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The Citi Prestige® Card is the best card on the market. It comes with:
- 50,000 bonus ThankYou Points after $3,000 in purchases made with your card in the first 3 months the account is open
- $250 in airfare or airline fee credits per calendar year
- free access to the American Airlines Admirals Clubs and Priority Pass lounges for you and guests
- 3x points per dollar on air travel and hotels
- the fourth night free on paid hotel stays
- free rounds of golf
- $100 rebate for Global Entry
The card has a $450 annual fee that is NOT waived, but as long as you have a plan to maximize the 50,000 bonus points and $250 annual fee credit by getting it twice in your first year with the card, you should come out way ahead.
Here’s how I’d use the 50,000 bonus points to get at least $800 and probably a lot more value.
The $250 Air Travel Credit should be simple to maximize to get $500 worth of statement credits before your next annual fee. The Air Travel Credit refunds to you the first $250 per calendar year that you charge to the Citi Prestige® Card in the categories of:
- airfare (booked with the airline or an online travel agency like Orbitz)
- award taxes, fees, and fuel surcharges
- baggage fees
- upgrade fees
- onboard food
- seat selection fees
- airline change fees
Get a $250 credit in 2015 for airfare or fees and another in early 2016, and you’ll get $500 worth of credits in your first year with the card.
But there’s one wrinkle. Check the fine print on the Air Travel Credit from the card’s offer page:
You see that? “Calendar year” doesn’t mean January 1 to December 31. If means January statement period through December statement period. That means if your statement closes on the 15th each month, your calendar year 2015 is December 16, 2014 to December 15, 2015.
This means two things:
- You don’t have until December 31, 2015 to make charges that count toward the 2015 statement credit.
- If you get the Citi Prestige® Card in December, your first 12 statements will be January through December meaning you only get one $250 statement credit in the first 12 months.
That leads me to a conclusion:
Either get the Citi Prestige now or wait until January.
If you get the card now, you will have one statement that closes in 2015. You must get your full $250 credit for 2015 on that statement (which I did easily on my first statement) because the $250 credit resets on your second statement that will come out in January 2016. You’d have 11 statements to get your next $250 credit before your next annual fee.
If you get the card in January, you will will have 11 statements (February through December) to get your first $250 credit and one (January 2017) to get your second $250 credit before your second annual fee.
Bottom Line
Because of the fine print on the $250 Air Travel Credit, you need to get the Citi Prestige® Card now or from January 2016 on in order to get $500 in statement credits from the benefit during your first $450 annual fee.
Just getting started in the world of points and miles? The Chase Sapphire Preferred is the best card for you to start with.
With a bonus of 60,000 points after $4,000 spend in the first 3 months, 5x points on travel booked through the Chase Travel Portal and 3x points on restaurants, streaming services, and online groceries (excluding Target, Walmart, and wholesale clubs), this card truly cannot be beat for getting started!
Editorial Disclaimer: The editorial content is not provided or commissioned by the credit card issuers. Opinions expressed here are the author’s alone, not those of the credit card issuers, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the credit card issuers.
The comments section below is not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved, or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser’s responsibility to ensure all questions are answered.
Also, for golfers, you can use the 3 free rounds before the end of the year. I’m going to Scottsdale in Dec and playing TPC and Gold Canyon, so over $500 in green fees for free. Throw in the 4th night free and the $250 airline credit and that’s over $1000 in benefits before the 50K Thank You points.
I got my card earlier this year (April) and charged more than $250 in air fare during the first statement. My bill stated that I would receive the airline credit in the last statement of the calendar year. If this is how Citi uniformly handles this credit, I do not see how this allows one to get two $250 credits within the first year of having the card unless you actually renew the card for a second year so as to get a second end of calendar year credit. The benefits of this card totally justify the fees for me, but I don’t believe you can get two credits while only paying one year in fees, unless there is a special limited time frame that this would work. Global entry fee reimbursement was immediate and appeared as a credit to my account when I looked at my transaction history online, even before my statement came out.
Huh? My credit appeared on the statement on which the charges appeared. Are you sure you didn’t already get the first $250?
The big drawback for me is the booking site. I consider myself pretty tech savvy. After all, I thought myself how to build and use computers, but that site is just nasty. Any plans on doing a guide on how to book there?
What are you having trouble with?
I got the Citi Prestige Card back in April 2015. When I opened the Citi Gold Checking account, in November, my Prestige card was closed and a new one opened. Of course I received a partial credit for the annual fee, and the new annual fee of $350 was charged. I didn’t have the opportunity to use the second $250 travel credit (which really sucks!) I was going to use the $250 annual fee for the new card this month, but it appears it wouldn’t make any difference since the billing cut off date is in January.
[…] $250 Air Travel Credit, which refunds airfare, airline fees, and award taxes and fees, resets as soon as your December 2015 statement closes. Mine closed December 3, […]