Disclaimer: My bias in the direction of CardUp is actual, particularly given the way it has been a fail-proof resolution for me for the final 8 years. However right here’s how the opposite choices to get miles whereas paying your taxes to IRAS at present stack up anyway, and how one can resolve for your self.
With regards to paying your earnings taxes, the default methodology is for IRAS to deduct these funds by way of GIRO by your checking account. Nonetheless, this default methodology isn’t going to get you miles. So when you’ve got a sizeable tax invoice (not less than 4 digits) and need to get a big quantity of miles for paying your earnings taxes, you’d need to be smarter and route it by a third-party fee processor.
You may both use an unbiased service equivalent to CardUp, or a financial institution fee facility i.e. Citi PayAll, SC EasyBill or UOB Fee Facility. This submit compares these choices so you possibly can resolve what works finest for you.
Right here’s a little bit of historical past: Prior to now, there was no means you can earn miles in your earnings taxes as funds to authorities establishments have been explicitly excluded from incomes rewards within the T&Cs of your bank cards. CardUp disrupted that once they launched in 2016 with a MAS license, and allowed Singapore residents to earn miles or cashback on previously-excluded funds for the primary time!
Because the banks watched CardUp’s recognition and utilization develop, some banks determined joined in to supply their very own fee processing facility – Citibank, Normal Chartered and UOB. At first, these banks provided promotional charges to entice prospects to change away from CardUp to their very own financial institution fee facility, however through the years, these promotional charges have come down considerably, whereas customary charge charges and minimal spend necessities have all however gone up.
2025 Comparability
| Cardup | Citi PayAll | SC EasyBill | UOB Fee Facility | |
| Admin Charge | 1.73% (OCBC VOYAGE & Premier Visa Infinite Playing cards) 1.75% (Visa, UnionPay) |
2.6% (beforehand 2.2%) | 1.9% | 1.6% – 4.7% (varies by playing cards and instalments)
1.8% for non-HNW UOB cardholders |
| Downsides | Promo charges final till Aug 2024.
No promo charges for MasterCard or AMEX playing cards. |
Just for restricted Citi playing cards: Citi ULTIMA Card Citi Status Card Citi PremierMiles Card Citi Rewards Card.
Clients with out an present Citi banking relationship should first spend min. S$6,000 on non-tax funds (at 1.6 mpd) with the intention to unlock promo charges (2 mpd) for tax funds. |
No choice for recurring funds i.e. it’s important to pay your total earnings tax in full without delay. | Earns solely 1 mpd with all UOB playing cards.
Promo charges finish the earliest i.e. on 30 April 2025. Charges and rewards (mpd) varies between UOB cards (check here). |
As a shopper who has been utilizing CardUp to pay for my earnings taxes (and extra) all this whereas, I’ve been monitoring this scene for the final 8 years and have observed that whereas a number of the banks have hopped onto this bandwagon to compete, their promotions and suppleness are nonetheless not as nice as CardUp’s.
The largest trade-off with utilizing a lot of the banks’ fee facility is that they both require you to make your tax fee in full for the bottom processing charges, or restrict your rewards to a small handful of bank cards.
UOB Fee Facility
If you happen to’re a UOB cardholder, the one card that provides you decrease charges than CardUp’s 1.75% is the UOB Reserve Credit score Card, offered you can repay your total earnings tax invoice in full suddenly.
In any other case, in the event you’re utilizing some other UOB bank cards, then CardUp will likely be a better option as you’ll pay decrease charges (1.75% vs. 2.3%) and you earn the next 1.4 mpd reasonably than simply 1 mpd.
What’s extra, you must notice that any quantities charged to the UOB Fee Facility don’t depend in the direction of the financial institution’s minimal spend for redeeming your welcome gives, nor are they typically counted in the direction of the necessities for an annual charge waiver.
UOB Fee Facility isn’t the most affordable means of shopping for miles, so when you’ve got a reliable invoice to pay, you can virtually definitely earn increased rewards for much less by a platform like CardUp.
SC EasyBill
If you happen to’re a Normal Chartered cardholder who can repay your total earnings tax in full suddenly and don’t thoughts paying barely increased processing charges (1.9%).
Nonetheless, the earn charges aren’t implausible:
- StanChart Past Card: 1.5 (Normal) to 2mpd (PB/PP)
- StanChart Visa Infinite: 1 to 1.4 mpd (if min. month-to-month spend of S$2,000 is hit)
- StanChart Journey Card: 1.2 mpd
Different SC playing cards earn lower than 1 mpd, so don’t hassle. Contemplating the very best card on this record can also be eligible to pair with CardUp at a decrease charge (1.75%), I really feel it’s a no-brainer to make use of CardUp as an alternative.
Do notice that SC EasyBill solely helps one-time fee requests, so you can not use it to pay your month-to-month instalments for IRAS.
Citi PayAll
There was as soon as a time when Citibank used to run extra aggressive promotions to battle for CardUp’s share of the market vs. its personal Citi PayAll facility, however nowadays appear to be over.
Not solely have they elevated their charges from 2.2% to 2.6% at this time, they’ve additionally restricted the rewards to only 4 miles playing cards: Citi ULTIMA Card (by-invitation solely, excessive net-worth people), Citi Status Card, Citi PremierMiles and the Card Citi Rewards Card.
Final yr, for purchasers with out an present and lively Citi banking relationship, Citi imposed a minimal spend of S$5,000 on non-tax transactions on a single card to ensure that cardholders earlier than they may get rewarded for earnings tax funds, however that has since been hiked to $6,000 this yr. That is dangerous information for you guys who’re simply hoping to pay their taxes and nothing else.
