Standard Chartered Journey

Last Updated: 4/10/2024
Recommendation: Very Good

Annual Fee

RM600

Annual Income

Airport Lounge Access

Unlimited access
Local Lounges only

RM96,000 per annum

Airline Miles Earn Rate

Local: 0.1 MPR

Dining: 0.5 MPR

Travel: 0.5 MPR

Overseas: 0.5 MPR

Payment Network

Review | Standard Chartered Journey Credit Card

The Standard Chartered Journey credit card is an affluent travel-focused credit card catered towards those with a minimum annual income of RM90,000.

The credit card boasts several niche features while still maintaining a decently attractive air miles conversion rate. Following the devaluation of the UOB Visa Infinite in Sept 2024, the Standard Chartered Journey has found itself coming out on top as one of the more attractive value propositions in the market.

In this review, we dive deeper to dissect the air miles conversion rate, lounge access, and other travel-related benefits to see whether the credit card deserves a spot in your pocket.

Air Miles Conversion

While the Standard Chartered Journey credit card has a typical Local/Overseas spend miles earning rate, points accelerators for Dining and Travel spend are present.

Given that there is no capping on the points earned both dining and travel spend, there is actually substantial potential to earn a decent amount of airline miles with the Standard Chartered Journey credit card.

However, one must also be realistic when looking at the MCC categories that grant extra "Miles" points. If your annual income is just above RM90,000 and you're looking to obtain the Standard Chartered Journey credit card, you're looking at a monthly income of around RM7000-8000.

This is a substantial amount of income, but how much can you actually spend on travel spend particularly? Most people don't spend thousands of ringgit on travel spend every month. All travel spend also includes purchases on third party aggregators such as Agoda, Booking.com and Expedia.

However, the dining spend is definitely a positive note of the Standard Chartered Journey. If you enjoy a RM30 meal twice a day, this means that you're spending RM60 daily. In 30 days, you're looking at a general dining spend of RM2000 a month, which only earns you a total of 10,000 "Miles" points. This translates to a total of 5,000 Airline Miles, which is not half bad

In fact, the Standard Chartered Journey is now one the best non-AUM credit cards to own in the market, post-UOB devaluation. With a substantial 0.5 MPR on dining, and access to Enrich, KrisFlyer and Asia Miles, this is a brilliant credit card to obtain if you're not a fan of CIMB's tiered bonus structure, which requires a hefty RM5,000 minimum monthly spend to obtain the higher 0.53 MPR on dining.

Moving on, as shown above, Standard Chartered confuses its customers by naming their points system "Miles", but in actuality, you are NOT earning Airline Miles with every swipe of your credit card. If you have been on my blog for some time, you should know the difference by now, but if you don't, then let me explain further.

Each bank has its own classification or naming for its points system. Maybank has "TreatsPoints". CIMB has "Bonus Points". Standard Chartered has "Miles". You get the idea.

This is deceiving to the blind consumer, as they would assume that they would earn 1 Airline Mile for every RM1.00 spent, which is NOT the case!

Standard Chartered stated in its T&C that its conversion partners include Malaysia Airlines' Enrich, Singapore Airlines' Krisflyer, Airasia BIG Points and Cathay Pacific Asia Miles.

Nevertheless, while I applaud Standard Chartered's move to grant extra points for dining and travel spend overseas, I do think they could do slightly better in the overseas points accrual rate department.

For a RM96,000 annual income credit card, the Standard Chartered Journey is just a little shy under RM100,000, which opens the door to plenty of other credit cards that come with excellent overseas airline miles accrual.

For example, the CIMB Travel World Mastercard which requires a minimum annual income of RM100,000 has an overseas earn rate of 0.64 MPR for Enrich Miles, and 0.53 MPR for other airlines, such as KrisFlyer and Asia Miles.

Similarly, the UOB Visa Infinite grants you 0.83 MPR for overseas spend. With the Standard Chartered Priority Banking Visa Infinite (which requires a RM250k AUM) offering a pretty disappointing 0.71 MPR on overseas spend, I guess it's not surprising that the SC Journey has a weak accelerator as well.

Be sure to check out my Ultimate Guide, KrisFlyer Ultimate Guide and Asia Miles Ultimate Guide for comparisons on the airline miles earning rates for various credit cards.

Airport Lounge Access

Lounge access is mediocre in some areas but positive in other areas for a RM96,000 per annum credit card.

Number of Lounge Access Passes: Unlimited Access
Supplementary Access: No
Spend Conditions: No spend conditions

Standard Chartered advertises that the Journey credit card has unlimited access to airport lounges in KLIA Terminal 1 and KLIA Terminal 2. In reality, the lounges covered are extremely limited, and I can even list them out for you.

Lounge Access List by Standard Chartered Journey Credit Card:

Plaza Premium Lounge CP21 (KLIA Terminal 1)
Plaza Premium Lounge Gateway@klia2 (KLIA Terminal 2 Arrivals)
Flight Club (KLIA Terminal 2)

So you essentially have unlimited access to three lounges in the entire Plaza Premium network. Lounge access is also only offered to Principal cardholders. Wow.

Don't get me wrong. I'm happy that the Standard Chartered Journey is going above and beyond to grant you unlimited lounge access. This is something even a RM250,000 annual income credit card couldn't give you!

However, let's think realistically. How many times do you logically enter lounges annually? Is the lack of access to more lounges a worthy sacrifice for unlimited lounge access?

I would have loved to see additional lounge access options available upon meeting a certain spend criteria monthly or quarterly, which is still unusual in the market.

Final Thoughts

With the recent devaluation of the UOB Visa Infinite, the Standard Chartered Journey has now emerged as a strong top-of-wallet contender for local dining spend. However, there's no doubt that the overseas MPR falls short of other spectacular credit cards around the RM100k annual income range.

With an RM600 annual fee that is only waivable upon spending RM60,000 each calendar year, you should only consider the SC Journey if you are able to take full advantage of the dining spend accelerator, as it would be a naive move to obtain the credit card solely for its unlimited airport lounge access, which is honestly overpromoted and overexaggerated by credit card influencers.

If you're serious about lounge access, the UOB Visa Infinite and UOB Visa Infinite should be your top pick for access to UOB's Private Lounge, as well as the CIMB Travel World Elite, CIMB Travel World Mastercard, and CIMB Travel Platinum Mastercard, which grants you excess to the Plaza Premium First lounge.

Be sure to check out my Ultimate Guide, KrisFlyer Ultimate Guide and Asia Miles Ultimate Guide for comparisons on the airline miles earning rates for various credit cards.