100% this. Trying to figure out where I might go to take advantage of this to earn more rewards is not currently the most intuitive experience, but I struggle to suggest what might help improve on it.
In addition to figuring out the partners, there’s also the “what offers are actually expiring soon?” I don’t necessarily want to need to log in just to check this.
Can you clarify a bit more what about the current system doesn’t do it for you? I’m not defending anything here, but for the sake of discussion we have invested a decent amount in this.
Searchable - there is a search bar
Scrollable - everything is scrollable, as far as I can tell
Alphabetized - fair point, I have no clue how this list gets sorted
Auto-updating - from a user perspective, it is automated. For a little extra context, merchants can go out of business or update their POS system without telling us, but otherwise things are pretty automated and real-time.
Perks - when I click on a partner, I see the % cashback and the conditions for the offer, are perks something different that you’re referring to?
The issue I’m trying to address is discovery. When I’m on the hunt for something (e.g. running shoes) I want to see a list of partners that I should keep a look out for. Currently, if I go to the Rewards tab on the app, I have no way of seeing this list. The location aspect is not helpful as I want to do this “research” before I leave the house which is usually far from where I shop.
I thought the the category options at the at the bottom of the page would show me this info but alas when I click on them, all I see is a blank page (I’m suspecting because of my location?)
If we could take all the attributes you noted and applying to a list of current partners, that’s what I’m looking for.
I guess the need comes from the forced location based discovery. I’m not doing my shopping research on-location, so I’m not able to discover partners ahead of time.
Additionally, when the category buttons have worked, I recall them only revealing featured and nearby partners in the category. I want to see ALL partners in that category regardless of location.
I’d rather it tell me via a popup or something. Like if I visit a merchant and they’re a partner, I get an app notification of whatever promo is running for that partner or what discount I can get…
I agree - the rewards section needs a bit of work… not only in terms of partner search but also in geographical specificity - even the act of locating the various reward levels is more complex than the rest of the easy-to-navigate app. I would love to have a discussion forum on how to improve the rewards section, since it is one of Neo’s USPs.
All good feedback! I do think it’s super buried from a UX perspective. Have you tried searching “shoes?” I believe that works and filters you down to a manageable number of places that you can scroll through.
Something I’ve heard in the past is having us more actively surface relevant deals, which could be good or could be annoying.
Just tried this and it kind of works … but there are two main issues:
Issue 1: False positives
Searching “shaving cream” gave me hits for ice-cream places
Issue 2: Missed partners
Searching up “cutlery” only resulted in Victorinox showing up even though Barb’s Kitchen Centre is also a partner (and, I feel, a far more relevant one for this search)
In my opinion, a searchable (and now that you mention it, filterable by category) list of partners is the simplest solution.
However, if that’s not in line with Neo’s vision, I do have an alternative approach. What if Neo staff (or partners themselves) give partners tags based on items sold/services offered to help with more accurate search results? I feel like this approach is more labour intensive though and could potentially demand further refinement of the search engine as well.
It’s definitely in line with Neo’s vision! I mean, if the search bar isn’t working for you, that’s super specific, tangible feedback, especially in the era of AI search.
One piece of feedback I heard from a friend who did not sign up for Neo:
Neo promotes its reward network as a distinctive feature, but there seems to be no way to see the partners before opening up the account. A customer needs to sign up for Neo to see what partners provide cash back. Therefore, people who make the decision to open an account with Neo vs other banks do not have the information they seek to make that decision.
In this particular case, one of the things he wanted to know if a specific grocery chain is a partner and how the cash back works because he would shop there regularly and spend thousands of dollars per year with one merchant. Therefore, he was trying to calculate the potential cash back rate from that partner vs annual fee vs competitors who have cash back calculators on their website.
One thing I would like that the current implementation isn’t working well with is just a complete list of partners, no searches, categories, etc. For me, I just want to be able to look at the list and see what stores overall I should keep in mind. Right now what a frustration is with the current setup is that you need to go to a category if you want that, or the map (but it’ll show duplicates). There’s no one place to see everything without duplication. There also isn’t seemingly a way to report partners not existing anymore (DJI shop Canada has been gone for a while)
I’ve heard rumours we are trying to make a calculator, but the partner network makes it pretty hard. I used the calculator on FinlyWealth, which is pretty robust, and was told I would net $1,000 / year on the Gas & Grocery World Elite… my actual cashback is just shy of $2,000 in that period. Part of the gap has got to be errors on my part, but most of that is actually just the partner network. It can be super significant.
i think if there was a ‘leaving soon’ note for stores, or a ‘coming soon’ note, that would also be helpful. but yes, alphabetical list is preferred for sure.
Sorry! Life’s gotten busy and I haven’t had much idle time to check on this, but here’s some stuff that has been a bit difficult when using the website version of this:
On searchable:
The search bar gives you the top X places (uncertain of ordering), but I would want to explore places
As an example, if I wanted to search for a “coffee roaster” today, typing that in the search bar gives me places that have that in the name, and hitting enter would give me the top search
There’s also no map view on the website version; map views are great for exploration and it would be great if that was on the website version too!
The categories that show up on the phone app are not easily discoverable; it’s only after I type in a related term (like coffee roaster) and scroll down would I find the category
It’d be great if that was on the website experience as well
On scrollable: I did not realize it was scrollable until I saw your message , but at the very bottom of the list is "search for " - that’s useful, but I think that should be the thing we’d do rather than going to the top hit
Skipping alphabetized
On Auto-updating:
I think that there should be some means to report if a merchant is no longer at a location or is out of business to help with this
I did notice that there’s now a means to report missing rewards directly in the app (awesome!), but it’s been radio silence since - I think I reported about 2 weeks ago now, but all I see is “We’re looking into your missed rewards. Check your email for updates.” but I don’t think I’ve received anything as of late
On perks:
Some merchants have multiple rewards (at least, for Asia Miles), where you’d get a bonus for spending past a certain amount in one transaction and a bonus for frequent visits, but I think overall, I think the view as it is right now is fine
This might be applicable to all experiences, but I would love to have a “favourite” for rewards that I can easily look up; think of the Wallet view, except it contains the merchants that I marked because I would always want to have them easily visible. Since some rewards accumulate based on number of visits, once i cap out, then I won’t see it any more until I start a new chain (one example would be Pallet Coffee Roasters).
, but at the very bottom of the list is "search for " - that’s useful, but I think that should be the thing we’d do rather than going to the top hit