The wait is over for grocery shoppers in Ontario as Moi Rewards will be launching at Metro and Food Basics stores on October 24, 2024. The grocery retailer has gone several months without a loyalty program in Canada’s most populous province after departing AIR MILES earlier this year. This marks the program’s expansion into its third province after introducing the revamped program last year in Quebec and New Brunswick
We also knew from a previous announcement that Moi Rewards will be teaming up with RBC to offer extra value to Moi Rewards and Avion Rewards members.
The moi Rewards launch in Ontario
On October 24 Moi Rewards will be available at participating Metro and Food Basics stores in Ontario. Members will be able to earn and redeem points on purchases made at these grocery and pharmacy retailers.
moi Rewards in Ontario has a lower earn rate
Unlike the 1 point for $1 spent at participating stores in Quebec and New Brunswick, Moi Rewards members will only earn 1 point for every $3 spent on eligible purchases in addition to any bonus offers that may be offered on overall spend or individual products. This earning is over and above any points, miles or cash back earned on the credit or debit card used for the purchase.
UPDATE: Thanks to frequent RWRDS Canada community contributor Harry B. who commented in our Facebook Group that this base earn rate is at Metro only – not at Food Basics. And sure enough the asterisk in the below screenshot is exactly for that “*Available at Metro Stores in Ontario only. Not valid at Food Basics.”
This is a head scratcher? Why set up different earn rates in different provinces? I get that they are adding the RBC connection for Ontario (see below) but even with that the complexity for the customer (not to mention for the program itself) of essentially running different versions of the program really doesn’t make sense.
Granted, the biggest competitors to moi Rewards in Ontario are PC Optimum and Scene+, both of which do not award any points on base spend. It seems apparent that the team at moi realized this and knew they could offer less than what is provided in Quebec and New Brunswick but still be offering more than the competition.
When it comes to redeeming points it is very simple for members. At anytime they can redeem 500 points for $4 off their purchase right at the point of purchase..
Earn extra points by linking an RBC credit or debit card
The expanded partnership between Moi Rewards and RBC Avion Rewards will see members who link their Moi Rewards account to their RBC credit or debit earn 1 extra Moi Rewards points for every $2 on eligible spend at stores in Ontario only. Members or shoppers in Quebec and New Brunswick will not earn the extra points when using a linked RBC card.
UPDATE: RBC has reached out to RWRDS Canada letting us that the linking of an RBC credit or debit card to your Moi Rewards account will earn the additional points in Quebec and New Brunswick. I had based my original statement the Moi Rewards website only showing the linked card offer for Ontario and not for the other provinces.
This new partnership earn rate is subject to a minimum spend as follows:
I am surprised at how high the minimum amount is set, especially for Metro and Food Basics. I mean it’s great that you can earn the extra points for linking your accounts, and you should link them no matter what so that when you do eclipse those minimum spend amounts you earn them but it really does not seem like much incentive to use an RBC card for the purchase.
Even with the extra points being earned when you spend $60 or more you will be rewarded more and get more value using pretty much any other credit card that has a grocery accelerator like the American Express Cobalt Card, Scotiabank Gold American Express Card or the MBNA Rewards World Elite Mastercard.
For example if you spend $60 that would give you an extra 30 Moi Rewards points for the purchase or 24 cents in points value plus what ever you earn on your RBC card. If you used an Avion Infinite or Platinum card that would work out $60 points or at a minimum 60 cents in value – so 84 cents in total rewards.
Of course you could take on the Avion and ION+ Card combo where you can get 3 points per dollar from the ION+ and then with the Avion card redemption value you would end up with a minimum of $2.04 in value.
Put that same purchase on the American Express Cobalt Card or Scotiabank Gold American Express card and you are looking at $3 in value! As you can see, even with this partnership there is not a whole lot of incentive to use an RBC card at these stores in Ontario if you have another card with a grocery store accelerator.
And if you spend under the minimum amount? I don’t think we even need to go there since we already showed what spending $60 will reward you with.
What about the moi Rewards Visa?
The relatively new moi RBC® Visa‡ Card is decent no annual fee card that will help you earn more moi Rewards points. Surprisingly though the card does not provide an accelerated earn rate at Metro and Food Basics stores – it only awards 1 point per dollar spent. It’s marketed as 2 points per dollar but that includes the 1 point from the moi rewards loyalty card and that’s for Quebec and New Brunswick. For Ontario, I guess that would be 1.33 points combined between the moi credit card and moi loyalty card since the latter is only 1 point for $3?
If you are about maximizing the value of every purchase you make on a credit card there are quite a few other no fee options like the SimplyCash Card from American Express or the Rogers Mastercard® that will provide you with more value than the moi card at Metro and Food Basics stores.
Wrapping it up
moi Rewards is launching at Metro and Food Basics stores in Ontario on October 24, 2024. It will be nice to have a loyalty program back at Metro after a few months hiatus and it’s really good to see Food Basics will now have a program available!
From a consumer’s perspective it is surprising and perhaps confusing they went with a different base earn rate in Ontario than the program has in other provinces. It’s confusing because if you don’t set the moi Rewards site to Ontario, you’ll see different earn rates that you won’t earn in Ontario and I’m sure it will have people calling in asking why didn’t I earn 1 point per dollar? From a business perspective it makes great sense for moi Rewards: “why give more than we have to when our competitors are providing nothing?”
It’s nice to see the RBC partnership in place and any chance to earn extra points is great but to me it falls flat given that you need to have a minimum spend for it to kick in and the extra value of the points isn’t very much – especially if you have other credit cards that have grocery store accelerators.
And to wrap things up this will not be the only grocery partnership that RBC Avion Rewards will be part of as it was announced earlier they will be teaming up with More Rewards out west but there are still no further details on that tie up.
Images via moi Rewards