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Citi Credit Protector is running a new promotion right now. Last promotion from Citi Protector mentioned here at MyCardBlog was a free Coby digital photo frame in last November. The price of that digital photo frame at Amazon.com is about $70. This time you can get 5 $10 visa prepaid gift cards from Citi by submitting 5 different rebate forms in 1 month intervals. It’s hard to say whether this promotion is better or not. Different persons will have different needs. Not to mention that you can cancel the previous Citi protector program by calling their customer service and enroll in this new promotion again!

The link for this new promotion is here. Click the banner at the up right of the corner and put in the card information you want to try this program. Once you submit your information, you will notified that you will receive the rebate forms needed for 5 $10 visa gift cards. Please note that each visa gift card must be redeemed in 1 month intervals which means you can only get 1 visa gift card each month. Since there’s a 85 cents per $100 new balance fees, you’d better choose a dormant card to enroll.

Benefits of Citi protector:

• Cancel two minimum monthly payments if you get married, buy a home, move, or welcome a child to your family.
• Cancel three minimum monthly payments if you’re a victim of a natural disaster and you incur at least $500 on expenses or miss at least five consecutive days of work.
• Freeze payments, Interest Charges and Fees when you take family leave for the birth or adoption of a child or the chronic sickness of a family member (up to 3 months deferral), or when you suffer an involuntary job loss or short-term disability (up to 24 months deferral).
• Eliminate your Account Balance-up to $10,000-in the event of long-term disability or death of you or your household’s highest wage earner.

The cost for this enrolling this program is 85 cents per $100 new balance on your monthly statement. If you don’t have any balance, you will not have to pay. (If the balance on your card is negative, should Citi pay you money? I don’t know.)

As far as I know, the Citi Professional Card, Citi Business PremierPass Card, and all Citi American Express Cards are not eligible for this promotion. Many consumer cards like: Citi Diamond Rewards Card, Citi AT&T Universal Savings & Rewards Card, Citi Platinum AAdvantage Card, Citi Diver’s Edge Card, Citi Dividend Platinum Select Card are eligible for this promotion. Of course, if you have multiple Citi credit cards, you can try to submit multiple rebate forms and get more from Citi.

I have a post about the new CitiBank Promotion which will give you $200 bonus if you can meet their requirements. Jim Semple made excellent comments on my previous post. The promotion code is CEMX. The promotion can be found at offer.citibank.com.

Today I found a new promotion code: CSVL. This new promotion coed gives you different promotion bonus: 16,000 ThankYou Points and triple thankyou points rewards for every dollar spent on your citi debit card in the first 12 months. The 16,000 ThankYou Points can be redeemed as a $150 gift card at thankyou network. Plus you can also get triple bonus points for your everyday banking activities linked to your checking account. The application  page can be found here.

Fine Print:

How to get 16,000 bonus thankyou points?

To qualify for the 16,000 bonus ThankYou Points offer, you must open a new qualifying regular checking account in the Citibank® Account, Citibank Everything Counts® or Citigold® account relationship package by 7/31/08 and deposit at least $1,000 in account between account opening date and 7/31/08. Accounts opened through Citibank Financial Centers must be funded by 7/31/08. Accounts opened remotely via CitiPhone Banking® or Citibank® Online must be funded by 8/30/08. Within 60 days of account opening, you must (1) enroll your new checking account in ThankYou® Network and (2) complete one direct deposit per month, two electronic bill payments or five signature debit card transactions and continue for three consecutive months.

How to get triple bonus points?

To qualify for the triple ThankYou Points offer, you must open a new qualifying regular checking account in the Citibank® Account, Citibank Everything Counts® or Citigold® account relationship package and enroll account in ThankYou Network. Your points from both qualifying debit card purchases and your checking relationship will be tripled for twelve (12) checking statement cycles commencing with the second full statement cycle after the statement period in which you enroll the new checking account in ThankYou Network. Monthly points for checking relationship require customer to maintain an active checking account with customer initiating minimum of one credit or debit transaction to the account per statement cycle. You can refer to this page to figure out how to use your citibank account to earn thankyou points.

As I pointed out at the beginning of this post, you can read Jim’s comment here to get better understanding of monthly fees. If you use CitiBank a lot and don’t like cash bonus, you can choose this promotion!

Citibank has just released a new promotion code to give $200 sign-up bonus for their new checking account customers. The promotion code is: CEMX. You can enter the code and apply for a new account online at offer.citibank.com. Once you enter the code, you will redirected to the application page. If you are not sure about the promotion, you can use the live chat service at the left of the application page to verify this offer. Or you can also call citibank at 800-374-9500 to apply for a new account. Or you can go to a local citi branch to open a new account with this new promotion code. Here are some requirements to get the $200 bonus:

• Open and fund a qualifying Citibank regular checking account with $1,000 or more by 6/30/2008
• Make a direct deposit to or two bill payments from your new account each month for three consecutive months

—first $100 bonus

• Continue making a direct deposit or at least two bill payments each month for the next three consecutive months

—second $100 bonus

The Citi EZ Checking account doesn’t qualify fot this offer. You must have to open a regular checking account or others. And you must be a new citibank customer. When you open a checking account, citibank will pull a “soft inquiry” to your credit report to verify your identity. This promotion is good until 06/30/2008. Don’t miss this $200!

