Doctor of Credit published a post yesterday about a rumor that the Citi Custom Cash card will be getting discontinued by the end of this week. That sadly looks to be nigh on confirmed as they now have a screenshot of answers for Citi bankers to provide in relation to any questions that they might get.
The Custom Cash doesn’t get a huge amount of attention, but it’s a nifty little card for what it is. It has no annual fee and you can earn 5X ThankYou points on the first $500 spent in a billing cycle in one of numerous categories—restaurants, gas stations, grocery stores, select travel, select transit, select streaming services, drugstores, home improvement stores, fitness clubs and live entertainment. That capped its usefulness to 2,500 points per billing cycle (the card otherwise earns 1X on all other spend other than 5X on hotels, rental cars, and attractions booked through Citi Travel), but it’s an easy way to earn 30,000 ThankYou points per year if you consistently spend $500 per month in one of those categories.
Sadly, that might be coming to an end…to an extent. Rumors suggest that Citi will be pulling new applications for the Custom Cash card before the end of the week. No specific date has been given, so it’d be best to apply ASAP if this is a must-have card for you.
That said, if you have any other Citi cards at the moment, you could look into product changing one of those to a Custom Cash card. There’s no guarantee that you’ll be able to do that, but it’s worth a try if it’s a card you want and there’s an existing Citi card you hold that you don’t really care about. It’s unlikely that product changes to a Custom Cash card will be possible after Citi has pulled the card for new applications (product changes to the Citi Prestige card weren’t possible after applications were pulled for that card), so now is the time to product change if that’s an appealing option for you.
Citi increasingly seems to be acting like a serial entrepreneur who likes creating shiny new things, but then quickly gets bored of them. That said, thankfully they’re not doing a Google and simply killing off products they don’t want to maintain, at least for now anyway. Per the screenshot obtained by Doctor of Credit that’s been provided to Citi bankers, it says (among other questions and answers) the following:
Will my existing Custom Cash card be converted to another product?
Existing Custom Cash accounts are not impacted by this change.
Are there any changes to existing Custom Cash accounts or benefits?
No. Existing cardmembers can continue to use their card and enjoy its benefits.
Another of the questions and answers is as follows:
Will the Custom Cash product become available again?
The Custom Cash card is not available for new applications.
That’s interesting wording because it doesn’t actually answer the question. The answer doesn’t state that it won’t become available again, just that it’s not available for new applications. That might mean that it will return at some point, or that they’ll rebrand it as something like the Citi Strata Custom Cash card, but essentially keep it the same. I wouldn’t count on that though if it’s a card you want.
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I just product changed P1 and P2 Strata Premiers to Custom Cash cards. This summer when Strata Elite annual fees comes due I will product change those to Strata Premiers, assuming that is a valid path.
@Stephen – the source reddit post has another image indicating tomorrow May 28 is the last day to apply. Presumably tomorrow would also be the last day to product change.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CreditCards/comments/1toq86h/confirmation_of_citi_custom_cash_discontinued/
As a helpful data point, I was able to product change my Citi double cash card to a custom cash card today. What was surprising to me was I only signed up for this double cash card a couple of months ago and had originally planned to PC next year, as I had generally understood that banks require you to wait at least 12 months from initial signup to product change to another card. I saw this post from frequent miler and thought “let me just try it and see what they say”, and they surprisingly let me do it!
If any of you are in the same boat – try it – the worst they could do is say no. I product changed over chat in the app if that helps.
Key question that I hope FM can answer within hours: is the Custom Cash going to remain earning essentially 5x AA miles? Will it go the way of Prestige or Rewards+? I would hate to apply and burn a 5/24 slot and then have it forced product changed to something like Strata or even Double Cash a few weeks or months later. But I would also hate to miss out on a 5x AA miles dining card that lasts for a decade. We don’t have much time to decide. Greg, Nick, Tim, Carrie?
I tried to PC from AA mileup card to Custom Cash + was denied. With the speaker’s accent I could not understand why. Has anyone else tried this PC?
Citi doesn’t have clear rules and sometimes a PC will be granted and other times it won’t be. PC is fickle with Citi and USB whereas PCing follows clear rules with Chase and Amex.
Citi’s CEO and CFO both made extensive comments about changes in the realm of credit cards. I think what Amex has done/is doing with its personal card lineup might be the direction to which all of the banks point. The game changes.
PCed a Strata and a Double Cash to 2 Custom Cashes (up to 6 now between P2 and me), one via phone yesterday, the other via chat today.
Today, I PC’d a Double Cash card to be my third Custom Cash card.
Just did a PC from plain Strata to Custom Cash via chat.
Over the last year or so Citi made smaller tweaks to somewhat limit the ability to optimize the earn / use of TY points. Rewards+ card got shut down and converted so that 10% rebate wasn’t available any more. Point sharing went away so folks with no-AF cards can no longer transfer to others with premium cards to make use of better transfer ratios. Now they’re trying to limit the ability to earn 5x transferrable points…