Exactly two weeks ago, I declared “5X everywhere dies again.” There had been a secret application link for the Citi ThankYou Preferred card that offered 5 points per dollar at drugstores, grocery stores, and gas stations for 12 months, but the application link had died.
Fortunately, the Miles Professor has found a great alternative. At a Citibank branch, she found an offer for a Citi ThankYou card with the following benefits (quoted from her post):
- 15,000 bonus ThankYou points after you spend $1,000 in your first 3 months
- 5 ThankYou points for every $1 spent at drugstores, supermarkets and gas stations for 12 months
- The card has no annual fee. Ever.
It looks like this card is functionally equivalent to the ThankYou Preferred card, but has dropped the “Preferred” from its name. So, if you have a Citibank branch nearby it may be worth a visit!
For more details, checkout the Miles Professor’s post: Citi ThankYou Card Offer for 5x At Drugstores Still Alive! (Bank Branch Strikes Again).
And, for more details about Citi’s ThankYou points and how to make the most of them, please see these Frequent Miler posts:
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they have this at my NYC citibank branch. I just signed up, and got the premier card too.
David: Good to know!
HansGolden: Thanks for that data point.
Greg, the TYP shutdowns are very, very real. I know firsthand from folks that shoot straight with me: some of my best buds. Despite the shutdowns feeling pretty random, I believe one of the keys is remaining profitable to Citi/Chase/Amex/etc: I have no fear of shutdown since I have so much profitable legit spend for CC banks. If folks were to do a minimum of non-bonused spend in equal measure to bonused spend, I bet they would not need to fear shut down.
Interesting. The story about shutdowns keep changing. Now it’s redemptions that trigger it?
Re above comment: The TY card without the 1pt per each mile flown was a no yearly fee card and he said the other DSR’s had been blocked recently for changing customers t that card and it was under review by the company.
You might be interested in knowing my experience regarding retention of my Citi Thank You Premier card. I read the above post and then checked a recent bill from Citi; I’ve had the card since July 2011. I thought I had been getting 5x points on the spending on the card this past winter/spring but no I was getting 1pt per dollar. I’ve never redeemed any points. I called Retention saying I was not going to renew in July unless I received an incentive. I was offered a $75 statement credit; also I was offered the same card but without the feature of $1 for every mile flown on purchased flights but he then found that the system would not allow him to do that. I said I wanted something like US Air/ Barclay has offered, 5000 miles for $1000 spent in 90 days. He said they had a new promotion he just found for a $125 statement credit and 2points per dollar for the next 18 months on any items charged. I accepted that offer.
Sam: thanks for that info. I hadn’t heard that the shut downs seem to be triggered by redemptions. I’ll do some research. Sadly, its very hard to distinguish the real stories from the made up ones. A number of people on Flyertalk and in blog comments purposely try to scare people away with stories like these, so I have to be careful about what I publish.
Before starting on the Citi 5x TYP card, people really need to read about the crackdown by Citi-see the FT thread on card abuse. It is not just big hitters-one person who didn’t even have a 5x card was shut down for review after seeking to redeem TYPs for a $50 check; that person is in a second week of pretty serious wrangling with Citi to save TYPs and maybe entire relationship.
People reporting their big 5x spends don’t seem to know that the shut downs are happening when attempting to redeem, not when the points are being accrued.
The original post in this blog about where to find apps for the 5x card really should be amended for this important development.
Btw it wasn’t done with all vanilla cards. I have 3 other prepaid products that I use and alternative reloads as well. See the points guy blog from the past week for some ideas.
Data point: I have now gone through two statement cycles and $26k in spending in a matter of 5 weeks. If not for a family vacation last week I would have more. Now my 2nd statement closed and I got all my 130k plus I also haggled out a 20k bonus at activation because they couldn’t raise my limit past 6.5k I would spend 5-6k per week and pay it off immediately.
I read on FT some where doing $20K/month or more. It was insane. I am in the “high income” bracket (doesn’t feel like it), and I feel nervous spending $3-4K/month at CVS or supermarkets. I can’t believe how some folks spend $10K+ so easily.
Yeah, go for it, but do it wisely. Some idiots that went crazy on this deal, are complaining that Citi closed their accounts and confiscated the points.
The staff at my local Citi bank did not have any pamphlets or other information on this offer.