BOBCARD has finally entered the airline co-brand space with the launch of two Etihad Guest Credit Cards. While the base variant targets casual travellers, the BOBCARD Etihad Guest Premium Credit Card is the one that packs serious value.
With 0% forex markup, complimentary Gold tier status and generous lounge access, the card has a lot going for it. Let’s break it all down to help you decide if this card is worth picking up. Here’s the detailed review,
Table of Contents
Overview
| Type | Airline Credit Card |
| Reward Rate | ~5.8% |
| Joining Fee | 5,000+GST |
| Best for | International travellers |
| USP | Etihad Guest Gold Status |
After Etihad Airways ended its partnership with SBI Card after five years, which included cards like the SBI Etihad Guest Premier Card, it has now entered into a new partnership with BOB Financial Solutions (BOBCARD).
The BOBCARD Etihad Guest Premium Credit Card is a metal card, aimed at travellers who fly Etihad & its partners frequently and want to stack miles from everyday spends on top of their flying miles.
Fees & Benefits
| Joining Fee | 5,000 INR+GST |
| Welcome Benefit | – 10,000 Miles (25K Spend) – 5,000 Bonus Miles (50K Spend) |
| Renewal Fee | 5,000 INR+GST |
| Renewal Benefit | 5,000 Miles |
| Renewal Fee waiver | 5L INR spend in a Year |
Note: The welcome & additional bonus miles are offered on reaching the required spends within the first 60 days.
The joining fee is quite reasonable for a premium travel card. And the fact that renewal is waived at just 5L annual spend is a big plus, as most airline cards don’t offer a fee waiver.
*** Limited Period Offer ends by 30th April***
Limited Period Offer: Get up to 15,000 Etihad Guest Miles: 10,000 joining miles on spending 25,000 INR in 60 days + 5,000 additional miles on cumulative spends of 50,000 INR. Offer valid till 30th April 2026.
Etihad Guest: Gold Tier
This is easily the highlight of this card.
| Tier | Activation Criteria |
|---|---|
| Silver Tier | On first card transaction |
| Gold Tier | On first transaction on Etihad.com (within 6 months) |
With the Premium variant, you get Etihad Guest Silver on your very first card swipe. And once you make your first purchase on Etihad’s website (even a small one like seat selection), you get upgraded to Etihad Guest Gold.
Getting Gold status otherwise requires earning 50,000 Tier Miles (with at least 20,000 from flying), which is not easy. So getting it with just a credit card transaction is a fantastic deal.
Here are the key benefits that come with Etihad Guest Gold status:
- Etihad Chauffeur service on First/Business GuestSeat bookings
- Business class lounge access (self + 1 guest) on Etihad flights
- Complimentary standard seat selection in Economy
- Free GuestSeat cancellation (once per year)
Note: Etihad Guest follows a Core + Custom + Beyond benefits structure. Gold members can choose 4 custom benefits annually. Lounge access is offered as a custom/default benefit, not automatic. So make sure you select it within 30 days of tier upgrade.
Important: Etihad is not part of any airline alliance. So Gold status benefits are limited to Etihad flights only, unlike Oneworld or Star Alliance programs where status works across multiple airlines.
Rewards
| Spend Type | Miles per 100 INR |
|---|---|
| Etihad Airways (etihad.com) | 6 |
| Retail spends | 2 |
The base reward rate of 2 miles per 100 INR (i.e., 2% return as miles) is quite low for regular spends given that Etihad miles are of low value generally. We’ll get to that shortly.
Note: Miles earned are credited to your Etihad Guest account within 3 days of statement generation.
Exclusion for rewards: This deserves its own section because the exclusion list is unusually long for a premium credit card.
These include regular spends like: education fees, hospital expenses, telecom bills, supermarket purchases, fast-food restaurants, and much more, apart from usual exclusions like insurance, government spends, etc.
Here’s the complete list of exclusions with MCC’s as per bank’s MITC.
This is a major downside, as this card blocks a huge chunk of everyday spend categories.
This is an unfair business practice picked up by banks lately and I feel BOBCard is crossing the line, so much so that I feel like RBI has to step-in soon to save us all.
Milestone Benefits
This is where the card tries to make up for the relatively moderate base earn rate.
| Milestone Type | Spend Requirement | Bonus Miles |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly | 4 transactions totaling 50,000 INR | 500 Miles |
| Quarterly | 3,00,000 INR / Qtr | 4,000 Miles / Qtr |
| Annual | 12,00,000 INR / Yr | 24,000 Miles / Yr |
Note: Each milestone benefit is applicable only once during its respective period.
