A New Era For Citi Thank You Points

[Joe4007]

If one has a Citi TY card that is ineligible to transfer points, would opening one of the eligible cards allow to transfer the points accumulated with the ineligible card?

[Nitantnel]

AA wants people to sign up for AA cards, not thankyou cards.

It works with BA for Chase, Delta with Amex, etc etc etc...

[AJK]

It works with BA for Chase, Delta with Amex, etc etc etc...

And how many people actually spend on any of those cards?

[Joe4007]

And how many people actually spend on any of those cards?

Out of the mileage community, I would assume a lot.

[Nitantnel]

And how many people actually spend on any of those cards?

Well, I'm sure they have them for a reason. The average guy who wants to accumulate Delta miles does not look for an MR or SPG card.

[David R]

If one has a Citi TY card that is ineligible to transfer points, would opening one of the eligible cards allow to transfer the points accumulated with the ineligible card?

Yes. Call Thank You and have them combine the Thank You accounts from both cards so that all points are in one pool. You should then be able to transfer the points earned from all the cards.

[Joe4007]

Yes. Call Thank You and have them combine the Thank You accounts from both cards so that all points are in one pool. You should then be able to transfer the points earned from all the cards.

Thanks.

[AJK]

Well, I'm sure they have them for a reason. The average guy who wants to accumulate Delta miles does not look for an MR or SPG card.

Just because Chase and AmEx are willing to cannibalize their other card offerings does not make it good business.

And, I'd argue the overwhelming amount of miles earned in DL/AA/UA are earned from transferrable currency cards (i.e. SPG/Plat/SP) and not their co-branded brethren. I imagine that most people who are even the least bit engaged with the their FFN programs are aware of both the existence of transferrable points and the ability to earn  to use the parent-cards in a more lucrative manner than their co-branded counterparts.

[Dan]

And, I'd argue the overwhelming amount of miles earned in DL/AA/UA are earned from transferrable currency cards (i.e. SPG/Plat/SP) and not their co-branded brethren.

And you'd be wrong.

The transferable cards exist for the savvy ones.  Our blogosphere is very small.  Most people that have UR and MR don't even use it for miles.  And majority of the country loves using their co-branded airline cards.

[AJK]

Not sure how you can unequivocally say that.

The whales, the guys putting 3MM+ per month on their cards, ain't doing it on a co-branded Delta card. Trust me. I personally know four such people.

Each one of these guys equals 3,000 average Joe's who spend their $1,000/mo on gas and groceries.

[Dan]

Not sure how you can unequivocally say that.

The whales, the guys putting 3MM+ per month on their cards, ain't doing it on a co-branded Delta card. Trust me. I personally know four such people.

Each one of these guys equals 3,000 average Joe's who spend their $1,000/mo on gas and groceries.

From talking to the card heads.

According to your logic we can just tax the 1% and let everyone else live tax-free.
Except that math doesn't work.  The collective 99% pay far more than the 1%.

[AJK]

Well, by consequence,  you're also saying that adding AA as a partner of TY wouldn't materially cannibalize their vanilla offerings. Yet they haven't done it. It's clearly not due to their not being a relationship... So what is it?

[Dan]

I never pretended to understand Citi's ways.

[Ergel]

From talking to the card heads.

According to your logic we can just tax the 1% and let everyone else live tax-free.
Except that math doesn't work.  The collective 99% pay far more than the 1%.

But the top 20% pay 93% of the taxes and the top 10 over 70% and top 1% over 35%. So the top is a very weighted portion of the market

[Dan]

But the top 20% pay 93% of the taxes

97% of Americans have never heard of a Sapphire Preferred card (and 98% of stats are made up on the spot) but they do know that in the airport they can earn 25K miles by signing up for an airline card and get free bags.
And they keep using that card.

[Ergel]

97% of Americans have never heard of a Sapphire Preferred card (and 98% of stats are made up on the spot) but they do know that in the airport they can earn 25K miles by signing up for an airline card and get free bags.
And they keep using that card.

For sure. And they will only have a single airline card and be loyal to that airline, for the free bags.
The question is, what percentage of the revenue are they vs. the top 10% spenders, some of whom know more (or will have a Amex Plat/Gold for the prestige)

[EP123]

97% of Americans have never heard of a Sapphire Preferred card (and 98% of stats are made up on the spot) but they do know that in the airport they can earn 25K miles by signing up for an airline card and get free bags.
And they keep using that card.

Chase has been heavily marketing the Sapphire Preferred card on all form of media, I would guess that more americans heard of Sapphire Preferred than they did of Starwood or many other cards

[menachem_m]

It's not a contradiction that the vast majority of 'average people' use the co-branded cards, and yet the vast majority of spend is done on the MR/SPG/CSP because of the lopsided spending of big businesses. It's also not a contradiction that we can't always read Citis' mind. They can all peacefully coexist.

[Dan]

yet the vast majority of spend is done on the MR/SPG/CSP because of the lopsided spending of big businesses.

The 1% doesn't do the vast majority of spending, the masses do.

[menachem_m]

Yes, but a much higher % of 'the masses' spends on MR/SPG/CSP than business do on co-branded.
It's quite feasible that 25% of  'the masses' spends on MR/SPG/CSP and I'd be pretty surprised if you have more than 2-5% of the huge spenders using co-branded.

The point is that no-one really has any hard data, so its just speculation, I'm just saying that's it's not necessarily a contradiction.