ICICI stops rewards on rent and wallet loads
From 5 February 2024, rent payments and e-wallet loading earn zero reward points on ICICI credit cards.
ICICI opens 2024 with a cut. From 5 February, two categories stop earning on ICICI credit cards entirely: rent payments and e-wallet loading. Both previously earned reward points; both now earn zero.
These were the two classic volume plays. Rent through an app turned your biggest monthly outflow into points; wallet loads let you earn on money that hadn’t been spent on anything yet, then spend it wherever cards weren’t welcome. Issuers everywhere have been closing both doors, and ICICI has now closed them in one notice.
As devaluations go, this is a quiet one — no fee, no cap gymnastics, just two exclusions. The tracker rates it moderate. But quiet is not the same as small if your points strategy leaned on either category, and it set the tone for what followed: by November, ICICI would be excluding government and education spend, capping grocery and gating lounges too.
Our take: the free lunch categories are being deleted, issuer by issuer. Treat any earn that depends on routing — not spending — as living on borrowed time, because in 2024 it is.