There’s also a bonus for Etihad flyers, you earn additional miles when you fly with Etihad twice in a year (applicable once per year).
Redemptions
Etihad Guest Program has gone through multiple rounds of devaluation and it carries one of the least point value in the industry, that’s as low as 50Ps/point in most typical redemption use cases.
However, after doing about 100+ award seat searches across the globe, I can confidently say that there are still some sweet spots that you may consider, and it’s broadly useful for:
- Upgrade with Miles on Etihad revenue ticket
- Partner redemptions
One of the easiest redemptions for Indians is the partner redemption on SriLankan Airlines.
You can get an award seat to Colombo from India for as low as 6K/20K miles on Eco/Biz one way, with award seats available in plenty, that’s suitable for family trips. Here’s a quick look:
I was also able to find some unbelievable awards, like 10K miles on economy to Europe, thanks to Akasa Airlines partnership. Here’s one for your eyes:
This is similar to Virgin Atlantic‘s popular India-LHR redemption, though it comes with significant tax component.
Apart from that, you could also get a pretty good value on many regional partner redemptions like intra-US on American Airlines, which is similar to Air India redemptions on United.
Zero Forex Markup
- Foreign Currency Markup: 0%
This is one of the noteworthy feature of the card. Zero forex markup on all international transactions along with rewards is good to have for many.
If you travel internationally or shop on foreign websites, this feature alone can save you a good amount of money.
Airport Lounge Access
| Access Type | Limit |
|---|---|
| Domestic | 12/Year (3 per quarter) |
| International | 8/Year (2 per quarter) |
The lounge access limits are decent, with no spend-based conditions attached. This is refreshing because many cards these days have started asking for spends to be eligible for lounge access.
Maximising the Card
Let’s do some math. If you spend 12 Lakhs in a year on eligible categories, here’s what you could earn:
- Regular spend rewards: 24,000 Miles (2 per 100 on 12L)
- Monthly milestone (assuming all 12 months hit): 6,000 Miles
- Quarterly milestone (assuming all 4 quarters hit): 16,000 Miles
- Annual milestone: 24,000 Miles
- Total: ~70,000 Miles on 12L spend (5.8%)
That works out to about 5.8% return if you value Etihad miles at 1 INR or at-least 2.9% return if you value Etihad miles at 50ps.
Then you’ve Gold status, lounge access and much more. So, as you see, this is quite competitive if you know how to get value out of it.
Should You Get It?
The BOBCARD Etihad Premium Credit Card makes a lot of sense if:
- You fly Etihad or it’s partners
- You fly at-least once a year (to keep miles from expiring)
- You have significant international spends
- You value Etihad Guest Gold status
- You can achieve milestones spend targets
If above sounds doable, BOBCard Etihad Credit Card is a must have in your wallet for obvious reasons.
If you already hold another Credit Card from BOBCard, your application may initially get rejected, but the card would be issued the following week, just like how it happened to me and many others.
*** Limited Period Offer ends by 30th April***
Limited Period Offer: Get up to 15,000 Etihad Guest Miles: 10,000 joining miles on spending 25,000 INR in 60 days + 5,000 additional miles on cumulative spends of 50,000 INR. Offer valid till 30th April 2026.
Bottomline
- CardExpert Rating: 4.5/5
The BOBCARD Etihad Guest Premium Credit Card is a solid airline co-brand card that delivers good value for foreign travellers.
The zero forex markup, Gold tier status, lounge access, and milestone bonuses make it worth considering, especially at this fee point with a waiver option.
What’s your take on the BOBCARD Etihad Guest Premium Credit Card? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below.
with so long list of exclusions, i wonder where do i use this card except Travel?
How can one confirm that their etihad membership is linked to the bob card ?
hi sid.Thanks for the wonderful review.AS Self Employed can you guide me how to apply for this card as it keeps asking for a company name.also i do hold their eterna as well.have been wanting to apply since march but unable to copmplete the process.
Use OTHER OR OTHERS for company name, as it worked for me.
The monthly milestones, are they calendar month or billing month ?
Beautifully written and aptly described!!!!!!!!
How can we verify card is linked to etihad account?
