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#243

IndianOil HDFC Bank Credit Card

Keep

Five per cent at the pump, ₹0.96 a point at the pump, and ₹0.20 a point everywhere else.

₹2,300

a year at ₹40,000 a month, after the fee

Verified · 3 documents

Skip the arithmetic — the board, ranked → · nothing to sign up for

What it's worth to you, after the fee

₹1,500
at ₹0.25L/month
₹2,300
at ₹0.4L/month
₹5,300
at ₹1L/month

Welcome: ₹250 activation voucher, on any one transaction within 37 days of card issuance

Priced on the everyday mix — 30% groceries · 10% utilities · 20% travel · 6% fuel · 34% everything else — with this card's published category rules applied. Plus milestones, minus the fee. No accelerator credit — the ranking model on /compare adds ~20% of spend at the card's best accelerator, so its ₹ for this card reads higher.

How these numbers are computed — and why the rankings show a bigger one →

Spend tiers, milestones and fee waivers included, at our house ₹/point. Portal and category multipliers can push higher — run your exact number →

Breaks even only by erasing its fee at ₹5,000 a month

At ₹5,000 a month — ₹60,000 a year — on the everyday mix this card returns ₹400 gross (earn ₹400) against a fee of ₹0 — the ₹500 is waived, the spend having cleared ₹50,000 a year = ₹400 net — the first rung at or above ₹0. The ladder runs in ₹1,000 steps to ₹1,00,000 a month and ₹10,000 steps to ₹5,00,000; figures are rounded to the hundred, and the accelerator is never credited.

2 notes on the card itself: how it is issued · why it ranks #243

HDFC Bank · Not published · entry

Why #243 The best fuel card in India at ₹500, and the reason is the redemption rate, not the earn rate: a Fuel Point buys ₹0.96 of IndianOil fuel and ₹0.20 of anything else. Ranked on the ₹4,608 of free fuel the caps actually allow in year one, not on "5% cashback".

0.6%
Headline earn rate
₹500 + GST
Annual fee1
₹50,000 spend
Fee waiver
₹1.00
HDFC Reward Points value →

A Fuel Point is only worth ₹0.96 against IndianOil fuel, and HDFC prints the chain — 1 FP = 3 XTRAREWARDS points, 1 XRP = ₹0.32. Every other exit is ₹0.20: statement credit (12,500-point minimum, ₹50 fee), SmartBuy flights and hotels, the product catalogue. Redeem this card anywhere but a pump and you cut its value by four fifths. The earn rate above already prices the ₹0.96.

The take

This is the fuel card the other fuel cards are measured against, and it works because of one number buried in the T&C rather than the "5%" on the poster. HDFC pays 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 at IndianOil pumps, and a Fuel Point converts to three IndianOil XTRAREWARDS points worth ₹0.32 each — ₹0.96 of free petrol. So the fuel leg really is 4.8% back, in a country where almost nothing pays anything on fuel. Then read the capping column. After your first six months the fuel bucket stops at 150 Fuel Points a month, which is ₹3,000 of petrol; groceries stop at 100, bill payments stop at 100. Past a cap the category earns nothing at all — not a reduced rate, nothing, and HDFC's own worked example shows a ₹4,000 fill-up on the 5th of the month scoring zero. Max every bucket every month and year one yields 4,800 Fuel Points, ₹4,608 of fuel, which is where the "up to 50 litres of free fuel annually" line comes from; year two onwards it is 4,200 points and ₹4,032. Against a ₹500 fee waived at ₹50,000 of spend, that is still a very good trade for a two-wheeler or a single-car household. Everything else on the card is ordinary: 1 Fuel Point per ₹150 is 0.64%, rent and wallet and government and insurance earn zero, there is no lounge, and if you redeem for statement credit instead of fuel you are taking ₹0.20 a point and paying ₹50 for the privilege. Buy it to fill up at IndianOil. Do not buy it as a rewards card.

Your renewal — keep, downgrade or cancel

This card reaches break-even by ERASING its fee, not by out-earning it: the waiver is the decision.

₹50,000 annual spend erases that fee
₹5,000/mo is where the waiver, not the earn, saves it

the whole desk — your spend, what changed, the downgrade →

Keep, downgrade or cancel

₹500/yr at stake · 5 spend bands

The charge ₹500/yr

The waiver ₹50,000 of spend in the year before renewal — about ₹4,167 a month — and the renewal fee is not charged.

Break-even ₹5,000 a month — ₹60,000 a year — is where this card's value crosses its fee, and it gets there by erasing the fee at the waiver rather than out-earning it.