In response to The Milelion, a leak suggests that Citi might be bumping up the miles earn rate to 2 mpd on tax payments made 18 April – 31 August 2025. Again in 2022, the promotional price was 2.5 mpd.
In contrast to UOB, Citi PayAll transactions will depend in the direction of the qualifying spend required to your welcome gives and card-related advantages.
For HSBC cardholders
If you happen to didn’t already know, HSBC already discontinued its Earnings Tax Fee Programme a couple of years in the past, and have particularly excludes CardUp funds from incomes rewards.
So in the event you’re a HSBC cardholder, you’d be foolish to make use of your HSBC card to pay your earnings taxes. Go for a special card as an alternative.
Use CardUp in the event you want recurring funds
If you happen to’re paying your earnings tax in month-to-month instalments, CardUp is the only option amongst all the above choices, as a result of you possibly can arrange recurring funds each month and nonetheless benefit from the promotional charges so long as you’re utilizing a Visa or UnionPay card:
| For month-to-month instalments | For one-off funds | |
| Promo code | BBTAX25R | VTAX25ONE |
| Charge cost | 1.75% | 1.75% |
| Fee kind | One-off and recurring | One-off and recurring |
| Expiry date | Have to be scheduled earlier than 31 August 2025. See T&Cs here. |
Final fee on 23 Could 2025 |
Many of the different choices mandate that you just repay your tax invoice in a single sitting as an alternative.
TLDR: The easiest way to earn miles in your earnings tax funds? CardUp.
If you happen to’re utilizing DBS / OCBC / HSBC / BOC / Normal Chartered / Maybank / UOB playing cards to pay your earnings taxes, CardUp is a no brainer choice so you possibly can earn miles.
Easy methods to calculate your value per mile?
A $5,000 tax invoice put by CardUp, as an example, can earn 8,000 miles on a 1.6 mpd card at a price of $87.50 processing charges. That’s equal to purchasing miles at ~1.09 cents every, which is the bottom amongst all its rivals.
See the eligible cards to pair with CardUp here. It’s an extended record – for much longer than any of the banks’ fee services.
I began with CardUp as a result of they have been the primary to make it attainable for me to earn miles on my earnings tax funds, however through the years, these of you who monitored the scene like I did would have observed that whereas CardUp principally saved their charges the identical (1.75%) all through the years, the banks have been fickle and gotten much less beneficiant over time.
If in case you have a OCBC VOYAGE or Premier Visa Infinite card, the financial institution has an ongoing promotion with CardUp at an excellent decrease 1.73% charges. Enter OCBCTAX173 within the promo code.
Citi cardholders with an present banking relationship may nonetheless discover the two mpd supply compelling (offered that the leak proves to be true), however for the remainder of us cardholders, CardUp is a no brainer choice this yr in 2025.
See this guide on how to set up your income tax payments with CardUp here.
If you happen to’re questioning why I’ve not included iPayMy on this record, that’s as a result of they’re virtually just like CardUp (which I personally use). Additionally, the cardboard I take advantage of for earnings tax funds is a UOB card, which particularly excludes iPayMy so I can’t earn rewards and haven’t been in a position to make use of it there.
Which bank card do you have to use on CardUp?
Personally, I’ve used my UOB PRVI Miles with CardUp since 2017 as a result of it has been incomes me a candy 1.4 mpd all through all these years. The identical card will get me just one mpd if I put it by the UOB Fee Facility. Nonetheless, because the promotional price for earnings tax by way of MasterCard on CardUp this yr is way increased at 2.25%, I will likely be switching to my Visa card for my IRAS funds to get 1.75% as an alternative utilizing the BBTAX25R promo code.
For many of us, 1.4 mpd is the candy spot with many playing cards providing that earn price on CardUp, together with however not restricted to:
- UOB PRVI Miles
- UOB Visa Infinite Metallic
- Normal Chartered Visa Infinite (on native spend >S$2k a month)
In any other case, the 1.2 mpd class additionally has the widest vary of mass-market playing cards that may be paired with CardUp:
- Citi PremierMiles
- DBS Altitude
- Maybank Visa Infinite
- UOB Krisflyer
If you happen to’re privileged sufficient to personal a by-invite-only high-end card just like the DBS Vantage, DBS Insignia, Citi ULTIMA or UOB Reserve, then you possibly can doubtlessly earn the next 1.6 mpd in your CardUp funds.
If that is your first time utilizing CardUp, use the code BUDGETBABE to avoid wasting S$30 off your first transaction with no minimal spend required. This lets you earn free miles on a fee of as much as S$1,154 (primarily based on CardUp’s common admin charge of two.6%).
Or use BBTAX25R to get the bottom 1.75% charges to your earnings tax funds.
Like this hack? Bear in mind to share it together with your family members to allow them to cease shortchanging themselves of miles they may have in any other case earned! 😉
Save in your CardUp funds once you use my affiliate promo codes BBTAX25R (to your earnings tax) or BUDGETBABE (for each different fee varieties).
Full Disclosure: The hyperlinks embedded right here on this submit are not affiliate hyperlinks, however merely to make it simpler so that you can take a look at extra data on the totally different fee web sites. I'll earn a small affiliate charge if you're new to CardUp and use my promo code. I earn completely nothing if you're already an present person and use my code - particularly in the event you signed up anytime previous to 2024 (between 2017 to 2024 once I've been actively recommending CardUp, I used to be not paid any affiliate charges or referral advantages apart from the identical referral next-fee-payment-waiver which regular customers received.
With love,
Finances Babe
