Citi AAdvantage Platinum signup bonus reduced to 30,000
Citi/AAdvantage Platinum signup bonus reduced to 30,000 miles
Recently, I wrote about my first batch of new travel rewards credit cards. One of these was the Citi/AAdvantage Platinum Select MasterCard for which I received a 50,000 mile signup bonus by spending $3,000 in the first three months of card membership. This morning, I saw an ad in the sidebar of my Facebook page offering 30,000 miles for this card. I was not surprised to see this after I read a post on One Mile at A Time last night anticipating the end of the 50,000 point offer:
“For quite a while now, both the personal and business versions of the Citi AAdvantage cards have offered a generous sign-up bonus of 50,000 American Airlines AAdvantage bonus miles after making $3,000 in purchases within the first three months of account opening.
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Anyway, it looks like there will be a change to this offer in the next couple of hours, as I’ve been asked to pull links for the cards at 12PM ET. ”
Lucky speculated that this change was motivated by the fact that, with the merger of the US Airways Dividend Miles and American AAdvantage frequent flyer programs, Barclaycard could not accept new applications for the new Aviator AAdvantage card. (The Aviator card replaced the previous Barclay US Airways MasterCard.) Makes sense to me since reduced competition to sign-up credit card users who ultimately wanted AAdvantage miles would allow Citi to reduce their bonus offering. Note, the Citi/AAdvantage Executive World Elite MasterCard still offers 50,000 miles for signing up and spending $5,000 in three months, but this card carries a $450 annual fee that is not waived in the first year. This product is positioned in the same segment as the Citi Prestige card so the steeper fees are not surprising, though this card does provide better amenities such as American Admirals club membership.
Needless to say, I am glad I got in under the wire on both of these credit card products. I will almost certainly not renew one of the two next winter since their benefits are very similar and since American is not my "home" airline.