Citigold Requirements Met & Some Troubling Language
Last month I wrote in great detail about Citi’s pretty amazing promotions for their Citigold accounts. Right now they are offering either 50K AAdvantage miles or 50K ThankYou points for setting up a new account. It is a pretty amazing deal and you can find all of the details in these posts (but read below as well):
Completing the Requirements & Asking Citi for Confirmation
I ultimately chose to go for the 50K AAdvantage miles. The requirements for that deal were:
- 1 or more bill payments in two consecutive months.
- $1,000 in debit card purchases.
Almost immediately after opening the account I paid a bill and loaded $1,000 to my Serve account via online debit loads. Then on Monday I completed the second bill payment since I had to wait for a new calendar month. Shortly after seeing that the payment cleared, I sent Citi a message to confirm I had completed all of the requirements. Here is what I received in return:
Thank you for choosing Citibank for your financial needs!
The fulfilment for the promotion 42ERCWNQU6 is:
-The AAdvantage bonus miles will be credited by Citibank to your AAdvantage account within 90 days from the end of the statement period in which you completes all offer requirements, (10/31/2015) approximately in the month of February 2016
Based on the terms, I see that you have completed the requirements.
Please note, all promotions will differ and are targeted to specific account holders during specific time frames, so if you did not receive this promotion via your Citi credit card statement, personal email, or through U.S mail to your home address you will not qualify for this promotion. We regret if this causes you any inconvenience.
Good & Bad News
This response is both good and bad news I think. On the good side it confirms that loading Serve online counts as a purchase to earn the miles. Great! The bad news is that they are specifically saying that non-targeted people aren’t eligible to receive the bonus. Now I was targeted and confirmed my enrollment several times via secure message, so I am not worried, but I find the inclusion of that language to be quite troubling.
Conclusion
We now know that online Serve debit loads (Bluebird or REDbird should work too) count towards the $1K debit spending requirement on the Citigold checking AAdvantage bonus. What we don’t know is if Citi will try to deny people from getting the bonus if they weren’t targeted. This message says so, but my guess is that people who already confirmed their bonus should be alright. Only time will tell of course.
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[…] Citi these days is a rather pleasant experience. I don’t know if it is because I am a Citigold client, but everyone is super pleasant to deal with. Last week I called on my now three year old […]
I opened the Citigold account in August and just received the 40k TY points last week. I haven’t been charged any fees yet. I was not targeted for this offer either so hopefully it works for others too.
Awesome! Thanks for sharing your data point Iris!
[…] Citigold Checking Bonus Update: Did Loading Serve Trigger the $1K in Spending & Citi May Not Ho… […]
When I chatted with a rep. They’re aware of the offer code, just not sure if they’re picking and choosing who gets it
I was not targeted and I chose the TYP promotion. Upon completing the 2nd bill pay (1st in Oct, 2nd in Nov) I sent a secure message to confirm and below is what I received. No mention of targeting. However there IS language that makes me think I’ll have to pay more than just one $30 monthly fee. “Your 90 day waiting period will begin at the end of November…..Your promotion bonus will be applied after your 90 day waiting period is complete.” So end of February is when my TYPs will post which means I’ll have to pay three $30 fees. Am I reading this wrong?
“Thank you for using Citigold Online for assistance with your banking needs. My name is Stephanie, and it would be my pleasure to verify if you have met your promotion requirements.
Upon reviewing your new account promotion 42ERCZ42PY, it appears that you have met all requirements. Your 90 day waiting period will begin at the end of November. Please keep in mind this waiting period is standard for all promotions and cannot be waived. Your promotion bonus will be applied after your 90 day waiting period is complete.
Please note that at the time the bonus award is to be posted to your account it must be open and in good standing. Since you have met all requirements, no further action is required on your end.”
Crap. As far as I know I wasn’t targeted – just used the offer code in the previous posts. Should I specifically ask if I will get the bonus or just wait? I hate to take on the monthly account fees waiting and never get the AA bonus. Now that I have opened the citigold account, I will not be eligible for any account bonuses for at least 2 years now right? I guess I should have waited to be targeted. grr.
Re cc funding, I’ve read conflicting reports as to what gets hit with cash advance fee. And yes, I have tried to research it, including DoC. Has anyone had that experience?
Wow, this is frustrating news. Sign up/funding with my AA Platinum was actually pretty smooth thanks to all the help from the blogs, and I SM’d to confirm I was eligible for the promo.
I was on the phone this AM with Citi customer service – pretty useless. They kicked me up to a supervisor who was more incompetent than the 1st guy I talked to. Anyway – no mention of not being eligible for the promo because of targeting, but they told me I’d have to wait a minimum of 60-90 days before I got my miles. I’m not optimistic I’ll ever actually see them.
My wife used to work for Citi, and the more I get involved them on the MS Front, the more it confirms what an inept organization they are.
Thanks for the update! I planned on using online serve loads to fulfill it. Still waiting for my debit card to arrive, though. It’s been a couple weeks now….
I was targeted, so no bad news for me in the post.
I opened the CitiGold back in the summer when the 40K TYP deal came out. I called, was told I wasn’t targeted, but took a shot anyway. My real goal was the 45K AA miles from funding with my Barclay Aviator. My debit card didn’t show up after a couple of weeks and they overnighted a new one.
