FEATURES SUMMARY

• Annual fee: $199
• Purchase rate: 19.49% p.a.
• Cash Advance rate: 19.99% p.a.
• Balance Transfer rate: 4.9% p.a.
• Interest-free days: Up to 55

• Extras:
  • Apply online
  • Rewards
  • Cashback
  • Purchase cover
  • Extended warranty
  • Phone/Internet banking
  • Personal Concierge Service
  • Priority Platinum phone line
  • International travel insurance

The platinum credit card from Bank of Queensland is a perplexing one. Why? Well, with all the competition out there, Bank of Queensland has still chosen to offer a credit card with all the same benefit as most other platinum credit cards, but with a high annual fee and much higher interest rates than most.

Despite these features, Bank of Queensland’s rewards program has enabled this card to be a pretty good card for cash back rewards. This card has free automatic membership to Q Rewards where points are earned at the rate of 2 points for every dollar spent on your platinum credit card. These can go towards your choice of rewards including travel, home ware, cash back, shopping vouchers, and whole bunch of retail products.

With this rewards credit card you get the majority of the usual travel benefits, including international travel insurance, personal concierge service, purchase protection (for up to $200,000) and extended warranty on purchases. Although it was interesting to see that transit accident insurance wasn’t included with this card as most platinum credit cards do tend to include this.

With an annual fee of $199 it’s not the highest priced platinum card out there but it is still pretty expensive. However the biggest let down on this card is the interest rates of 19.99% p.a. for cash advances and 19.49% p.a. for purchases. Despite having up to 55 days interest free, rates like these rates could quite easily lead to accumulating interest on your bills if you don’t manage to pay it in full each month.

On a brighter note, the balance transfer offer is 4.9% p.a. for the life of all new transfer applications. Of all the low balance transfer credit cards we have reviewed, Bank of Queensland’s cards were the only ones which offered a low rate on an ongoing basis, which is probably this card’s shining light.

See our top credit card picks in the Editor’s Choice category