[Confirmed] City National Bank To Change $250 Airline Credit Per User To $350 Across All Cards & Other Negative Changes

Update 11/14/19: They will begin charging a $95 fee per additional user in January (this fee won’t be charged until your card anniversary), remember CNB does not do annual fee refunds so it might make sense to cancel those cards ASAP.

Update 11/1/19: The change to the airline credit has now been confirmed with a number of other negative changes that go into effect January 1st:

  • Under the Airline Incidental Fees Statement Credit benefit, cardholders under the Crystal Visa Infinite Card Account (“Account”) may receive a statement credit of up to $350 per Account per calendar year for Qualifying Airline Purchases (as defined below) charged to the Account.
  • We are revising the Guide to Benefits (a) to change the Priority Pass Select program membership eligibility, enrollment, renewal and change processes and procedures; and (b) to reflect that we will no long cover the access charges for visits by accompanying guests of Members; instead, the Member’s Crystal Visa Infinite Card will be charged $32 per guest, per visit.
  • The Visa Infinite Discount Air Benefit is being discontinued. Accordingly, the section of the Guide to Benefits entitled “Visa Infinite Discount Air Benefit” is deleted in its entirety.
  • We are removing net purchases made at merchants that are classified as gasoline stations or groceries from the category of net purchases that accrue 3 Points for each one dollar spent.

Hat tip to DDG

Original post: City National Bank offers a Visa Infinite card, one of the best perks of that card is that it comes with a $250 airline credit and each cardholder including authorized users gets their own credit. You can add up to 3/4 authorized users, meaning that you could get a credit of up to $1,250 annually. Reddit user adao7000 said that they went into a branch to apply for this card and were told that City National Bank would be revamping this card and as part of the revamp this credit would be changing to $350 across all users. In addition authorized users might cost extra and the sign up bonus will be removed. Obviously this is not confirmed yet, but something to consider.

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Vishal
Vishal (@guest_1086850)
November 8, 2020 12:10

Any recent DP on AA GC?

Giuseppe Benvenuto
Giuseppe Benvenuto (@guest_1048256)
September 3, 2020 15:20

Goodbye GroundLink Benefit:

Did anyone else notice that the GroundLink Benefit was quietly removed from the City National Crystal Visa Infinite Credit Card Guide to Benefits? Isn’t CNB abrogated to send written notice of any changes to programs?

https://www.cnb.com/content/dam/cnbcom/documents/cards/Crystal-Benefits.pdf

This benefit is now struck-through in bold red letters (Pages 76 – 77)

Giuseppe Benvenuto
Giuseppe Benvenuto (@guest_1050480)
September 8, 2020 11:44

That would certainly do it… and it would appear you’re correct. They are outta here!

It’s a shame. Back pre-COVID GroundLink was often times quite competitive (with this discount) with UBER and Lyft. Plus the cars were leaps and bounds better! They were my go to airport service. So I guess it’s understandable they’d go belly up.

Not holing my breath for a comparable replacement benefit…

Tayshung
Tayshung (@guest_1031173)
August 6, 2020 15:22

 William Charles This morning I asked my relationship manager if CNB is going to expand the travel reimbursement category to grocery, restaurants, etc., he replied CNB is considering similar change and should see an official communication with updated card features by the end of August.

Sruly
Sruly (@guest_1035072)
August 12, 2020 13:17

That would be awesome!

Was just thinking I need to use the credit and cash out my points before AF hits.

Thinking of buying a flight with my points through concierge and cancelling for a 12 month airline credit.
Any better ideas to cash out?

Alex O.
Alex O. (@guest_1007338)
June 30, 2020 21:38

DP – AA GC 6/15, CR 6 DL

Kyle
Kyle (@guest_1018548)
July 17, 2020 21:52

Did you buy $350? 6 DL meaning 6 days later?

Yu
Yu (@guest_956620)
April 13, 2020 14:26

Anyone purchased AA GC and got credit recently? If yes, please share when and the GC value you bought.

Thanks.

