Tag Archives: Citi Bank

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How to Pool Hilton Honors Points into 1 Account

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Good morning everyone, happy Monday!  I had a great time in Minneapolis this past weekend at Frequent Traveler University (FTU) Advanced.  I enjoyed catching up with old friends, meeting readers, and networking with fellow travel hackers.  If you missed FTU, the next travel conference I will be at (and speaking at) is Chicago Seminars, on October 20-22.

Last week, I wanted to book a 5 night Hilton stay, but I only had enough Hilton Honors Points to cover the first night.  I could have booked the first night and then racked up the remaining Hilton Honors Points over the next several months to book the rest of the nights, but I wanted to take advantage of Hilton’s 5th Night Free feature, where when you book a stay of 5 nights or longer, you do not need to pay points for the 5th night.  I reached out to my travel hacker friends on Facebook and Twitter and asked if someone would let me borrow 91,000 Hilton Honors Points so I could book the 5 night stay.  Luckily, 1 of my friends agreed to help me out and we were able to test out Hilton’s new point pooling feature. Here is how you can pool Hilton Honor Points into 1 Hilton account.

As you can see, I only had 69,365 Hilton Honors Points, but I was short 90,635 Hilton Honors Points needed to book a 5 night stay that cost 160,000 Hilton Honors Points.  Rates were 40,000 Hilton Honors Points per night, but since the 5th night was free, I only needed to pay 160,000 Hilton Honors Points (4 x 40,000 = 160,000). To get started pooling Hilton Honors Points, sign into your Hilton account and click on More Ways to Use Points under the My Points section on the left side on the page.

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How to Cancel Airline Tickets Booked with Citi ThankYou Points

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Good morning everyone.  A few weeks ago, I redeemed my Citi Thank You Points for an American Airlines flight that was a code share with Alaska Airlines.  By booking the American Airlines code share flight instead of the Alaska Airlines flight, I was able to get 1.6 cents per point (CPP) for my Citi Thank You Point redemption.  This redemption value is only going to be around until July 27, 2017, then all flights booked with Citi Thank You Points will only get 1.25 CPP in value.  At the time, I was very pleased with the redemption value, but then a few weeks later, my travel plans changed and I no longer needed that flight.

Luckily, a schedule change occurred and I was able to cancel my airline reservation for free and get my Citi Thank You Points redeposited into my account.  In this post, I will explain the process of cancelling an airline reservation and getting your Citi Thank You Points redeposited.

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Forgot Expiration Date or Misplaced Citi Hilton Honors Reserve Credit Card Free Weekend Night Certificate?

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Good afternoon everyone, I hope you had a great Mother’s Day weekend.  Over the last few months, I have received my 2 free weekend night certificates from my 2 Citi Hilton Honors Reserve Credit Cards after spending $10,000 on each credit card during my card member year.  This is possible if you sign up for a new Citi Hilton Honors Reserve Credit Card every 2 years and keep your existing Citi Hilton Honors Reserve Credit Card open (that satisfies Citi’s 24 month rule where you cannot open or close that card or a card in the same rewards family within the last 24 months).  As an example, I got my first Citi Hilton Honors Reserve Credit Card in February 2013 and my second card in March 2016.  I plan on getting a third card after March 2018.  I wonder if you can convert an existing Citi credit card to a Citi Hilton Honors Reserve Credit Card.  Does anyone know?

Anyway, I wanted to share some details about the old and new Citi Hilton Honors Reserve Credit Card Free Weekend Night Certificate.  Depending on when you applied for that credit card, your free weekend night certificate may look like the old or new format.  The old format is not very pretty but it contains more useful information.  The new format is cleaner, but doesn’t provide as much information.

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Book One Way Award Flights to Hawaii on Delta for 15,000 KLM / Air France Flying Blue Miles

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Good afternoon everyone, I hope your week is going well.  A few nights ago, I was helping a friend find and book award tickets from the Bay Area to Kauai, Hawaii (LIH – Lihue, Hawaii).  She is a teacher and wanted to travel over Spring Break next year. Her Spring Break is the first week of April and Easter is on April 1, 2018, so she wanted to leave right after Easter.  I went to Google Flights to see what flight options were available but their flight calendar doesn’t show any flights past April 1, 2018 (if you are reading this post after May 8, then it should show you later dates).

Google Flights SFO-LIH Map No 4-2-2017

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My Recent Citi Forward & Premier Credit Card Retention / Targeted Spending Offers

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Good morning everyone, I hope you had a festive Drinko Cinco de Mayo yesterday.  A few weeks ago, I called Citi to convert my Citi Prestige Credit Card into a Citi Dividend Credit Card.  During that call, I asked the rep if it were possible to convert my Citi Forward Credit Card to another Citi Dividend Credit Card.  She checked the card’s offers and told me that no product change / conversion offers were available.  Undeterred, I asked if she saw any other offers on the credit card and she read off a few retention / targeted spending offers.  After going through all available offers, I accepted an offer for 3,000 bonus Citi Thank You Points after spending $300 in the next 30-90 days (I don’t remember the exact number of days, since I was planning on completing the spending requirement the following day).

To complete the spending requirement, I loaded / reloaded my Amazon gift card balance with $301 using my Citi Forward Credit Card.  A long time ago, the Citi Forward Credit Card used to offer 5x Citi Thank You Points at restaurants and bookstores (including Amazon).  But unfortunately, on June 4, 2016, Citi changed the earning rate of the Citi Forward Credit Card from 5x to 2x at restaurants and bookstores, thereby reducing my spending on the card from a lot to $0.

Fun fact: The rep mentioned that as long as there is a purchase once every 25 statement cycles (~2 years), Citi will not close the credit card for inactivity.

Reload Amazon Gift Card Balance

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