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It looks like Citibank is getting serious about offering competitive credit cards again with the release of their new card called “Double Cash” it’s effectively a 2% cash back card with no annual fee. There is no sign up bonus currently available for this card.
Note: It also looks like Citibank has removed their Citibank Dividend card from the website and replaced it with this. The Citi Dividend page is now also redirecting to this page which indicates that consumers might have a forced product change done.
Product Change
At the moment it’s not possible to do a product change to this card, but Citibank is hoping to offer product changes starting September 7th, 2014. I can see this becoming a popular option for people who sign up for Citibank credit cards with high sign up bonuses and want to downgrade to a no annual fee card with a good earning rate on non category bonus spend.
Generally card issuers do not allow you to do a product change from a co-branded credit card to bank loyalty card (e.g you probably won’t be able to convert an American Airlines card to this Double Cash card). Update: Rapid Travel Chai says that they were able to do a product change to a Citi Dividend from a Citi AA card, this means you’ll most likely be able to do a product change to the double cash card from any existing Citi product.
Update 2: Several Citi reps have stated that a product change will only be possible once a card has been opened for a full year or more. This means that it would not be possible to sign up for a card with a high sign up bonus and no annual fee for the first year and then get it converted to this new double cash card. Other readers have confirmed that in the past Citi has enforced this one year rule.
The 2% cash back is earned in the following way:
- 1% cash back when you make your purchase
- 1% cash back when you pay for those purchases
I was hoping that Citibank was trying to teach it’s customers to be responsible with credit and pay their cards in full every month but unfortunately the second 1% is earned whether you pay in full or pay over time as long as you make your minimum payment.
You should always always always be paying your credit card in full to avoid any high interest charges. If there is one thing I hate seeing, it’s people paying money to these massive corporate behemoths because they didn’t pay their card in full.
Card Pros:
- 2% cash back
- Mastercard (Fidelity offers a 2% cash back card but this is an American Express card which has lower acceptance)
- No annual fee
- 0% introductory APR for the first 15 billing cycles
- Rewards can be redeemed in increments of $25
Card Cons:
- 3% foreign transaction fee
- Not currently able to do a product change from an existing Citibank product
- Cashback expires after one year if no charges are placed on the card
Our Verdict
Because of the fact that no sign up bonus is currently being offered, I don’t think this card is worth applying for directly. Here’s why: instead of signing up for this card you could instead sign up for a card that has a high cash sign up bonus the current highest is the Wells Fargo Propel card which is $400 + $100 travel reimbursement. Removing the travel reimbursement completely you’d need to spend $20,000 on this new Citibank product to match that bonus. Most people aren’t spending nearly that much on non bonus category spend.
A lot of people, myself included also already have the Fidelity American Express card which earns 2% cash back on all purchases and as such we’d need to be putting through $20k worth of spend that couldn’t be put on that American Express card. I personally don’t really have too many troubles with AmEx acceptance.
There are also other options, e.g the Barclays Arrival which comes with 40,000 points after $3,000 in spend which are worth $440 when redeeming against travel expenses and also earns at a rate of 2.22%. Let’s also not forget the JCB Marukai card which earns 3% cash back, but has an extremely weird earning and redemption model.
We’ve put together this list of cards which offer a high cash back rate on all purchases which might be useful for those considering signing up for this Citibank offer.
All of that being said, I can see why some people would be incredibly interested in this offer. Anybody with a Citibank card that is currently sitting idle would be silly not to consider doing a product change to this card, we’ll see how easy that process is in early September and if all cards can be downgraded or not.
Those who have already signed up for the higher cash credit card bonuses might also find this new card alluring, especially if they don’t have the Fidelity card or have a lot of credit card spend which cannot be done on an American Express.
I’ll personally be sitting this offer out, come September I’ll downgrade one of my Citibank cards to this and use it when I can’t use my American Express (or gift cards which I’ve earned more than 2% on). The Fidelity AmEx card will still be my main one though as the points are more flexible and can be more valuable when redeeming for travel.
It’s also worth waiting to see if Citi decides to offer a sign up bonus for this card and see if any new information is released before signing up. This card should also now show up when using Citi’s pre-qualified card tool.
Thanks to the following forums for providing some of the information found in this post:
