Yesterday I linked to Dan’s Deals reporting that starting April 1, Citi Thank You Points would transfer to Singapore Airlines Krisflyer and to British Airways as well.
I’ve generally found Dan to be reliable, as I noted at the time.
Of course I’m relying on Dan’s Deals here for this information, I haven’t independently verified it yet, but I usually find Dan to be pretty reliable.
I’ve since, however, received comment from Citi’s PR team.
The information posted on DansDeals.com regarding transferring ThankYou Points to certain international airlines is not accurate. ThankYou members can redeem points for travel on any airline with no blackout dates in the ThankYou Travel Center. Currently ThankYou members cannot directly transfer their ThankYou Points to an airline.
“Currently” seemed like a bit of a weasel word, because of course members cannot currently transfer points to airline miles, and Dan said that would be coming in the future, on April 1.
Online Travel Review followed up with Citi and reports,
I called to confirm that this will not be changing in the future and Citi’s rep said that there are no plans at all to allow transfers to BA or Singapore.
(Emphasis mine.)
Dan provides a bit more information on his previously having confirmed the information with Citi.
I called the Citi ThankYou department myself 3 separate times and confirmed each time that starting in April you will be able to transfer ThankYou points to British Airways and Singapore. I took down names of reps and had them confirm it with supervisors. One rep even read me the exact memo they had about it, hard to make up something like that.
..I get an urgent email from Citi asking me to please remove the post. I asked why and did not receive an immediate response.
.. I receive a call…asking me to pull the post as it is incorrect. I said I could not do that unless she would be able to guarantee me that I was indeed given false information from Citi reps..[She] would not explicitly deny the upcoming changes other than saying my post was incorrect as points can’t be transferred.
..I once again called the Citi ThankYou department..and asked about transferring my points to British Airways or Singapore and was told yet again that I would be able to do so starting in April..this information was confirmed by a supervisor
Strange indeed, and file this one under either there’s a full moon, or Citi is being intentionally misleading in order to keep this one under wraps.
We won’t know, I suppose, until this either does or does not happen, likely sometime in April.
Well, I’m glad I didn’t impulsively apply for the Citi Premier card with the 50k bonus, as I had considered doing when I first heard this news.
We’ll see whether they announce something next month, I guess.
Gary have you tried calling the number that dan posted on his site?
I called thank u this afternoon and asked when can i transfer points to SQ BA rep told me April 1 , i asked are you sure? –reply– can transfer 1 point for 1 mile to either April
re called thank you , rep first wanted to know where did i get info — told them on web– rep said –miss info on web — told rep want to plan a trip in april – rep, said ba is for sure , just not sure of exact date but will be very soon and u will be able to make that trip
Early April Fools’ Day joke?
Citi just doesn’t want to be ‘scooped’ on a pending announcement – just my guess.
Suppose Citi really started offering this. Maybe there is some contractual obligation regarding when and what they can say about it. So naturally they gave the official response quoted here.
I applied for two cards – me and my wife – and both approved. But I will not call to activate until this is fleshed out. I’d love another 100,000 BA miles but would not do it for just the pay with points feature.