Update: Reader JackRyan went for it and received the sign up bonus on the Citi Premier card despite having the Citi Forward converted to the Citi Preferred with a new account number. That’s great news. Fingers crossed we get more datapoints confirming this.
A lot of readers have been asking the same question, that’s generally a good guide that a dedicated post would be useful. Now onto the question. Citi Forward cardholders were automatically product changed to a Citi Preferred card on January 3rd. Readers want to know if this product change has reset the 24 month clock/rule Citi has. This rule basically states that:
- Bonus ThankYou points are not available if you have had ThankYou Preferred, ThankYou Premier or Citi Prestige cards opened or closed in the past 24 months.
So it’s really a matter of whether this product change counts as the Citi Preferred being opened or not. Generally speaking product changes have counted as the card being opened if the card number changes. In the case of the Citi Forward to Citi Preferred, card numbers have changed. Because of that I think that this will have reset your 24 month clock. It’s possible that Citi has specially coded this product change to not affect your 24 month status, but knowing Citi and their IT department I’d be shocked if this was the case (although it’s equally likely that they have messed something else up by mistake meaning it didn’t reset the clock).
At the end of the day, we won’t know until people actually try and report back. Readers are particularly interested in this as the Citi Premier card is currently offering a 50,000 point bonus. My favorite catch cry for this hobby is “be the data point you want to see”. If anybody does try, I’d love to hear your experiences.
