One of the more lucrative features for the cardmembers of Citibank has been the ability to get a 30% Citi Bonus Points on their Citi Prestige Credit Cards, if they had a CitiGold Account. There is both good news and bad news on this front.

The good news first, and it has already been put in action. Citibank has now decided to add more cards which get bonuses and also more account types. Citibank is now offering bonuses on the following credit cards:

• Citi Rewards Credit Card
• Citi Cashback Credit Card
• Indian Oil Citi Credit Card
• Citi Premier Miles Card
• Citi Prestige

For six billing cycles which start after July 1, 2019, Citibank is offering bonuses to customers who also hold an affluent/HNI account with Citibank, on a monthly basis. The offers are valid for customers with the following accounts:

• CitiPriority (15% bonus on net points earned)
• CitiGold (30% bonus on net points earned)
• Citi Private Client (50% bonus on net points earned)

However, there is a catch here. You only get the bonus in the months you maintain the Net Relationship Value with Citibank for the month prior. For instance, if you have a mid-month to mid-month billing cycle, then in the month prior, your Citibank account should have the Net Relationship Value in the bank:

• CitiPriority (INR 15 Lakhs)
• CitiGold (INR 75 Lakhs)
• Citi Private Client (INR 5 Crores)

There is no cap on the additional reward points credited for a month. These additional reward points are exclusively brought to you basis your relationship value and is independent of all the other existing Offers promoted by the Bank. Additional reward points will be calculated and credited within 60 days from the credit card statement generation date of all open and active Customers’ account(s).

Now for the bad news. For CitiGold and Citi Private Clients, Citibank used to provide a 30% annual bonus on points earned. This was a card feature, and not a promotion. This feature has been discontinued for good now, and for the first half of 2019, these customers are being pro-rate awarded points as per the following grid on their spends:

Cumulative spends from 1st Jan’19 till the start of the Statement cycle in July 2019:

• INR 2.5 Lakhs – INR 5 Lakhs: 10% Bonus
• INR 5 Lakhs – INR 7.5 Lakhs: 20% Bonus
• INR 7.5 Lakhs+: 30% Bonus

Basically, Citibank has moved the goalpost here totally, and if this is a good thing or bad, depends on which side of the table you are on. Earlier, people who just had an account were getting the benefits of additional points. For instance, if you had an NRV with Citi for CitiGold with just INR 25 lakh rupees only from back in the day, you don’t get these benefits then. Or if you have an NRV of a couple of lakhs with CitiPriority, you get filtered out for this promotion.

Here are the updated T&Cs of this product feature turned into promotion now.

What is your take on this new Citibank promotion which broadbases the participation in terms of using Citibank Cards with Citibank Banking relationships?