Citi has announced that you can now transfer Citi ThankYou points to a number of airline partners, this is in addition to the transfer partner of Hilton they already had. You need to have one of the following credit cards open to be able to transfer their partners:
- Citi ThankYou Premier: Annual fee of $125 waived for the first twelve months. 20,000 points after $2,000 in purchases within the first 3 months of account opening. Earn an additional 30,000 points after another $3,000 in purchases within the first 3 months of your second year of being a cardmember.
- Citi Prestige:Â Annual fee of $425, not waived. $200 statement credit for airline fees and 30,000 ThankYou points after $2,000 in purchases. Those with a CitiGold checking account might be able to get a higher bonus by asking at their branch.
- Citi Chairman: No longer available for sign ups, basically been replaced by the Prestige.Â
Below is a full list of the partner programs and their exchange rate:
Hotel:
- Hilton: 1:1.5 transfer (e.g 1,000 ThankYou points = 1,500 Hilton points)
Airlines:
All of the airline programs have a 1:1 transfer rate. This means that you’ll receive 1,000 airline miles if you exchange 1,000 Citi ThankYou points.
- Asia Miles
- EVA Air Infinity MileageLands
- Etihad Guest
- Garuda Indonesia Frequent Flyer
- Qatar Airways Privilege Club
- Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
- Thai Airways Royal Orchid Plus
Our Verdict
This is a nice change and will definitely be a welcome change for those with a stockpile of ThankYou points. For those that don’t have a stock pile this will make other earning opportunities more attractive, for example:
- Earning Citi ThankYou points monthly when you have a checking account open
- For those who still have an active Citi Forward, there is an extremely easy (and cost effective) way of manufacturing credit card spend at bookstores
- You can also still get 5x points on all dining expenses
If you know of any other easy methods of racking up ThankYou points please let us know in the comments section.
In terms of the best transfer partner options, Singapore Airlines seems to be the standout but it really isn’t my specialty at all (I suck when it comes to the tricks of redeeming). I’ll link to the best posts on that subject below, if you found any posts particularly helpful then let me know about them in the comments (shameless self promotion is OK, just as long as the post doesn’t suck).
It looks like Malaysia airlines was also originally a transfer partner, I’m unsure why they were removed.
