In November 2018, Citi announced a raft of changes to the Prestige card (See: Prestige ups fee, slaughters 4th night free for most of us).
One of the changes was a new cell phone protection benefit, although we didn’t have details at the time of what that would entail. Citi has today provided more information about how it’ll work.
The cell phone protection benefits will be as follows:
- Coverage of up to $1,000 per claim, with a limit of $1,500 per year.
- Covers damage or theft of up to five eligible cell phones.
- Monthly cell phone bill must be paid with the Citi Prestige card.
- $50 deductible per phone.
- Claims can be filed online.
Overall, this is a decent benefit, although some will prefer to continue paying their cell phone bill with the Chase Ink Preferred card as that also offers cell phone protection but has the added benefit of earning 3x Ultimate Rewards versus 1x ThankYou point with the Prestige card.
The Ink Preferred card has a higher overall limit per year ($1,800), but only covers up to $600 per claim. If you have a more expensive phone, it might therefore be better to pay your monthly cell phone bill on the Prestige card rather than Ink Preferred for the higher coverage, despite not earning as many rewards each month.
The wording in Citi’s press release only refers to ‘per year’, so it’s not entirely clear as to whether that refers to a cardmember year or calendar year.
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[…] Note: Citi Prestige coverage begins May 1, 2019. See this post for more details. […]
Another card people might be interested in with better phone protection than the Ink is the REI card. Most store cards aren’t worth it, but this one is! $600 limit, $50 deductible, $1,000 total coverage per 12 months. It also gets 5% back and price protection, and has no annual fee.
The Ink Preferred says the phones have to be for business expenses and the business has to match the business name on the CIP card. My situation is that 5 family members all share the AT&T family plan. The plan lists the names of 2 members (I’m the 2nd name listed). Based on this, I won’t think the CIP will cover me. But it sounds like the Prestige will.
Right now our monthly bill is about $180. x12 months, that’s about $2000. I pay with Ink Cash, which is 5x. That’s 4x $2000, about 8000 UR I will be giving up if I switch to Prestige for insurance. I think that’s a reasonable exchange for 5 phones.
I use the Wells Fargo Cash Wise Visa for cell phone. Get $600 per phone with $25 deductible. For claim (I’ve had one) you submit your latest cell phone bill, latest credit card statement showing you paid the cell phone bill, and invoice from Apple showing cost of replacement phone. All done online and reimbursement sent by check in 2 weeks. I get 1.5% cash back on the Cash Wise card.
$100 deductible with the ink as well. Wells Fargo’s deductible is $25.
@ Stephen — Thanks to Chase’s stupid 5/24 rules, I got the US Bank Platinum card for the sole purpose of insuring our new cell phones. The problem with this solution is that this card earns ZERO points/miles (sacrilegious, I know). Therefore, this is awesome news, and our cell phone bill will be paid with our Citi Prestige card come May 1, 2019!
Anyone have experience with how these protection benefits work (or don’t) with MVNOs or Pre-Paid carriers who are less recognizable or have a different billing structure than monthly bills (eg 1-year plan purchased on eBay). What if the phone is purchased separately? Used?
+1 Also, “monthly” implies some regularity, but how regular does it have to be?
I have the same question as most of the other cards that offer this benefit don’t cover pre-paid carriers, even when pre-paid on a recurring monthly basis, such as Cricket and AT&T prepaid.