Glossary
Cashback
Cashback is a percentage of your card spending returned to you as a statement credit or real money, rather than points you have to redeem through a catalogue.
Cashback is the most transparent reward type: spend AED 1,000 at a 2% cashback rate and AED 20 is credited back to you, almost always as a reduction on your next statement balance. There is no conversion table and no expiry games — what you see is what you get.
Cards are either flat-rate (one percentage on everything) or tiered (higher rates on specific categories like dining, groceries, or fuel, and a lower base rate elsewhere). Tiered cards pay more overall if your spending clusters heavily in the bonus categories; flat-rate cards are simpler and safer if your spending is spread evenly.
Almost every tiered cashback card caps how much bonus-rate cashback you can earn per month or per category — check the cap before assuming the headline rate applies to unlimited spending.