AU Tejas Credit Card

Quick verdict: A deal-led entry card whose headline is a flat 10% cashback at partner brands — movies, grocery and food delivery, cabs and bill payments — but only at those partners and only up to ₹250 a month. Off-partner spend drops to an ordinary points rate. The value is entirely a function of whether your apps match AU's partner list, so read that list and the caps before you apply.

The AU Tejas is an entry rewards-and-cashback card that leans on partner-merchant deals rather than a broad earn rate. Aimed at younger, digital-first spenders, its whole pitch rests on one number — 10% back — that looks generous until you notice the two conditions attached to it: it applies only at AU's partner brands, and it's capped. Get the partner match right and it's a cheap card that punches above its ₹500 fee; get it wrong and you're holding a fairly ordinary points card. That distinction is the single most important thing to settle before applying.

What it earns

• Flat 10% cashback at partner merchants — across movies, grocery and food delivery, cab bookings and bill

payments — capped at ₹50 per month in each of the five partner categories, ₹250 a month combined (so roughly ₹3,000 a year at the ceiling), with a ₹150 minimum transaction. This is the headline, and it is partner-only, not a blanket rate.

• 1 reward point per ₹100 on general (off-partner) spends — about 0.25% at ₹0.25 a point, a bare base

rate. The 5 points per ₹100 AU advertises applies only to AU Rewardz portal bookings (flights, hotels, vouchers, bill payments), not to ordinary spending — and fuel, rent, education, government, EMI and cash transactions earn nothing.

• 500 bonus points for completing 5 transactions of ₹500 or more in a statement cycle, plus a

2,000-point activation bonus (or a ₹500 voucher) on activation and a first transaction within 30 days.

• A 1% fuel surcharge waiver on transactions between ₹400 and ₹5,000 (capped ₹100 per cycle).
• A ₹500 + GST joining and annual fee, with the annual fee waived on ₹1.5 lakh of annual spend from the

second year — it is not lifetime-free.

Where the value actually lives

Everything hinges on the partner list. The 10% is real, but it only fires when you spend at AU's partner brands in the eligible categories, and each category stops the moment you hit ₹50 of cashback in a month — ₹250 across all five. In practice that means the card rewards a specific behaviour — ordering food, booking cabs, buying movie tickets and paying bills through the right apps, spread across categories rather than piled into one — and does little for anyone whose spending sits outside those lanes.

Do the arithmetic before you assume it's a winner. At the cap, the partner cashback tops out around ₹3,000 a year; away from partners you're back to about ₹0.25 per ₹100. If your monthly food-delivery, cab and movie spend genuinely maxes the ₹250, the card comfortably clears its ₹500 fee. If it doesn't — if your partner spend is patchy — the 10% becomes a headline you rarely collect, and the card quietly reverts to a plain entry rewards card. Note too that there's no lounge access here, and the 3.49% forex markup makes it a poor travel companion; this is a domestic, app-spend card.

The honest read

The Tejas is best judged not as a rewards engine but as a targeted deal card. Its strength and its weakness are the same fact: the 10% is concentrated, not spread. For the reader whose real-world spend maps cleanly onto AU's partners and who'll work the ₹250 cap, it's a genuinely cheap, high-return starter — the activation bonus and low fee sweeten a first-card decision. For everyone else, the marquee number is mostly decorative, and an entry card with a broader flat cashback rate will serve better. Don't be seduced by "10%" in the brochure; be honest about how much of your spending actually earns it.

The bottom line

The AU Tejas earns its keep only if your partner-brand spending is real and regular. Match the list, work the ₹250 monthly cap, and it's a low-cost card that returns several times its ₹500 fee — helped along by the 2,000-point welcome and the fee waiver at ₹1.5 lakh of annual spend. Miss the list, and you're left with 1 point per ₹100, no lounge access and a fee to justify — the 5X rate lives only inside the AU Rewardz portal. Read the partner brands and the caps first; that is where this card is won or lost.