replacement Sears Mastercard is a World MC

[coldfusion]

I've posted here before about being a longtime holder of a Sears (Platinum) Mastercard, the card itself is nothing special except that for the last 3 years or so I frequently get 10X bonus TYP offers that I can readily meet with organic spend for a net 11 TYP/dollar yield.

I was a little surprised today to get a replacement card, even more surprised that it came with a congratulations that the card benefits have been upgraded and to use my World Mastercard with ThankYou Rewards etc etc, along with a standard Citi World Mastercard guide to benefits.  The card itself has the `world` writing under the citi label on the front.

No idea if Citi has been doing this on a targeted basis and I happened to meet some criteria to warrant an upgrade, if all current Sears Mastercard with TYP Rewards cards are being upgraded to World Mastercards, or ???

Has anyone else been upgraded, and if so when?

[blindambition]

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@coldfusion wrote:

I've posted here before about being a longtime holder of a Sears (Platinum) Mastercard, the card itself is nothing special except that for the last 3 years or so I frequently get 10X bonus TYP offers that I can readily meet with organic spend for a net 11 TYP/dollar yield.

I was a little surprised today to get a replacement card, even more surprised that it came with a congratulations that the card benefits have been upgraded and to use my World Mastercard with ThankYou Rewards etc etc, along with a standard Citi World Mastercard guide to benefits.  The card itself has the `world` writing under the citi label on the front.

No idea if Citi has been doing this on a targeted basis and I happened to meet some criteria to warrant an upgrade, if all current Sears Mastercard with TYP Rewards cards are being upgraded to World Mastercards, or ???

Has anyone else been upgraded, and if so when?

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Congrats on the upgrade. Even if Citi nuked their benefits. 😊 

[AverageJoesCredit]

Congrats @coldfusion . Thats cool

[wasCB14]

Between Citi and MC nerfs, a Citi WEMC by late 2019 will be worse than a Citi Platinum MC from early 2019.

Of course, nerfing benefits doesn't stop Citi and MC from wanting to charge higher fees for these allegedly premium cards. If merchants are reluctant to discriminate between cards (charging consumers different prices) then it won't sway individual behavior much.

[coldfusion]

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@AverageJoesCredit wrote:
Congrats @coldfusion . Thats cool

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Thanks AJC.

I find it an interesting take given both Sears' state and Citi's upcoming nerfing of benefits.  Whether it's a general change or only targeted may give a hint as to why they're doing it. If a general change one plausible explanation is that it's just a way to backdoor higher merchant fees, as wasCB14 infers.