At your spend

₹1,500 a year, net of the fee, at ₹3,00,000 of annual spend — this clears the waiver, so no fee is charged

₹2,800 a year, net of the fee, at ₹6,00,000 of annual spend — this clears the waiver, so no fee is charged

₹5,300 a year, net of the fee, at ₹12,00,000 of annual spend — this clears the waiver, so no fee is charged

₹15,100 a year, net of the fee, at ₹36,00,000 of annual spend — this clears the waiver, so no fee is charged

₹25,000 a year, net of the fee, at ₹60,00,000 of annual spend — this clears the waiver, so no fee is charged

Everyday earn plus milestones, minus the fee — the same model as the value panel above, so the two cannot disagree. run your exact spend →

The downgrade

HDFC Bank publishes no document naming a card you can step down to, so we name none — an invented product change is a phone call you would waste. That leaves keep or cancel, and the numbers above are the whole of it.

What has changed under this card

  • 23 Sep 2026 Axis EDGE brings Accor back, drops ITC, and adds Cathay, Miles & More and Hilton a program these points reach
  • 15 Sep 2026 Wyndham splits its three flat free-night tiers into four a program these points reach
  • 8 Sep 2026 Flying Blue splits award tickets into Light / Standard / Flex — a 25% rise for the same product a program these points reach

We price what is in force today — a change that has not happened yet is not in these numbers. the full archive for this card →

If you call to cancel

What the bank offers to keep you is the one fact this desk cannot compute. We are collecting those reports — dated, and only in aggregate — before publishing any: an offer one reader was made is not one you are owed. Called about this card? Tell us what they offered →

The desk publishes subscribable .ics feeds for the dates it knows — offer deadlines, devaluations, expiry audits. Your renewal date is not one of them: only your statement knows it.

What's good

  • 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 at IndianOil pumps — 4.8% back once you price a Fuel Point at HDFC's own ₹0.96
  • 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 on groceries and on utility/telecom bill payments too
  • 1% fuel-surcharge waiver on transactions of ₹400–₹5,000, up to ₹250 a statement cycle
  • ₹500 fee waived on ₹50,000 of annual spend
  • ₹250 activation voucher for one transaction inside 37 days
  • Complimentary IndianOil XTRAREWARDS programme membership, on the mobile number registered with HDFC
  • UPI transactions earn on the RuPay variant — HDFC's own worked example pays 20 Fuel Points on a ₹3,000 UPI spend

Watch out

  • The 5% buckets are hard-capped: 150 Fuel Points a month on fuel after your first 6 months (250 before), 100 on groceries, 100 on bill payments
  • Past a cap the category earns NOTHING — not the 1-per-₹150 base rate, zero; HDFC's example zeroes a ₹4,000 fill-up
  • A Fuel Point is ₹0.96 ONLY as IndianOil fuel; statement credit, SmartBuy and the catalogue all pay ₹0.20
  • Statement-credit redemption needs a 12,500-point balance and costs ₹50 a time; the catalogue costs ₹99 + tax
  • Fuel Points only accrue on IOCL-authorised POS terminals — if the TID/MID isn't in HDFC's set-up, the transaction earns nothing
  • Rent, wallet loads, government spends, EMI, insurance, jewellery, supermarkets, liquor and bakeries earn nothing at any rate
  • Fuel points must be converted to XTRAREWARDS in blocks of 500 before they buy fuel, and take 3–4 working days to land
  • Unredeemed points lapse after 2 years, and changing your registered mobile number generates a new IOCL loyalty ID that lapses the old balance
  • No lounge access, and forex is 3.5%

What these points actually fly

HDFC Reward Points move to Avianca LifeMiles , Air France-KLM Flying Blue , Etihad Guest , United MileagePlus , Air India Maharaja Points , AirAsia Rewards , SpiceJet SpiceClub , Accor Live Limitless (ALL) , Marriott Bonvoy , Club ITC , IHG One Rewards , Radisson Rewards and Wyndham Rewards — and those price every award dynamically. There is no published chart to quote, so we quote nothing: an estimate is not a seat.

what the cards that DO reach a chart can fly — 2,196 corridors priced →

What earns, what doesn't

12 sourced rules · 6 pay zero

The rows below come from the card's own T&C — Table 1.1, which names the accelerated MCCs, and §2.1, which is an EXHAUSTIVE no-earn list ("Reward Points will not be accrued for the following transactions"). Base is 1 Fuel Point per ₹150, worth ₹0.96 against IndianOil fuel and ₹0.20 anywhere else. THE STRUCTURAL ODDITY: this card's fuel accelerator is not MCC-gated at all — Table 1.1 says the inclusion is "All IOCL fuel pumps & outlets basis TIDs / MIDs shared by IndianOil", i.e. terminal identifiers, and §2.2 adds "If in case the TID / MID is not available in the set-up, such transactions will not qualify for the benefit". So an IOCL pump running a terminal HDFC has not registered pays nothing, whatever its merchant category is. And because "Fuel" is on the §2.1 exclusion list, fuel that misses the accelerator does not fall back to the base rate either — it earns zero.