Vincent
Vincent (@guest_956623)
April 13, 2020 14:41
  Yu

Yes, I bought it in February, $100 and $50 both worked. Bought them in 2 cycles, first 2/10/20 credit posted on 2/14/20 and second 2/27/20 credit posted on 3/4/20

John
John (@guest_897717)
February 3, 2020 20:09

Can confirm the Incidentals credit no longer applies to AA GC’s. Anyone have any ideas on the best way to cash in on the $350 before I have to cancel at the end of March.

VJB
VJB (@guest_901857)
February 7, 2020 14:38

I purchased 1/27 and credit posted 2/5. How did you find out it is not applied?

John
John (@guest_903566)
February 9, 2020 11:54

It was actually just applied, surprisingly. I emailed my account manager and she said AA had been coding gift cards incorrectly in the past and it had been corrected so they would no longer be credited. I’m not sure if it was coincidence or if it got credited because I called and inquired. But it did take over 5 weeks to get the credit.

Phil
Phil (@guest_892605)
January 29, 2020 15:30

Is the annual fee charged the date it was opened or when it was last charged? I believe I applied 2/5/19 but was charged 2/28/19. Does that mean it will be charged the new annual fee on 2/5/20 or 2/28/20? Thanks.

AJ
AJ (@guest_885130)
January 22, 2020 18:45

Have been emailing back and forth with my local branch for the last several months trying to get them to reverse the annual fee and they’ve really lagged the process. Apparently they requested refund from the credit card service team and then escalated it elsewhere but are essentially now telling me I’m **** out of luck. I’m having a hard time finding data points on people’s experience of getting their annual fee reimburse. Any successful dp’s out there on how to proceed?

And I’m also wondering why we haven’t hear much in terms of whether people are being reimbursed for AA e-gift cards?

Scary to think that my family member and I (two cards so $800 worth of annual fees) are both out our cash, with not even AA gc’s to show for it.

Help!

John
John (@guest_897725)
February 3, 2020 20:21
  AJ

My account manager confirmed to me today that they are no longer reimbursing AA GC’s. I purchased one a month ago and was never reimbursed.

VJB
VJB (@guest_901860)
February 7, 2020 14:40

by terms, these should not be reimbursed from day 1… your account manager will never say yes to that

Olympia
Olympia (@guest_873409)
January 12, 2020 10:08

Interested in hearing any stories about reimbursements for 2020. There are currently no data points on flyer talk about folks seeing any credits.

Alex
Alex (@guest_874557)
January 13, 2020 11:39

So far negative experience. I had a transaction on 1/2 which posted on 1/6. Still no reimbursement.

Olympia
Olympia (@guest_876212)
January 14, 2020 17:31

Thanks for sharing. I need to buy soon to be able to cancel before the fee. Obviously would rather not be stuck holding the bill for them though. I guess we wait and see.

cjsjtu
cjsjtu (@guest_891872)
January 28, 2020 23:32

Still no reimbursement after 20 days

Feng
Feng (@guest_878325)
January 16, 2020 12:51

I am also waiting for any data points regarding airline travel credit in 2020 before canceling the card.

Nightwisper
Nightwisper (@guest_890620)
January 27, 2020 23:13

Purchased 2 AA gift cards on 1/14/2020. Still waiting for reimbursement. Anyone had good luck this year?

John
John (@guest_897726)
February 3, 2020 20:22

My account manager confirmed to me today that they are no longer reimbursing AA GC’s. I purchased one a month ago and was never reimbursed.

Anyone have any ideas how to get the most out of the $350 in the shortest amount of time? I was thinking of buying and selling United Club passes but would lose almost 50% of the value.

Liam
Liam (@guest_864232)
January 2, 2020 18:40

I bought $250 AA e-gift card on 12/29/19. I figured it would take a few days for the credit to post on the account. Will that count against the 2019 limit or 2020 limit? Thanks a lot in advance.

Josh
Josh (@guest_867041)
January 7, 2020 10:09

I bought a gift card on 12/31/2018 and it counted for 2018.