Yonder: Best UK Credit Card For Dining?

Dining can represent a significant portion of monthly spending, particularly if you care about what you’re chomping down on. Food is life, right? In the UK, sadly, dining hasn’t been a very rewarding experience from the credit card rewards side. Maybe you earn a point per pound spent, but that’s about it.

I’m here to say that dining in the UK can, and should be a more rewarding experience, with a new card challenging the status quo. But first, a little backstory.

I’m an American living in London, and I’ve seen rewards on both sides of the pond. In the US, some cards offer up to 4X or 5X points on all purchases that class as dining, yet in the UK, 1X has been the benchmark for “best” rewards. WTF!

With a curiosity for the next generation of rewards, I signed up for the Yonder Card, hoping it could deliver on its promise of a more rewarding dining experience. After earning 5X points at some of my favorite restaurants and using points at exceptional rates to take some money off my bill, I’m sold.

Here’s why I think Yonder is the best UK card for dining, and why it’s not my thoughts that matter, but the actual rewards numbers and perks.

Up To 5X Points On Dining

If I spend £100 and earn 500 points, i’m happy. That sure beats spending £100 and earning 100 points. On that metric alone, Yonder is heating up a market that’s been dormant for too long.

It’s not a perfect science — only a couple handfuls of (for now) rotating London restaurants earn at these higher 3-5X points rates each month — but the curation and quality makes it easy to drive me into exciting new cocktail dens and restaurants of all price points.

How Do Points Earnings Stack Up?

The common thread is always delicious. Yonder Card is also making points earned far richer than other competitors offering airline miles, by offering higher rewards values, when points are redeemed at one of these curated monthly partners.

This may sound complicated to non points nerds — sorry! — but it’s incredibly easy and fool proof. Words can be boring, so I took these screen captures help to share a bit more of the actual user experience I’ve been impressed by. Hit the button!

Here above, you can see one of this month’s 9 options, Bancone. Pasta just hits different this time of year. As you can see, you just show up like any other person and dine.

When you pay with your Yonder Card, you earn 5X points at these selected partners. After you pay, if you have points and want to use them, you get to use them at the rates described. A little pop up appears in your app where you can swipe away some, or all of the bill — depending how much you spent.

I like Yonder as a card to earn rewards for more daily or weekly joy in between my travels. It’s been worth moving some spend over to this card to benefit not only when going away, but at home too.

Yonder Treats

One fun, and unexpected benefit of carrying the card has been “Yonder Treats”, where the fintech firm offers surprise and delight benefits each month. Many of which help to far outweigh the monthly £15 fee (after the first three months free as a welcome).

There’s currently £10 monthly free credit to try sustainable city bike company ‘HumanForest’, but there’s also been pop up offers, like Yonder Lunches, where the company covered £10 of lunch for 350 points, out of the blue. That’s high cents per point value — for real.

No Foreign Transaction Fees Abroad

Food and travel are like pizza and tomato sauce. Aside from the significantly increased dining reward potential at “home”, being able to earn rewards for dining abroad, sans the stupid foreign transaction fees many other cards charge, is delightful.

If you fly to Rome for some Cacio e Pepe on a whim, or New York for a steak, you’ll be able to earn rewards on those meals without pesky fees for spending abroad. The app actually tells you how much money it saved you when you get home.

Yonder Card: Current Best For Dining Rewards?

If you live in, or around London, it’s hard to make an argument for a better rewards card for dining in the UK right now. 5X points is unheard of, and redeeming points at circa 2.5 pence per point is simply outstanding. It beats most airline or hotel redemption opportunities with other cards. 

For those outside of London, earning 1X on all purchases while enjoying attractive travel insurance and no foreign transaction fees is appealing, but it’s less conclusively a winner. Basically, for Londoner’s, or anyone who regularly dines in or around London, this is the current best in class dining card by any reasonable metric.

Representative example: Approval subject to eligibility. Representative APR: 59.3% APR (variable), Purchase rate: 23.94% APR (variable),

Monthly fee: £15 a month, Assumed credit limit: £1200

Impact on your credit rating: You’ll need to make your minimum monthly payment on time, or it can impact your credit rating. Only borrow what you can afford to pay back.Yonder Card

There’s a current welcome offer of 3 months free, plus £50 to spend at partners.