Citi has added Choice Privileges as a 1:2 transfer partner for cards with an annual fee and 1:1.5 for cards without an annual fee. For every 1,000 Citi ThankYou points you transfer you’ll receive 2,000 Choice Privilege points on the Citi Premier & Citi Prestige. Choice is generally better value in Europe and Scandinavia. You can find a full list of Citi transfer partners below:
| Emirates | EVA Air Infinity MileageLands | Malaysia Airlines Enrich |
| AirFrance-KLM Flying Blue | Etihad Guest | Qatar Airways Privilege Club |
| Asia Miles | Accor Hotels (1:0.5) | Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer |
| Thai Airways Royal Orchid Plus | Virgin Atlantic Flying Club | Qantas |
| JetBlue (1:0.8 rate, 0.5 with Preferred) | Sears SYWRP (1:12) | Jet Airways JetPrivilege |
| Turkish Airlines Miles & Smiles | Avianca LifeMiles | Club Premier Aeromexico |
| Choice Hotels (1:2) | Leading Hotels of the World (5:1) |
Does anyone have transfer issues today? An agent couldn’t help, the error message sounded like a Choice issue, so I created a second new account and still isn’t working. In order history, each one says ‘canceled’ and the error message reads ‘When we tried to complete your Points Transfer, we encountered a system error. Please try again or contact Customer Service for help.’
I am having the same issue since last week and “Customer Service” has not been able to help yet. Were you able to get your issue resolved and if so, what did you have to do? Thanks.
It was resolved after a few days. There was nothing they could do help me either. Was a major disappointment as I had a great deal using points in Rome. Now I keep some Choice points in reserve just in case.
Thanks for the information. I have been waiting for “Customer Service” for over a week and trying almost every day to see if it was fixed. I started out trying to transfer 100K, but also tried 75K and 50K. Each time it was immediately “cancelled”. Today, I finally tried 25K and it worked fine so I did it twice and that worked so I am good for the moment. Good idea keeping some in reserve if transferring quickly is going to be unreliable.
Decent deal. Just got 80k TY pts and can cash out at 1 cpp with Premier. Or transfer to Choice hotels at 0.5 cpp.
I just booked a cheap roadside Choice Hotels motel in S Florida pre-cruise for $96 cash, but I could transfer $80 worth of TY pts (8000 pts) over to Choice and redeem the same hotel for 16,000 Choice pts. Savings of $16 before considering the foregone hotel rewards.
are preferred bookings worth transferring can you give an example of a hotel or two?
Choice hotels points are currently on sale for 0.52cpp on Daily Gateaways (ends today). That would value TYP at 1.04cpp. Not really great.
Sure, but you can buy hundreds of thousands of points, at least this year when they didn’t sell out. So if you plan ahead, you can stock up for more than a year.
Honesty it isn’t even that hard to find 0.7-0.9 cpp at Choice hotels in the US. A 1:2 transfer rate is definitely great news.
With high cash rates right now due to pent-up demand, Choice hotels points can be valued over 1cpp easily. I’m able to get 1.6cpp in some cases (though you should not count on it).
yeah.. but besides Ascend, where else would I want to stay at
It depends where you’re traveling. Near some national parks, a Quality Inn might the be the only points hotel nearby in ANY program (or a Days Inn or Super 8 hotel in the Wyndham program might the only other points option). If that’s where you’re going, you either stay at the Quality Inn or you pay through the roof for not necessarily much better an indie hotel nearby, or you have to stay much further away.
If you never go to such places, and only stay in big cities, you can be much more choosy.
By the way, at some Choice hotels (including some Quality Inns near national parks), just about every room may be available on points (and for the same number of points), including some suites! So that can increase the value quite a bit relative to some other programs that only let you book the most basic room with points, or that charge you way more points for better rooms.
+1 on all the points re national parks. $320 for a basic room at Quality Inn in Estes Park, CO or 30k points for their biggest room with a fireplace and a view (equivalent of $156 if bought on a sale like this).
Agreed. We stayed in a very decent Rodeway Inn outside Bryce Canyon. 8k pts/nt but I paid the $55/nt cash rate bc it was so cheap and I was running low on pts. Got a 3.7 star review but it was clean and efficient and close enough to the park.
Also stayed at a $600/nt 2 BR suite outside Yellowstone for 8k/nt (and 16k for the 3rd night because it was a weeknight). 7.5 cents per point, baby!!
I agree, 0-7-0.9 cpp is a very conservative estimate in the current environment. I was able to snag ~1.5 cpp earlier this summer at several Choice properties near national parks. Now unless, there is a devaluation coming soon, the new Citi transfer rate really ups the value of TYP for me.
Yeah, prices around national parks were insane this summer. Super 8s and Quality Inns going for $300+/night. I was glad I had points.