCB sadly, if you don't spend 5L in a year, you have to pay Rs.10000+GST and you won't get amazon Prime/swiggy etc memberships as you haven't spent 8L on the card and so you are not eligible for those milestone benefits 🙁

 

[Venky]

By getting Amazon Prime via other subscriptions, do you mean via Tata Play or something else ?
That's great to hear (but bad if you are paying for it while you could get it for free 😛 )

Its been free since 2 years. I had airtel broadband 3 years ago and closed the connection two years ago and I still have my prime via airtel with no active connections 😂

 

[SiddharthR]

Its been free since 2 years. I had airtel broadband 3 years ago and closed the connection two years ago and I still have my prime via airtel with no active connections 😂

Same with me, I had taken Tata Play Binge Trial for 7 days and they gave me Disney+Hotstar subscribtion for one year

 

[Tejas]

Hypothetical Conditions:

1. Your portfolio will have only 1 HDFC card, nothing else (no axis, sbi, SC, Citibank, etc) and you will use only the chosen one for all/max payments.
2. Both are LTF but you can choose only one of them, can't have both.
3. Your Annual Spend is 10Lakh+ every year, for life.
4. No more devaluation than what it is right now.

What would you do in this case ?

My choice would be DCB... Reasons:
- Wont get Bonus Reward Points in Infinia (as its LTF)
- Would receive Amazon Prime, Swiggy ONE, etc every year (Infinia would give dineout/swiggy only for first year while DCB has spend based benefit)
- Accelerated Reward Capping would affect, but not much (I assume)
- Not an Apple Guy so don't care much about getting newer Iphones each year by paying only 30% if the value (Apple products are 1:1 for Infinia but not for DCB)
- Approx same lounge access for primary and add-on card holders


** Please do comment which card you chose and why so that everyone can have a healthy discussion about choices **


NOTE: Just a fun poll to see what you would choose where you can't put some spendings on other CCs (like Magnus) for benefits which would make one of them less imp than the other..

Infinia without any doubt.

There's a lot more to Infinia than meets the eye. #IYKYK

That higher accelerated points cap is a major decider for me. Makes my Krisflyer Miles accumulation much faster.

 

[satyamkaushik]

Infinia for the acceptance rate. Diners Club at times is not accepted at certain places.

 

[NewUser]

Infinia

Minus the spend based vouchers, DCB is a subset of Infinia.
In addition to already mentioned points,
1. I have huge spends in smartbuy instant vouchers. I think it's 3x for DCB and 5x for Infinia. Same goes for Amazon(already mentioned) and Flipkart.
2. This may be trivial for some, but I like the metal sensation to my fingers every time I take the card out of wallet.
3. Feels like I already have the best card in industry [I rarely, if ever, have spends crossing 1L+ in a month, making Magnus undesirable, and I don't think I'll have my hands on the Centurion anytime soon]. So peace of mind.

 

[NOOBY]

There's a lot more to Infinia than meets the eye. #IYKYK

We dont know 🤣

 

[sb210]

Infinia if you are planning to buy AZ, FK Gvs every month. It will outweigh all the annual / monthly DCB milestones