CITI Cards

[enharu]

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@longtimelurker wrote:

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@Hockeyplayrr wrote:

unless you are going to redeem thank you points for gift cards.  They seem to be pretty worthless.  Statement credit only gets you about 50 cents per point.   Making the 2x dining and entertainment category equal to only 1% cash back...

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Mortgage/Student loan redemptions (which don't need either a mortgage or a student loan) work fine at 1c per point.

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dont they make the check payable to the bank? how do you cash it?

[enharu]

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@B335is wrote:
I would advise anybody remotely thinking of the Citi AAdvantage card to take into consideration American's massive devaluation of reward travel. Partner awards havent been changed yet but that will be the next shoe to drop.

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+1. most likely they'll devalue it within the next couple months. Hopefully they'll notify us ahead of time though. The ninja move was just downright shady. 

Luckily, I redeemed most of my AA miles last week for a trip to HK! Gonna be attending the Mnet music awards this year. I was gonna apply for a 2nd AA exec card, but I guess it's not as compelling of an offer now.

[Alaskagurl]

I hope they don't devalue partnet awards. IF, they do I will close the card and use CSP or NFCU Flagship 2x rewards and pick the cheapest flights!

[Shock]

Im looking to PC when my one year anniversary hits. The AA Advantage seems like the best out of em all. But I don't anticipate flying American too much. It would be sweet if it had no annual fee.

EDIT: Now that I learned they will devalue AA miles, no cards look good to me anymore. And my CDP is pretty useless.

[B335is]

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@Alaskagurl wrote:

I hope they don't devalue partnet awards. IF, they do I will close the card and use CSP or NFCU Flagship 2x rewards and pick the cheapest flights!

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It's not so much a matter of IF they will devalue partner awards, but WHEN they will be devalued - hopefully months away - but I certainly wouldn't sit on those miles for too long.

[Hockeyplayrr]

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@enharu wrote:

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@longtimelurker wrote:

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@Hockeyplayrr wrote:

unless you are going to redeem thank you points for gift cards.  They seem to be pretty worthless.  Statement credit only gets you about 50 cents per point.   Making the 2x dining and entertainment category equal to only 1% cash back...

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Mortgage/Student loan redemptions (which don't need either a mortgage or a student loan) work fine at 1c per point.

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dont they make the check payable to the bank? how do you cash it?

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yeah how do you go about this? I have a bunch of points just sitting there.

[iwazl71]

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@ozjulian wrote:

Between the CITI TYP and CITI HiltonHonors or CITI AA Platinum.

What would be the best card among the 3? Thanks

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I say the Hilton Reserve.  I got the Reserve about a year ago and and so far have spent about 5k on it.  In return, I got 2 weekend nights which I spent on a nice weekend 5 star hotel in New York, and also about 150k points which earned 3 nights at a real nice 4 star hotel.  That was about $2000 in hotel rewards.

[NoAnchoviesPlease]

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@Hockeyplayrr wrote:

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@enharu wrote:

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@longtimelurker wrote:

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@Hockeyplayrr wrote:

unless you are going to redeem thank you points for gift cards.  They seem to be pretty worthless.  Statement credit only gets you about 50 cents per point.   Making the 2x dining and entertainment category equal to only 1% cash back...

---

Mortgage/Student loan redemptions (which don't need either a mortgage or a student loan) work fine at 1c per point.

---

dont they make the check payable to the bank? how do you cash it?

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yeah how do you go about this? I have a bunch of points just sitting there.

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I got several thousand dollars in student loan "rebates" this way from TYP, just had to call in, give the name of my servicer, and they mailed me the check. Then I wrote my account number on it and mailed it in. This was probably 5+ years ago at least. And since you're sending a check it counts toward your payments, unlike a rewards statement credit. 

[longtimelurker]

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@NoAnchoviesPlease wrote:

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@Hockeyplayrr wrote:

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@enharu wrote:

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@longtimelurker wrote:

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@Hockeyplayrr wrote:

unless you are going to redeem thank you points for gift cards.  They seem to be pretty worthless.  Statement credit only gets you about 50 cents per point.   Making the 2x dining and entertainment category equal to only 1% cash back...

---

Mortgage/Student loan redemptions (which don't need either a mortgage or a student loan) work fine at 1c per point.

---

dont they make the check payable to the bank? how do you cash it?

---

yeah how do you go about this? I have a bunch of points just sitting there.

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I got several thousand dollars in student loan "rebates" this way from TYP, just had to call in, give the name of my servicer, and they mailed me the check. Then I wrote my account number on it and mailed it in. This was probably 5+ years ago at least. And since you're sending a check it counts toward your payments, unlike a rewards statement credit. 

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Yes, but that is the good "correct" way, which is not what I am referring to!

But similarly, I redeemed 110,250 TYP, calling up the Thank You Center and saying I wanted a Mortgage check redemption.  They asked who the holder is and whether they are OK accepting partial payments.   I gave the name of Bank of America and said yes.   A few days later, three checks ($1000, $100 and $25) come to my house, payable to Bank of America.   I just sign and deposit in my checking account, either via smartphone or ATM.

Some people deposit real stuff this way, writing the Bank name as payee, so it is nothing special.

Now Citi could tighten up, and see from my CR for example that my mortgage is with Wells Fargo, but people have done this for quite a while, so probably not on their priority list to fix

[NoAnchoviesPlease]

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@longtimelurker wrote:

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Yes, but that is the good "correct" way, which is not what I am referring to!

But similarly, I redeemed 110,250 TYP, calling up the Thank You Center and saying I wanted a Mortgage check redemption.  They asked who the holder is and whether they are OK accepting partial payments.   I gave the name of Bank of America and said yes.   A few days later, three checks ($1000, $100 and $25) come to my house, payable to Bank of America.   I just sign and deposit in my checking account, either via smartphone or ATM.

Some people deposit real stuff this way, writing the Bank name as payee, so it is nothing special.

Now Citi could tighten up, and see from my CR for example that my mortgage is with Wells Fargo, but people have done this for quite a while, so probably not on their priority list to fix

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Ah, I completely missed that bit of the details That would've been nice some months, although paying down the student loan was also good.