Update: I’d like to thank Jim Semple for his effort on the issue of fees associated with the CitiBank banking account which I didn’t point out in my post.

I’ve applied for the Citibank Checking Account Bonus but when finished for pending approval (a few days), found this fine print which involves monthly fee unless $6000 in accts, so it’s not a full $200 bonus unless you tie up $5000 more Balance. To avoid monthly fees, you need to maintain a $6,000 combined average balance — an easy goal to reach. Why? Because so many accounts go toward it: Checking, Savings, CDs, Money Market, Lines, Loans, Mortgage and Brokerage (to qualify, accounts must be linked to your ATM/Debit Card.)

# Monthly Fee. None if you meet the required balance OR you have a stand-alone Ultimate Savings Account.
If not, in NY, NJ and CT, it’s $9.50 for Regular Checking and $12.50 for Interest Checking. In all other states, it’s $12.50 for Regular Checking and $15 for Interest Checking.
# Checks. Free if you meet the required balance. If not, $.50 per check.

Following is Jim’s opinion about this promotion:

If you don’t put up $6,000, then CS Bank Rep also told me that to allow (after qualifying) 120 days to pay Bonus, so if qualifying for 2nd Bonus, you wait up to a total of 10 months (3 months 1st Bonus, 3 months 2nd Bonus, up to 4 months on 2nd Bonus Payout) then at $9.50 Monthly Fee (some states higher), would be $95 so you would net (out of $200) $105.00 for 10 months (minus any interest you might have earned on that $1,000 for 10 months which at 3.00% could be around another $25 not including compounding). You still make about $80 for 10 months on $1000.

So best to put up $1000 in checking acct, $5000 in their Ultimate Money Market account (2.96% APY) for best return. You only need 2 BillPays monthly to qualify MM higher interest rate which qualifies eligibility for Bonuses. BillPay must use funds over the $6000 minimum total of accts to maintain. So direct deposit a small amount monthly into Checking and make 2 small BillPays monthly (like to your credit card).

I just want to point out another option here: If possible, you can apply for a Citi credit card with 0% APR on balance transfer and do a small balance transfer. In this way, you are also qualified for $200 bonus and you can still get some free money from balance transfer.

These days my post about earning enough thankyou points for a free trip to Europe and Asia have been proved to be a very popular blog post in the internet. It was also highlighted at www.digg.com. If you have a solid credit history and willing to take advantage of the bonus thankyou points, I think it’s a great idea to accumulate your thankyou points and redeem them for a flight ticket. Actually, most frequent flyer forums conclude that the best way to use your thankyou points is to redeem them for a flight ticket. Considering that the Citi Platinum Select AAdvantage World MasterCard is offering 25,000 bonus AAdvantage miles, I think it’s a good idea to get enough AAdvantage miles to get a free flight ticket.

How can you get enough AAdvantage miles for a free ticket?

Sign-up bonus miles from Citi:

Citi Platinum Select AAdvantage World MaterCard 25,000 bonus miles

Citi Gold AAdvantage World MasterCard 15,000bonus miles

CitiBusiness AAdvantage MasterCard/Visa Card 25,000 bonus miles

Another card you can consider is the Starwood Preferred Guest Card from American Express. They offer 10,000 bonus starpoints which can then be converted to AAdvantage miles later. (If you are lucky, you can get 20,000 bonus points.)
According to AA, 50,000 miles are enough for an economy class ticket to Europe or Asia at off-peak season. (see the detailed requirement)

Fidelity is offering AAdvantage miles for opening a new nonretirement brokerage account. If you deposit $2,500 in the new account, you will get 5,000 miles. If you deposit $10,000, you will get 15,000 miles. If you deposit $50,000, you will get 25,000 miles.

I hope this post will be of some help to those who want to get a free ticket!!!

My post “Earn ThankYou Points for A Free Trip to Europe and Asia” turned out to be a very popular post. It was also mentioned at Fatwallet! It’s amazing. However, recently, Citi is about to change the terms on using fixed flight option. I have to make some changes here.

There will be only a limited credit cards can be eligible for the fixed flight travel option at thankyou network. Please remember that the new terms will be effective on April 15, 2008.

Certain ThankYou Members have the option of redeeming for air travel at fixed ThankYou Point amounts. As of April 15, 2008, ThankYou Members with a Smith Barney Account, Citibank® Account, Expedia® Account or the following Card Accounts are eligible for fixed flight airline tickets at fixed ThankYou Point amounts: Citi PremierPass® Card – Elite Level, Citi PremierPass® Card – Smith Barney Elite Level, Citi PremierPass® / Expedia.com® Card – Elite Level, Citi® ChairmanSM Card and Citi Chairman® American Express® Card. This list is subject to change without notice. Fixed flight option Travel Rewards are only available when you call the ThankYou Service Center. Agents will work to offer you the best deal on available flights – you are not required to select the fixed flight option.