Fuel capped — 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 at IndianOil pumps and outlets — 4.8% at HDFC's own ₹0.96 a point — but only up to 250 Fuel Points a month for the first six months and 150 a month afterwards, which is about ₹3,000 of petrol. Past the cap the category earns NOTHING, not the base rate — HDFC's own worked example scores a ₹4,000 fill-up on the 5th of the month at zero. Accrual is by IOCL-authorised terminal (TID/MID), not by MCC, and fuel at any non-IOCL pump earns nothing at all because "Fuel" sits on the §2.1 exclusion list. Separately, a 1% fuel-surcharge waiver applies on transactions of ₹400–₹5,000, capped at ₹250 a statement cycle
Rent & property management excluded — Zero Fuel Points — named in both §2.1 and the Table 1.1 exclusion column
Government / tax excluded — Zero Fuel Points — "Government related transactions" in §2.1, "Govt. spends" in Table 1.1, and TAX is listed separately in §2.1 as well
Utilities (electricity/water/gas) capped — 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 on utility MCC 4900 (and 4812/4814 on the telecom side), minimum transaction ₹150, capped at 100 Fuel Points a month — about ₹2,000 of bill payments — and zero past the cap
Insurance excluded — Zero Fuel Points — §2.1 names insurance outright
Education not applicable
Wallet loads excluded — Zero Fuel Points — wallet loading is named in both §2.1 and Table 1.1
Groceries & supermarkets capped — 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 on MCC 5411, 5499, 5921 and 5462, with a minimum transaction of ₹150 — but capped at 100 Fuel Points a month, about ₹2,000 of spend, after which the category earns nothing. Note the tension in HDFC's own documents — Table 1.1 accelerates these grocery MCCs while §2.1 lists "Supermarkets" among the categories that accrue no points at all, so a supermarket outside those four codes is a dead spend
Dining & food delivery not applicable
Travel (airlines, hotels, transit) not applicable
Telecom capped — 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 on MCC 4812 and 4814, sharing the bill-payment bucket's 100-Fuel-Point monthly ceiling with utilities MCC 4900
Jewellery / gold excluded — Zero Fuel Points — jewellery is named in Table 1.1's exclusion column
Forex / international spends full — International spends earn the base 1 Fuel Point per ₹150; the foreign-currency fee is 3.5% + GST, which swamps a 0.64% earn several times over. HDFC's Key Fact Statement names only Infinia (2%) and 6E Rewards Indigo XL (2.50%) as exceptions to the 3.50% column, and this card is not one
UPI (RuPay-on-UPI only) full — UPI spends earn the base 1 Fuel Point per ₹150 — Table 1.1 says so in the rate line itself, "(including UPI transactions)", and HDFC's worked example pays 20 Fuel Points on a ₹3,000 UPI apparel purchase, noting "We have considered that the card is RuPay variant"
EMI conversions / merchant EMI excluded — Zero Fuel Points — §2.1 excludes "EMI (all type)" and Table 1.1 repeats it
  • Rent & property management · excluded Zero Fuel Points — named in both §2.1 and the Table 1.1 exclusion column
  • Wallet loads · excluded Zero Fuel Points — wallet loading is named in both §2.1 and Table 1.1
  • Fuel · capped 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 at IndianOil pumps and outlets — 4.8% at HDFC's own ₹0.96 a point — but only up to 250 Fuel Points a month for the first six months and 150 a month afterwards, which is about ₹3,000 of petrol. Past the cap the category earns NOTHING, not the base rate — HDFC's own worked example scores a ₹4,000 fill-up on the 5th of the month at zero. Accrual is by IOCL-authorised terminal (TID/MID), not by MCC, and fuel at any non-IOCL pump earns nothing at all because "Fuel" sits on the §2.1 exclusion list. Separately, a 1% fuel-surcharge waiver applies on transactions of ₹400–₹5,000, capped at ₹250 a statement cycle
  • Utilities (electricity/water/gas) · capped 5 Fuel Points per ₹100 on utility MCC 4900 (and 4812/4814 on the telecom side), minimum transaction ₹150, capped at 100 Fuel Points a month — about ₹2,000 of bill payments — and zero past the cap

per HDFC Bank T&C · rank every card by spend category →

Does your spend count toward the fee waiver?

not published — and we say which

₹50,000 a year is the bar that waives the ₹500 fee. A different question from the one above — earning points and counting toward a threshold are separate rules, and issuers write them separately.

