The CardBuzz blog
Card-by-card write-ups from our team, features, fees, lounge access and who each card actually suits. For the numbers after every cap and exclusion, head to the card pages.
4330 posts · Page 64 of 361 · View the full archive
How-To GuidesEarning Rewards on Autopay: Matching Bills to Your Cards' Strengths
Autopay is usually discussed as a convenience and safety tool. It is also a rewards engine: every recurring bill routed through the right card earns points on spend that happens regardless. The optimisation is a one-time
ComparisonsStanding Instructions vs UPI Autopay: Choosing the Right Rail
Card standing instructions and UPI Autopay both automate recurring payments, but they run on different rails with different strengths. Picking the right one per bill affects rewards, reliability, control, and what happen
How-To GuidesThe Quarterly Subscription Audit: Cancelling What Autopay Keeps Alive
The average urban household carries a surprising number of recurring subscriptions — OTT platforms, music, cloud storage, news, fitness apps, software, memberships — many of them on autopay, several of them forgotten. Th
How-To GuidesWhy Autopay Mandates Fail: Bounces, Expiry, and How to Bulletproof Them
Autopay fails silently. There is no alarm when a mandate bounces — just a missed payment discovered weeks later, sometimes via a late fee or a credit-score dip. Mandates fail for a small set of predictable reasons, and e
How-To GuidesRouting Utility Bills to the Right Card: Electricity, Gas, and Broadband
Utility bills are the perfect rewards substrate: unavoidable, recurring, and substantial in aggregate. A household's electricity, piped gas, water, and broadband can total ₹4,000–₹8,000 a month — ₹50,000–₹1,00,000 a year
How-To GuidesCredit Card Bill Autopay: A Setup That Actually Prevents Missed Payments
The most important autopay mandate you will ever set up is the one that pays your credit card bill. A single missed card payment can cost a late fee, penalty interest, and a CIBIL scar that lingers for years. Yet most pe
How-To GuidesSetting Up Bill Autopay in India: eNACH, Card Standing Instructions, and UPI Autopay
India has three distinct autopay rails — eNACH, card standing instructions, and UPI Autopay — and they are not interchangeable. Each has different setup flows, limits, failure modes, and rewards implications. Choosing th
How-To GuidesBuilding a Medical-Expense Buffer: A Sinking Fund That Works with Autopay
Emergencies are unpredictable; medical expenses are not entirely so. Every household has a predictable layer of health spending — annual checkups, recurring prescriptions, dental work, the insurance premium — and a volat
Credit HealthWhen Not to Put a Medical Bill on Credit: Avoiding the Debt Trap
Credit cards are excellent tools for medical payments — until they are not. The line between "smart use of the interest-free period" and "medical debt compounding at card rates" is crossed with a single missed full payme
How-To GuidesMedical Bills and Reward Exclusions: What Earns Points and What Does Not
Medical spending feels like it should earn rewards like any other spending. Mostly it does — but the exclusions are specific, poorly documented, and easy to trip over. Here is the map of what earns and what does not when
How-To GuidesPaying a Family Member's Medical Bill: Card Mechanics and What to Keep
When a parent or spouse is hospitalised, the payment usually falls on whoever is present and has a working card — regardless of whose name is on the medical file. Paying a family member's medical bill with your card is s
How-To GuidesHospital Pre-Authorisation Holds on Your Card: How They Work
At hospital admission, the billing desk swipes your card for an amount — sometimes ₹50,000, sometimes several lakhs — but no charge appears on your statement. That is a pre-authorisation hold: the hospital reserving part