Citi cardholders who log into their accounts may see a pop-up detailing the exact benefits being removed from their cards, which will vary depending on the Citi card. You can also call the number on the back of your card, but Citi confirmed that all cards will lose the following:
Citi Price Rewind (a form of price protection).
Trip cancellation and interruption protection.
Other departing perks, depending on the Citi card, include:
Ah, reminds me of the good old days when you could file a $500 price protection claim against stuff like TVs on BuyDig/Greentoe via a fly-by-night merchant’s advertised price…
It would seem like there’s no real reason to hold a Citi card anymore based on this news? We have one in the sock drawer that my wife got before we met. Our primary cards, depending on the purchase, are the Priceline Rewards Visa and the City National Bank (Not Citi) Crystal Visa Infinite.
That’s really a laundry list of all the best benefits. It’s hard to think of any reason to keep Citi cards if extended warranty, price rewind, and travel protections are gone. I mean say for the very popular Double Cash card, why would you keep using Citi compared to Fidelity VISA Signature card that gives the same cashback plus those other benefits?
I’m guessing Citi are hoping for inertia from a lot of card holders they accumulated with attractive terms. It’ll be interesting to see if they are correct or if backlash is more than they anticipated. Definitely for me, all our Citi cards are now sock drawer material.
I’d say it’s removed on most cards. From our cards, here’s what it looks like:
Double Cash: all benefits removed
Citi Dividend Platinum Select: all benefits removed.
Citi ThankYou Preferred: all benefits removed except extended warranty.
Citi AAdvantage: all benefits removed except extended warranty.
Pretty much all their attractive cards have lost all benefits. Which goes back to not having any reason to use them considering other options available.
I agree not much use for their cards, although i knew price rewind wouldn’t last…
On the warranty front, I already discounted citi’s completely as worthless and had moved durable goods to amex.
But I still have 60k or so orphaned citi points from years ago.
I canceled all of my Citi accounts years ago after a terrible customer service experience. As price match benefits have been removed on other cards I’ve been tempted to go back, but don’t value that benefit quite enough to deal with Citi. I feel slightly vindicated but mostly disappointed; anytime a major issuer cuts a benefit it’s bad for consumers overall.
The Citi Prestige card is losing most if not all of the “depending on card” benefits. I can’t think of another card which may be keeping those. Does anyone have a card that’s keeping those benefits, like return protection? Perhaps the AA Executive card?
The application page for that card do not show any travel insurance, rental reimbursement, etc within the travel benefits so I’d conclude that it’s been axed as well. For other benefits, they only list purchase protection against fraud. Again does not bode well for retaining benefits.
It’s hard to imagine a card with $450 annual fee not having the minimum benefits almost all other travel cards have, even those with no annual fee but I think Citi just decided that most people did not care enough about those benefits and those who do are customers they’d rather not have (such as the bad customers reading these very boards).
Credit card fringe benefits, aside from the points/miles per dollar, often go unnoticed by most consumers. If I were to ask my wife, for instance, about which card she should use for large purchases to an extend a warranty, or which card to use for a hotel, she would have no idea. In fact, the whole concept of a credit card extending a warranty or providing travel interruption insurance wouldn’t even cross her mind. The only thing she knows about is collision damage waivers for rental cars. I suspect most consumers are also in this boat.
And our situation is really easy - travel, restaurants, groceries, and anything that needs an extended warranty goes on the Crystal Visa Infinite card. Everything else goes on the Priceline card. Most consumers have wallets full of credit cards and no clue what benefits are attached to them aside from their payments and maybe the points they get per dollar spent.
On the flipside, the customers that are aware of the benefits, and thus use them, are likely Citi’s least profitable customers. People on no-AF cards like Double Cash that make extended warranty claims, carry no balance from month to month, and file $500 price protection requests are bad customers for them.
As you mentioned, the interesting group of people seems to be those shelling out the big bucks for a luxury card with annual fees in excess of $400. Those folks likely know about the fringe benefits since they are paying for them, and so long as they aren’t abusing the hell out of the card, are also likely pretty profitable for Citi. They are probably higher income as well… not sure what they are thinking to cut benefits from these cards. It would have allowed them to create a clear tier system where no AF cards get zero benefits, and the expensive cards get a slew of perks.
I agree totally. It seems to me to be a much more sensible strategy to add value to those luxury cards.
The timing is kinda funny for me because I was about to close a couple of Citi AAdvantage cards (to reset the 2-yr churning clock). Now beyond the annual fee, I have a perfect reason to give them when they ask why I’m closing them.