I did the bill pay just in case, then PM’d citi to see if I qualified. They said I had to call. When I called, they said we told you on July 10 that you aren’t targeted. 😉 Oh, well.
So I opened a savings account attached to the checking account and funded with the Barclay Aviator again.
I did keep the acct open long enough to park some cash in it and order Yen for my trip to Japan (Citi has branches in Japan and Japanese hospitals don’t take credit cards, so it was our emergency fund ) They overnighted the Yen for free.
Closed both accounts before any fees posted.
Bottom line:
45k AA miles x 2 = 90 K AA miles
Free foreign currency
Reduced Citi Prestige fee to $350
All for free!!!!!
How can you hate Citi with that kind of generosity? I plan to put lots of spend on my Prestige after I finish my SW companion pass as a thank you.
good for you for having a $45,000 credit limit on one credit card. a lot of us don’t have high limits like that. I was only able to generate 8 as my limit was 15 but I had a balance from purchasing gift cards. also what generosity? they didn’t give me those points I earned them by funding with my credit card. The customer service for their executive card might be good but their banking customer service is some of the worst I’ve ever experienced. that coupled with the fact that they would not honor bonus miles on ghost links to their credit card signup offers….they have not been my favorite to deal with over the past few months.
People on Reddit who had issues getting points credited almost all had problems with AA miles vs TYP.
I’m waiting for my 40k TYP to be delivered. Said by end of November….
Where are you going on Reddit to find people commenting on experiences with this? Can you point me in the right direction?
Not overly bothered if I do not get the bonus, the initial funding + the $100 discount on the prestige make it a worthwhile effort….of course I would love the 50k TYP also, but not a deal breaker.
I will take my points and move on, not worth it wasting energy hating Citi
Lucky you! I tried signing up online before and I got a message saying I have to call them. I think it’s because I live in Hawaii
Everyone got that message. Just hit the back button.
I happened to open a Citi AA Platinum account last month before I learned about the Citigold bonus, and I’ve been trying for nearly a month to get some secure message confirmation of my eligibility. Citi has thus far declined to say yes, or to say no, through seven messages. Anyway, I won’t bother with the account unless the bonus is assured.
Got exact same response. You met terms but you may not qualify. Lovely. Hopefully they aren’t having someone go through every account come bonus time to verify if they were targeted. No complaints though since the real bonus (for me) was in the Arrival miles from the initial funding.
I was not targeted but confirmed the promotion BEFORE and AFTER completing the requirements. I did not notice that language but would be willing to bet it’s in the confirmation message. they have already pissed me off royally by locking me out of my credit card accounts online for two weeks while I waited for them to send me an ATM card and the pin number to log back in . I will go to the CEO if I have to and tear him a new a$$hole if they try not to give me this bonus. i hate Citi
whitney are you a chick? you sound hot and classy ” I will go to the CEO if I have to and tear him a new a$$hole if they try not to give me this bonus. i hate Citi”
Haha says the guy with a picture of a man with a hat covered in blue feathers!
I tried creating another login account online Per their suggestion but that did not work either. all in all I spent over 2 1/2 hours on the phone with them across multiple phone calls. I did finally receive my ATM card and I’m now able to login but am disgusted at the fact that after all of that wasted time and frustration they refused to do anything beyond a $50 statement credit on my credit card. my time is worth a lot more than $50 for 2 1/2 hours plus tons of frustration.
ha if you only knew the truth you’d feel like an idiot for making that comment
I had this happen as well. It’s beyond frustrating when you’re allowed to deposit 5 figures into a checking account that you don’t have access to for a week or more. I’m STILL waiting on my checks too! After a week of having no account number and enough digging around I found out that you can create a new log in with that bank account to gain access.
Now I’m having to siphon funds out $2k at a time and am stuck with a rolling $10k/30 days because I can’t do the withdraw from my other bank (need account number) and I already paid off the credit card used to load the account (don’t want a high balance on statement closing) so billpay isn’t an option. I’ll also be on the hook for an extra $30 monthly fee for it skipping into November 1st (no billpay in October) before I realized how to gain access. All in all if I get the bonus it’ll still be worth it but definitely wasn’t expecting it to be such a hassle and I didn’t particularly enjoy floating that much money when I was already light from other MS related activities.
If you have the ATM card number that’s all you’ll need so hopefully you did get that (or have access to it). Give it a try and good luck.
I tried creating another login account online Per their suggestion but that did not work either. all in all I spent over 2 1/2 hours on the phone with them across multiple phone calls. I did finally receive my ATM card and I’m now able to login but am disgusted at the fact that after all of that wasted time and frustration they refused to do anything beyond a $50 statement credit on my credit card. my time is worth a lot more than $50 for 2 1/2 hours plus tons of frustration.
I’ve signed up and wrote them in secure mail to confirm my enrollment , however based on their term where stated only selected target which gives me bad vibe in what if they keep of tracking who they’d send this promo out to … That would be no good for most of us just sign up using the code
Thank you for the update. I picked the Thankyou Points offer. Do I also need to complete both Bill Pay and 1k debit use. I cannot recall the debit card use part.
The debit was only for the AA offer.