My Etihad tier lifted to Silver tier within a week of making the first txn. So I guess that’s the easy way to re-confirm that the accounts are linked.
Once I achieve the silver/gold status in Etihad using this card, will I be able to retain the status as long as I hold the card? Or is it only for the first year? Please clarify
Only for the first Year!
I got this card in mid April application was smooth but faced some issue in activation ,after doing all set up on app was not able tonuse it for 4-5days but it was done.
Used it at Bangalore 080 ,iys was VIP access.
Let me know to get gold status without actually booking on etihad ( current situation not good also ) if points etc way work for anyone .
Can u suggest 3 best cards to have .
Hi Siddharth.. I recently received the card and just like many others, it was a “rejected then approved” situation. My Etihad guest account no. is not printed on the card and BOB Card customer support has no clue. Does your card have the FF number printed or it’s just how they have designed it.
Mine was neither printed on the card, as you can see in the article’s image.
But I guess they’ll have it in the backend as they’ve captured it during the application.
What if I buy miles to get upgraded to Gold? Would that work?
This isn’t fully verified yet, but here’s what I found while testing:
1. The minimum purchase is $32 for 1,000 miles, which isn’t small just to experiment with.
2. The transaction is processed via Points.com, so it’s unlikely that BOBCard would trigger the activation purely based on that.
That said, there’s still a possibility it could work if the transaction description reflects Etihad and BOB relies on the description rather than backend identifiers.
Thanks, let me email BOB and check
Did they respond? I tried to check with Etihad support but they have been not responding for days :/
If you buy min 1000 miles on etihad website, you will get etihad gold. I did the same to get it.
Wonderful, thanks for reporting the same. 🙂
How long after purchase were you upgraded to gold status?
Are the domestic lounge list same as other bobcards? Like the Bangalore VIP section of the lounges?
I just checked using my BOB Etihad Premium Card, and it works for the BLR 080 Domestic VIP Lounge.
Even better, it also grants access to the 080 Arrival VIP Lounge. 🙂
Thanks for the review
After completing the first transaction on Etihad, how long will I have to wait before I am upgraded to the gold tier?
Within 2 weeks Ideally.
Hi Sid,
Thanks for sharing the updates on the newer cards and the enhanced features on existing ones very insightful.
Given the current landscape, I would appreciate your thoughts on a few points:
1.The best airline credit card option, considering I don’t travel internationally very frequently.
2.Any credit card similar to the erstwhile Axis Vistara co-branded card that offers strong returns on regular spends.
3.The most rewarding credit card for paying insurance premiums (in the range of a few lakhs), with a focus on maximizing benefits.
Looking forward to your recommendations.
Thanks,
BG
1 & 2: IndusInd Tiger card at 3% AI points earn rate, beyond 6L spends.
3. Milestone benefits on cards might help if it’s about high value txn in single month.
Renewal benefit 5000 Avios? How Avios come into Etihad card? I am confused.
Oops, typo. It’s Etihad Guest miles, updated, thank you.
I got the card today n m confused over joining bonus ..I hv to spend 50k till 30th April thn only bonus miles Eligibility? or within 60 days if I spend 50k ?
Spend within 60 days of card setup date to avail the additional joining bonus miles.
does miles stone count all spends as amex or it will exclude categories as above mentioned???
All spends counted for milestones, as of now.
Is it Master Card World or Master Card World Elite ?
MC World. MC shouldn’t have allowed the MC World Elite logo for this card but BOBCard somehow got it approved magically, lol.
BoB system not approving the application. What can be an alternate channel ?
Please guide.
Application denied for me as well by default. But later got a call and approved, floater limit. Same happened to someone else who applied the same week. So I assume they’re approving now if not before. Otherwise, escalation is the only route that I see.
Can you elaborate a bit more on how the card got approved after initial rejection for existing BOB cardholders. Did it happen automatically or you need to chase CC?
It’s automatic. I got a call from BOB around 5 days after the application date (same day as rejection), confirming the application was in process. About 5 days later, the card was delivered.
Do you know if gold status is available in year 2 also? i.e. is the status available as long as you hold the card?
It’s only for the 1st Year unfortunately. Chances are we might be able to get it by re-applying again once the status ends, except that in that case one can’t avail the renewal fee waiver.
Thanks for the prompt response Siddharth
Thanks for the legendary review, good to see such detailed reviews from you after a long time. Europe redemption appears to give INSANE value.