The Smiles App: What It Actually Gets You in the UAE

Smiles points expire after 24 months. Nothing tells you when the clock is running out.

If you downloaded the app for some delivery promotion in 2023 and haven't opened it since, that's the one sentence in this article that matters. Go and check the balance. The rest can wait five minutes.

Most people in the UAE have Smiles somewhere on their phone — it came with an e& line, or a friend's referral link, or a promo code someone posted in a WhatsApp group. Very few of them know what it does now, because it's not the app it was when they installed it.

It's not just for e& customers

This is the misconception that costs people the most.

You don't need an e& line. Registration takes a UAE mobile number, an international number, or an e& account, which means anyone living here can use it regardless of network. If you're on du or Virgin, you have fewer ways to earn points — e& spend is one of the main routes — but the offers, the vouchers and the app itself are all open to you.

It's also free. That settles most of the question about whether to have it.

How the points work

Three ways in. Spending on e& services, where the rate goes by tier: Silver earns one point per dirham on eligible spend, Gold two, Diamond up to ten. Ordering inside the app — food, groceries, home services, cash vouchers paid by card. And holding a Smiles co-branded credit card.

Points come out as orders, home service bookings, e& bill payments, or cash and discount vouchers at what e& counts as 3,000-plus partner outlets across the UAE.

The voucher section is the part almost nobody uses and probably the best thing in the app. You buy a voucher at a discount and spend it like cash somewhere you were going anyway. It sits behind a tab most users have never opened.

Smiles Unlimited: AED 29 a month

The paid tier. Fourteen-day trial, cancel anytime in-app, benefits run to the end of the billing cycle.

What you get: free delivery on food orders over AED 30 and groceries over AED 50, unlimited buy-one-get-one voucher downloads across dining, wellness and entertainment, and no service fees on home service bookings across 35-plus services.

E& says the average subscriber saves over AED 300 a month. That describes the people using it hardest, not you.

The real test is simpler. Delivery in the UAE runs roughly AED 5 to 15 an order. Two or three orders a week through Smiles and the waived fees alone cover the AED 29. One order a fortnight and they don't — the BOGO vouchers would have to carry the whole thing.

Take the trial and don't change how you order. Then look at what you'd have paid.

Where people lose money on it

Letting points expire is the big one, and a twice-yearly calendar reminder fixes it permanently.

Paying for Unlimited and then opening a different delivery app out of habit is the second. The free delivery only applies inside Smiles. If your thumb goes somewhere else first, you're paying AED 29 for nothing.

The third is treating Smiles as the whole picture, and that one isn't really its fault.

What Smiles can't tell you

Smiles knows what Smiles has. It doesn't know that your Mashreq card has 50% off the same cinema, or that ESAAD covers the restaurant you just booked.

Most people here are holding five or six of these at once — a bank card programme, an airline scheme, a mall app, an employer benefit, maybe ESAAD or Fazaa, maybe a paid membership. Every one in its own app. Checking all of them before you pay would take about four minutes and nobody has ever done it.

DiscGo puts them in one place. Offers from 35-plus bank, membership and government programmes, over 145,000 of them across 24,000 UAE locations, filtered to the programmes you actually hold — Smiles included. No card numbers, no banking logins. It's free on iOS and Android.

Check your Smiles balance first, though. Some of it may be on its way out.