It’s very straightforward, some popular credit cards like: Citi PremierPass Card, CitiBusiness Card with ThankYou Network, Citi Professional Card with ThankYou Network and CitiBusiness PremierPass Card will not be eligible for the fixed flight option. It seems that if you want to take advantage of this program, you’d better have Citi PremierPass Card-Elite Level or Citi PremierPass/Expedia.com Card-Elite Level. Other credit cards are not so easy to get.

So the key to play this program is to get one of above mentioned credit cards and get enough thankyou points. Following is a list of cards offering great thankyou points bonus:

CitiBusiness Card with ThankYou Network: 15,000 ThankYou Points—-by far, the easiest business card to get!

Citi PermierPass Card-Elite Level:20,000 ThankYou Points or the non-Elite Level card: 10,000 ThankYou Points.

Citi Professional Card with ThankYou Network: 10,000 ThankYou Points

CitiBusiness PermierPass Card: 15,000 ThankYou Points (this sign-up bonus will expire on March 31, 2008)

40,000 ThankYou Points from CitiBank (this post)

Other methods to earn ThankYou points:

Use Citi checking/saving account and debit card (Citi Bank will send about 300 ThankYou points every month. If you use all of the banking services provided by Citi Bank, you may get up to 800 points per month.) You can also use other credit cards like Citi mtvU card and Citi Diamond Preferred Rewards card to earn ThankYou points.

I think the fixed flight travel option is by far the most valueable way to redeem your thankyou points. Because there are not so many good gift cards in the thankyou network.

Right now, we can find the official promotion page for the previously mentioned (this post) banking promotion from CitiBank.

If you are a new customer to Citi, you have to do the following steps to get the 40,000 ThankYou points.

1. Open a regular checking account with $1,000 deposit and then make one direct deposit or 2 bill payments for 3 consecutive months.

2. Open a Citi Ultimate Savings Account an deposit $25,000 in this account.

3. Enroll in ThankYou Network and wait for the 40,000 ThankYou Points appear in your account.

You can apply for the new account online or by phone at 866-458-9212 and mention the promotion code: CSZL.

If you are already a Citi Bank customer, you can still qualify for this promotion.

If you currently have the Ultimate Savings Account, you should open a checking account and finish the necessary activities as mentioned above. And fund this Ultimate Savings Account $25,000.

If you currently have a checking account, you should open a new Ultimate Savings Account and finish the necessary activities as mentioned above.

Read this post and then you can figure out how easily you can earn a free ticket to Asia or Europe by combining this promotion and getting extra bonus points by applying for new credit cards. Details of the promotion can be found here.

Suggested post: A Proposal—Earn ThankYou Points for A Free Trip to Europe or Asia.

I believe most of us may be not aware of the deal just reported at MSN Money. According to the article customers who establish certain money market and checking accounts and perform qualifying banking activities will receive enough ThankYou(R) Points to redeem for up to two round-trip airline tickets, valued at up to $400 each, to anywhere in the continental U.S., with no blackout dates.

Citing its latest consumer research which found that travel is one of the most compelling rewards for people, the banking leader today announces that customers who establish certain money market and checking accounts and perform qualifying banking activities will receive enough ThankYou(R) Points to redeem for up to two round-trip airline tickets, valued at up to $400 each, to anywhere in the continental U.S., with no blackout dates.

What should you do?

From February 25 through March 31, 2008, new and existing Citibank customers can receive ThankYou Points for up to two round-trip airline tickets, from a choice of major airlines, to anywhere in the continental U.S., valued at up to $400 each, with no blackout dates or Saturday night stay required, when they:

1) Deposit $25,000 in a new or existing money market account.
2) Open a new qualifying Citibank checking account with a minimum deposit of $1,000, enroll it in ThankYou Network and make one direct deposit to or two electronic bill payments from the checking account each month for three consecutive months.

I haven’t seen any promotion code or other specific requirement right now. If you want to open a new checking and money market account, please call Citi to make sure that you can get the bonus. Detailed report can be found here.

I enrolled in the Citi Credit Protector in the early November, 2007. Today I got my free digital picture frame from UPS. This digital picture frame is Coby DP-769 7-Inch Widescreen Digital Photo Frame with MP3 Player. According to Amazon.Com, the price for this one is about $75. What a great deal! (see the specific feature through this link at Amazon) The cost for enrolling in Citi Credit Protector is 0 and for only 85 cents per $100 of your New Balance shown on your billing statement for each billing period. SO if you don’t use that credit card, you pay nothing for a 7-inch widescreen digital photo frame. If you do want to use that credit card, you can pay your balance before the statement sate. In this way, they will also not charge you. If you have multiple citi credit card, you can have multiple free digital picture frames! If you don’t have a citi credit card yet, please try to get one! Easiest citi credit cards to get are: Citi mtvU card for Sollege Students, Citi Dividend Card for College Student, Citi Diver’s Edge Card for College Students, and Citi Business Card with ThankYou Network. See the posts about Citi Credit Protector at MyCardBlog.Com. (post 1 & post 2) Enroll the Citi Credit Protector for a free digital picture frame here.