BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE Review

BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE - Best Credit Cards for Fuel in India

Table of Contents

We have many ‘all-rounder’ credit cards that give us great rewards on everyday spends. But, most of these are not useful for fuel expenses. Some cards exclude fuel transactions for rewards while others have a surcharge. Fuel expenses are now a big chunk of our monthly expenses thanks to the ever increasing prices. Fortunately, we have some fuel credit cards that give us good savings on fuel expenses. Fuel credit cards are co-branded with one of the partners like IOCL/HPCL. So, the key thing to check for any of the fuel cards is to ensure there is a nearby petrol pump where we can use the card. In this post, we review the BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE. This card provides a 7.25% value back on our fuel spends.

Fees and Charges

Unlike other issuers, SBI Cards always charge a joining fee for credit cards. But, this is offset by the welcome gift. The annual fee waiver is relatively less at Rs 2L spends for the rewards it provides.

Joining/Annual FeeRs 1499 plus taxes
Welcome Gift6000 Reward Points (Rs 1500 Value)
Annual Fee WaiverOn spends of Rs 2L in a card membership year
BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE Review: Fees and Charges

Rewards

The BPCL SBI OCTANE credit card has a 7.25% reward rate for all BPCL spends. Other than this, it also gives good rewards for Dining, Departmental Stores, Grocery & Movies category spends as well. This makes it easy to achieve the required spends for an annual fee waiver.

Type of SpendReward PointsReturn Rate @25 per RP
BPCL Fuel, Lubricants & Bharat Gas Spends25 RP per Rs 100
*Maximum 2500 RP per billing cycle
* Rs 4000 Max transaction value for rewards
* 1% fuel surcharge waiver
6.25%
Dining, Departmental Stores, Grocery & Movies10 RP per Rs 100

*Maximum 7500 RP per month
2.5%
Other spends (Except Non-BPCL Fuel and Wallets)1 reward point per Rs 1000.25%
BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE Review – Reward Points

The caps on the accelerated rewards for fuel are there to curb misuse with commercial spending. The monthly transaction value to hit the max cap of accelerated fuel rewards would be Rs 10000. This should be more than enough for most people. We can also spend on other categories like Departmental Stores and Grocery to reach the annual fee waiver. The 2.5% value back on these is also pretty good.

Milestone Rewards

I would not recommend aiming for this milestone reward. We can spend Rs 2 Lakhs to get the annual fee waiver and get maximum rewards on fuel transactions.

  • Rs 2000 gift voucher on Rs 3 Lakhs spend in a membership year (0.67% Return)
  • Gift voucher options: Aditya Birla Fashion, Yatra, Urban Ladder, Hush Puppies, and Bata

Rewards Redemption

Each reward point is worth 25p. We can redeem the reward points for either fuel or from the reward catalog. Fuel redemption makes more sense as it is instant redemption at the listed outlets. PoS redemption is supported at outlets listed here. E-Voucher redemption is supported at outlets listed here.

LTF IDFC First Bank Credit Card

Return on Spends Calculator

We can use the below calculator to find the return we will get on spending for the BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE. The data needs to be entered only in the green-colored cells. The calculations do not include the 1% fuel surcharge waiver.

Pros and Cons

PROS

  • 7.25% rewards on fuel and BPCL spends is good
  • 2.5% rewards on Dining, Departmental Stores and Grocery spends allows using the card for general spends

CONS

  • The annual fee can be less, ideally Rs 999 plus GST
  • 0.25% return on other spends limits using the card as a ‘daily driver’.

Final Thoughts

Fuel credit cards are generally not a good fit as they offer good rewards only for fuel transactions. Plus in most cases, the reward rates are not good with lesser caps.

BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE addresses these limitations to a large extent. With a generous rewards rate on fuel and good rewards on other spend categories, this card can be a good addition to our wallet. Consider this card if:

  • Monthly spends on fuel spends are around Rs 10000 to hit the max cap of accelerated fuel rewards.
  • You are able to spend the required amounts for a fee waiver, spend milestones on the other credit cards you hold.
  • You can spend Rs 2 Lakhs on this card to get the annual fee waiver.
  • Last but obvious one – There is a BPCL outlet nearby to use this card. 🙂

If you are looking out for a fuel credit card, do check out this post on the best fuel credit cards in India.

APPLY NOW

BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE

CardMaven

Joining / Annual Fees
Rewards
Features and Benefits
4.7
Share the Post:

Related Posts

11 thoughts on “BPCL SBI Credit Card OCTANE Review”

  1. Rajat Nigam

    Is it possible to get the fee waived off by writing to customer support (in case the spends don’t cross Rs. 2 Lac threshold)

  2. What about lounge access for Add-on cards? Or can I use my card for someone else? TIA!

    1. Card Maven

      Domestic airport lounge access should work fine for add-on cards too. But the same limit of max 1 visit per quarter applies across all cards.

  3. I believe this is worth to be considered as we fuel card and 2.5 on Dining, Departmental Stores, Grocery none other cards give that(offline spends). I have checked Infinia/Magnus/Eterna/Pinnacle and seems they don’t give this much reward .
    Pinnacle 2.5 only on online spends
    Infinia 3.33% for spending on smart portal for flights/hotels else it is just 1.66% for vouchers and 1% for cash credit
    Magnus has 1.2%
    Eterna has 3.75 but on online spends only

    1. Finding the BPCL petrol bunk using SBI POS machine which gives reward points is soo difficult…,,if your octane was swiped in any another pos other than SBI in BPCL bunk it will be totally useless ..

      1. I have a BPCL octane card. It doesn’t matter which bank POS machine card is swiped on the outlet needs to be BPCL.

        Also points redemption is also quite easy now at least in Mumbai and Thane.

        1. This is the exact feedback i was waiting for!! Are you sure regardless of POS machine, if you spend at the mentioned BPCL outlets your points are accumulated?

          1. karthickeyan

            yes, regardless of the pos machine,point get accrued. using this card for over a year

          2. Thnx for the info, what about points redemption? what has been your experience with respect to redemption of points at fuel stations?

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Scroll to Top