Scotiabank · Visa
Best for travellers who want a Visa
No foreign transaction fee and six free lounge visits a year on a Visa. The earn rates are ordinary, so this is a card you buy for the travel perks, not the points.
Rates and features verified 2026-08-18Full terms and conditions
What we like, and what we don’t
Worth having
- No foreign transaction fee
- Six complimentary airport lounge visits a year through the Visa Airport Companion programme
- $2,000,000 travel medical covering 25 days
- Visa Infinite acceptance, unlike the Scotiabank Gold Amex
- The first supplementary card is free
Watch out for
- The earn rates are weak: 2 points a dollar on groceries, dining and transit, 1 on everything else
- Travel itself earns only 1x unless you book through Scene+ Travel
- $150 annual fee with no first-year waiver
- Scene+ points are fixed at one cent, so there is no way to redeem your way to better value
- The advertised "35,000 points" is 25,000 welcome points plus a 10,000 annual bonus that needs $40,000 of yearly spend
- Travel medical falls from 25 days to 3 days at 65
- $60,000 personal or $100,000 household income required
What this card earns
- Groceries
- 2x
- Dining and restaurants
- 2x
- Transit
- 2x
- Entertainment
- 2x
- Everything else
- 1x
- Bonus rates apply up to
- $50,000 of annual spending after that, the base rate
- What we value a point at
- 1¢
The earning fine print
3 pts/$1 applies only at Sobeys, Safeway, IGA, Foodland, participating co-ops, FreshCo, Chalo! FreshCo, Thrifty Foods, Rachelle Bery, Les Marches and Voila; all other grocery stores earn 2 pts/$1, which is the rate recorded here. The $50,000 annual cap is a SINGLE COMBINED cap across every accelerated (3x and 2x) category, not a per-category cap; past it everything earns 1 pt/$1. Travel earns 1 pt/$1. The advertised 4x requires booking through Scene+ Travel. Gas is not a bonus category on this card.
The welcome offer
- Welcome bonus
- 25,000 points after you spend $2,000, within 3 months
- Offer ends
- 2026-11-01
What the offer actually requires
The advertised "up to 35,000 points" is 25,000 welcome points PLUS a 10,000 ONGOING ANNUAL bonus that requires $40,000 of annual spend. It is not part of the welcome offer, so only the 25,000 is recorded. The "up to $1,250 in first year value" is a modelled bundle including $358 of assumed lounge value and $132 of assumed FX savings.
Fees and interest rates
- Annual fee
- $150
- Additional card
- Free
- Foreign transaction fee
- None
- Cash advance fee
- $5
- Dishonoured payment fee
- $48
- Purchase APR
- 20.99%
- Cash advance APR
- 22.99%
- Balance transfer APR
- 22.99%
- Balance transfer fee
- 1%
Who can get this card
- Minimum personal income
- $60,000
- Minimum household income
- $100,000
Insurance and benefits
- Travel medical
- $2,000,000 first 25 days of a trip
- Trip cancellation
- $1,500
- Trip interruption
- $2,500
- Flight delay
- $500
- Baggage delay
- $1,000
- Rental car damage waiver
- Included
- Purchase protection
- Included
- Extended warranty
- Included
- Airport lounge
- 6 free visits a year
- Concierge
- Included
What the benefits really mean
Travel medical drops from 25 consecutive days to 3 consecutive days at age 65+. Lounge access is the Visa Airport Companion Program (DragonPass): 6 complimentary visits per membership year, then US$32 per person per visit. First supplementary card is free; each additional one is $50. The $150 fee can be rebated with a Scotiabank Ultimate Package, which is an account benefit rather than a first-year waiver.
Our verdict
This card ranks near the bottom of our list and that is not a mistake. On ordinary spending it simply does not earn much. It is priced and built for a specific person: someone who travels several times a year, wants lounge access, and cannot use an American Express abroad.
For that person the six lounge visits and the waived foreign transaction fees can be worth well over the $150. For everyone else, the Scotiabank Gold American Express costs $30 less, also has no foreign transaction fee, and earns more than twice as fast.
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Where this came from. scotiabank.com product page, fees page, rates page, Passport Infinite+ COI. We take every figure from the issuer’s own pages, never from another comparison site, and we leave a field blank rather than guess at it.