As we know, as of April 19 the reward categories changed on the Citi Thank You Premier card. We now earn 3x rewards on travel and 2x rewards on dining and entertainment, which is the reverse of what it was previously.
Interestingly, many Premier cardholders who only recently got the card were receiving communication from Citi indicating that they would continue to receive 3x rewards on dining and entertainment until their anniversary year is up. We reported on this here.
At that time, we speculated that the newer cardholders would get both 3x travel and 3x dining/entertainment. We’ve now been able to confirm this in an official response from Citi. We also confirmed that this benefit is applicable to anyone who signed up for the card from 4/19/14 – 4/18/15. All of those new cardholders will be eligible for 3x rewards for one year from the date that they became a cardmember.
Here’s the official reply:
Q:
- Is this offer automatically applied to anyone who became a cardholder between 4/19/14 and 4/18/15, or is it only for those who received such communication from Citi?
- Will they also begin earning 3x points on travel as well? Will they now be earning 3x points on both the travel category and the dining/entertainment category or will they just earn based on the old rates of 2x for travel and 3x for dining/entertainment?
A:
Yes, for those people who recently applied for ThankYou Premier (in the last year), they will earn 3X on dining out and entertainment for one year from the date they became a cardmember. After that, they will earn 2x in these categories.
Effective April 19, all ThankYou Premier cardmembers began earning 3x on travel.
Can anyone make heads or tails of their most recent Premier rewards activity?
I applied a few months ago, so I am expecting that I’ll be getting 3x for both Travel and Dining/Entertainment until my anniversary date. When I look at my Points Summary (for the most recent period), I see the number of 1x points I earned (one small charge that I thought would be Travel but wasn’t), 2x points for Dining/Entertainment, and 3x for Travel/Gas. Then I have 3 separate “Bonus Points Earned” line items. One is 5000 points that I was expecting for completing a retention bonus spend (that I was given not too long after completeing my initial minimum spend for the 50k sign-up points). But the other two are for lesser amounts and I can figure out (mathematically) how to get them to correspond to anything else. I figured maybe one of them is an adjustment up of the amount they’re showing for the Dining/Entertainment only being listed as 2x. But the numbers don’t match. And I have no idea what the other bonus point line item would be from.
If anything, it looks like I might have more points than I’m expecting. So I’m not sure I want to call or secure message them. A little easier audit trail of the points would be nice, unless I’m missing something. Anyone else find their Points Summary for the most recent month to make sense?
D*mn, missed it by 3 days. In hindsight, we all should have seen this coming. Banks aren’t allowed to change things like this in the middle of the (credit card) year, right?
Definitely something to keep in mind with Citi in the future.
To the contrary: Citi is honoring the bonus rates for newer cardholders, up to their anniversary year.
Apparently they can, because U.S Bank is with the Club Carlson. Here is what they can/can’t change: https://www.doctorofcredit.com/what-changes-cancant-credit-card-issuers-make-in-the-first-year-of-approving-a-card/
While I’m hopeful that my card from Dec’14 will get 3x in both dining/entertainment AND travel (including gas stations), I don’t see how their reply indicates that. They simply state that the card will continue to get 3x dining/entertainment. Has anyone actually confirmed via statement of receiving 3x on both?
I’m waiting until Q3 before I put any more dining spend on the Citi TY card since Freedom and Discover are 5x/5% in Q2.
I thought so initially as well, and I was upset that they didn’t answer my second question. But then I looked closely at the second sentence and noticed that she wrote, “all”, in reply to that point. ALL Premier cardholders are now earning 3x travel.
Thus, until your anniversary year you’ll be getting 3x travel/dining/entertainment.
Good point. Thanks. I’ll report back if I have an experience that says otherwise.