Not published. HDFC Bank states what the IndianOil HDFC Bank Credit Card earns and does not earn, but has not published which spend categories count toward the fee waiver — the ₹50,000 bar. We won't guess it from the earn table or from a sibling card: Axis published three cards' rules on one day and all three lists differed. If you hold this card and have it in writing from the issuer, send us the document and we'll source it.

Lounge access

0 of 793 tracked doors

No lounge access. This card opens exactly 0 of 793 tracked lounge doors — board with the crowd, or find a card that doesn't →

Can you get it?

the route in — no cutoffs published

The cutoffs and the actual route in — not the "apply now" button, the door that opens.

Route Direct application
Income · salaried not published
Income · self-employed not published
Age band not published

Direct application — no invite list, no banking relationship required.

Open to apply — HDFC runs a live application flow for the card and it sits in the bank's own credit-card shelf. HDFC publishes no income floor for it; the fee is ₹500 to get and ₹500 a year to keep, waived on ₹50,000 of annual spend. Worth knowing before you apply: the activation voucher needs a transaction inside 37 days, and the IndianOil XTRAREWARDS membership is created against the mobile number registered with the bank — change that number later and the accrued XTRAREWARDS balance lapses unless you have IOCL reissue the loyalty ID first.

HDFC Bank publishes no income or age cutoffs for this card. Blank means blank — we don't invent numbers to fill a grid.

per the official HDFC Bank MITC — figures marked (community) aren't in the PDF; the issuer won't say · filter the board by what you can get →

The fine print

6 of 7 MITC rows published

What the MITC actually says — the rates, fees and cutoffs the brochure skips.

Forex markup 3.5% + GST — the Foreign Currency Transactions cell that covers every variant HDFC does not name as an exception (Infinia 2%, 6E Rewards Indigo XL 2.50%)
APR 3.75%/mo (45%/yr) — the rate HDFC's own KFS worked examples apply to a standard variant; only Infinia and Infinia Metal Edition are named at 1.99%/mo (23.88%/yr)
Late fee Nil ≤₹100; ₹100 (₹101–500); ₹500 (₹501–1,000); ₹600 (₹1,001–5,000); ₹750 (₹5,001–10,000); ₹900 (₹10,001–25,000); ₹1,100 (₹25,001–50,000); ₹1,300 (>₹50,000) — HDFC's standard slab, w.e.f. 1 Aug 2024
Cash advance 2.5% of the amount withdrawn or ₹500, whichever is higher
Add-on card not published
Overlimit 2.5% of the over-limit amount, min ₹550, and only on explicit consent
Redemption fee ₹50 for statement credit (since 1-Aug-2024); ₹99 + taxes for a catalogue redemption; nil on the IndianOil fuel route

Joining ₹500 and renewal ₹500, waived on ₹50,000 of annual spend. HDFC's Key Fact Statement uses ONE combined "Joining / Annual membership Fee" column and merges eight variants — {Equitas Excite, BizGrow, BizFirst, GIGA Business, MoneyBack/MoneyBack+/Business Moneyback, Freedom, Best Price Save Smart, Indian Oil HDFC Bank} — under a single ₹500 cell; the waiver sub-cell covering MoneyBack through Indian Oil reads ₹50,000/Annum. Confirmed from the PDF's word geometry in both the Mar-2025 and Dec-2025 editions (one centres the merged text, the other top-aligns it, and both land on the same cell). The card's own fees page splits the combined column into "Joining Fee: ₹500" and "Renewal Fee: ₹500", so joiningFee is deliberately unset — an equal pair is a phantom. Fuel-surcharge waiver 1% on transactions of ₹400–₹5,000, max ₹250 per statement cycle. Earn is quoted in Fuel Points, which the card T&C equates to Reward Points ("1 Fuel Point = 1 Reward Point") and prices at ₹0.96 against IndianOil fuel (1 FP = 3 XTRAREWARDS points, 1 XRP = ₹0.32) and ₹0.20 everywhere else. 5% at IOCL pumps capped at 250 FP/month for the first 6 months and 150/month after; 5% on groceries (MCC 5411/5499/5921/5462) and on utility/telecom bill payments (4812/4814/ 4900), each capped at 100 FP/month; 1 FP per ₹150 on everything else including UPI, minimum transaction ₹150. Past a category cap that category earns NOTHING — HDFC's own worked example zeroes a ₹4,000 fill-up. Rent, wallet, government, EMI, insurance, jewellery, supermarkets, TAX, vending machines, liquor and bakeries earn nothing at any rate. Statement-credit redemption needs a 12,500-point balance. Points lapse 2 years from accrual. Network not published; the T&C's worked example says "We have considered that the card is RuPay variant", so a RuPay variant exists.

per the official HDFC Bank MITC · reviewed 10 Jul 2026

What's changed for this card

8 dated changes

Full tracker →

Devaluations and buffs that touch this card directly, its issuer, or the points and programs it earns and transfers to. Every one is dated here; the tracker carries each one's before → after and the write-up.

  • 23 Sept 2026
    Partner major Axis Bank
    Axis EDGE brings Accor back, drops ITC, and adds Cathay, Miles & More and Hilton
    Accor and Marriott off the grid since 2 April 2026; Club ITC live; no Cathay, Miles & More or Hilton → Accor live at the punished rates; ITC removed; Cathay, Hilton and Miles & More live; Marriott still gone

    Axis's own Travel EDGE terms, re-read 25 September 2026, already show the grid that went live on 23 September. Accor ALL is back, and not at the old Atlas 1:2: EDGE Miles convert at 2:1 (Olympus 1:2) and EDGE Rewards at 5:1, with Magnus for Burgundy at 5:2 and only Burgundy Private still at 5:4. Club ITC is off the table. Three partners are new. Cathay Asia Miles sits on that same punished grid. Hilton Honors is the ordinary one: EDGE Miles 1:2, EDGE Rewards 5:2, Burgundy 5:4. Lufthansa Miles & More is the exception on Atlas, which converts 1:1 there while every other standard airline on that card is 1:2; the EDGE Rewards side of Miles & More is the ordinary 5:2. Marriott stays removed. Qatar Privilege Club was already back. Flying Blue, Air India and Qantas moved into Group A, which is the capped group. The Axis Rewards credit card's Amex network is advertised as joining-fee and annual-fee nil for a limited period; there is no separate Amex variant on this board, so that offer is not modelled as a fee change.

  • 15 Sept 2026
    Devaluation moderate Wyndham Rewards
    Wyndham splits its three flat free-night tiers into four
  • 8 Sept 2026
    Devaluation major Air France-KLM Flying Blue
    Flying Blue splits award tickets into Light / Standard / Flex — a 25% rise for the same product
  • 1 Sept 2026
    Devaluation moderate HDFC Bank
    SmartBuy moves Amazon Pay gift cards to 1X under Insta Deals
  • 25 Aug 2026
    Partner moderate Vietnam Airlines
    Vietnam Airlines Lotusmiles opens a broad SkyTeam status match — up to Elite Plus
  • 21 Aug 2026
    Buff minor Club ITC
    Club ITC pays up to 50,000 bonus Green Points for spreading 10 nights across all five brands
  • 20 Aug 2026
    Partner moderate Air India (Maharaja Club)
    IHG Hotels & Resorts becomes a Maharaja Club earning and conversion partner
  • 18 Aug 2026
    Partner major American Express
    Amex India re-rates Virgin Atlantic upward — 2:1 becomes 5:4, the first MR buff in years

Every HDFC Bank change we've dated → 37 events since 2001, 23 of them nerfs — worst year 2026.

Verified against HDFC Bank's own documents on · the net-annual-value engine, at our house ₹/point

Every document behind this page — 3 of them, each with the day we read it
  1. official IndianOil HDFC Bank Credit Card Terms & Conditions — the 5% fuel/grocery/bill-payment table with its monthly Fuel Point caps, the exclusion list, and "1 FP = Rs. 0.96"
  2. official IndianOil HDFC Bank Credit Card Fees & Charges — "Joining Fee: ₹500 plus Applicable Taxes" and "Renewal Fee: ₹500 plus Applicable Taxes"
  3. official HDFC Bank Key Fact Statement cum MITC, updated 15 Dec 2025 — Indian Oil HDFC Bank at ₹500, waived on ₹50,000 a year, with a 1% fuel-surcharge waiver capped at ₹250 a cycle

Something stale or wrong? The document wins — tell us →