richarddd

According to Citi, priority boarding only applies to reservations made at least 7 days after the card is opened.

PedroNY

Well, I am not Rick, but I can confirm that in 2008 and 2009, I used to cycle 1 MC + 1AMEX + 1 VISA BIZ + 1 MC BIZ about every 90 days, so total of FOUR CARDS in one application day cycle. That also goes for my wife, Mrs. PedroNY. We usually received 4 approvals at a time, sometimes just 3 as only 1 out of 2 business cards would be approved. 2 personal cards would always come up as 1 inquiry, but business cards would always come up as 2 separate inquires.

At that time, bonuses were 25,000 miles and then bonuses became 30,000 miles and after 1 month you could call Citibank and receive 3,000 mile retention bonuses on personal cards and 5,000 miles on business cards. The 60 day rule applied to personal cards, 90 day rule applied to business cards. Also you could not exceed over 6 inquires in 180 days, so usually I staggered 4 applications (per person) every 91 days or so. It did work very well in 2008 and through October of 2009. I think a lot of churners, including myself, were halted by Citi in the end of 2009.

Anyway, that's what I can tell from historical, personal (2 different people) experience. Since 2011, I have not been able to get more than 2 Citi (personal or business) at a time. However, they started to allow me to apply for AAdvantage cards again. So, veryl nice to have it in your churn schedule, supplement it with some other Citi cards as well.

I hope this helps, if anything, a little bit of a throw back.

Cheers,

PedroNY

djflier

Hi PedroNY and other expert churners

I'm new to the churn game and trying to figure out what the best way forward is for my wife and I. So basically as I understand you and your wife will apply for two Citi cards at a time and then cancel them but get different type of Citi cards? How often will you cancel them and then reapply? Are you also applying for other cards as well at the same time?

With each new card are you getting the introductory points like 25k and 50k each time?

How many credit cards do you have at any one time in your churn schedule you mentioned?

Thanks
DJ

MDtR-Chicago

There are links in the first post of this thread to current AA card offers. There is also a link to an old thread that details, step by step, how to most effectively apply for these cards.

Generally, you can get two personal cards with sign up bonuses each 18-24 months

Read back a few pages for many personal experiences.

ma91pmh

Thanks PedroNY for confirming my brain was not freezing up. When you get a little older you started to doubt your memory, and Happy knows her onions so I wasn't sure my mind was playing tricks. I looked back at my CC records and I also found one set of three cards I had gotten in August 2009 just before the end of the world. So Happy if you were just doing 2 at a time looks like you missed out on a boat load more miles from 06-09.

So fact is Citi have moved the goal posts in the past, and am sure will move them again in the future, so when we talk about Citi "rules" we should remember they are just a snapshot of what people are experiencing at a given point in time, and that some of us keep trying to push it to find new gaps.

The Citi biz is clearly more churnable than every 18-21 months right now too though hard to know what exact schedule but I am on my third since being let back in from the cold on the 75k offer. (Got 1 x 75k and 2 x 50k).

Also it is off-topic in this thread but as we are talking about churning the Citi HHonors card appears to be fully churnable at 2 cards per 65 days.HHhonors may not be AA but still you can build some valuable points through that channel.

ma91pmh

@DJ - the schedule on which you can get new cards varies by issuer and card type. For the AA cards listed here, it appears current experience is you can get two cards every 18-21 months, with the latter end of the spectrum more likely (though if you apply at 18 months out you don't seem to be breaking your chances of trying again at 21 months if you are turned down)

The business version of the card is a little more hazy and seems you can get it once every 65-90 days, but some reports of challenges after 2-3 cards.

You don't necessarily have to close old accounts first, but at some point you will start getting push back for reaching the "limit" of cards from that issuer, but again reports on what that actual limit are for Citi are somewhat hazy. I tend to cancel 1-2 of my oldest cards as annual fees come up or before doing a churn.

Personally I do what is called an "app-o-rama" every 3 months (some people call this "churning" but I see them as distinct: churn=getting same card repeatedly, app-o-rama=applying for many cards on same day). I blogged my last one here http://milesabound.com/my-latest-cre...rd-app-o-rama/. This was actually a couple of days short of 3 months since my prior one but I'd met all the spend and was getting antsy! I generally look to achieve a few things in each app-o-rama: try to churn some cards (i.e. get the same card again, and again); spread the cards across the issuers (primarily Citi, Amex and Chase but next time I am going to start expanding to some more obscure issuers like US Bank as well as the tier 2 guys like Barclays); spread across points program (last one was largely Hilton based so next time will try to diversify that); and generally challenge some of the current conceptions (like two Citicards in 60 days) to see if they still hold. I personally take a more aggressive stance on credit applications as I have been able to succesfully get multiple large car loans and jumbo mortgages refinanced despite having lists of inquiries and new accounts longer than the bible on my credit report so I am not convinced you need to be as careful as some folks make out... but that of course is very much at your own risk, and I will certainly disclaim upfront that if you do run into credit issues don't blame me

brettskyg

I applied for this offer in post 1. The CSR confirmes 50k miles (2 browser trick did not work b/c I also got a new premier card a few months ago). CSR also confirmed $100 off a AA purchase The title to this thread states that there is supposed to be a companion cert. The CSR has no idea what i was talking about and told me they haven't done that in years. She asked her supervisor and the supervisor confirmed. Can someone help me out on this?

Secondary question but does running a credit report to get your own report/score count as a hard inquiry and points against you?

ma91pmh

No it does not. They run as a "soft" inquiry so it does not show up to creditors requesting your credit history.

I actually pay for a credit monitoring service and check my own credit at least weekly and it has no impact on hard inquiries and score

travelpye

Thanks to all for helpful information in the thread!

My data points: opened and still have Citi AA Visa 10/2010

Using different browsers, today I applied for Visa on this offer: $100 credit, two admirals club passes, 50k miles (40k for $2k + 10k after $5k), 2 miles/$ on AA

AND

AM EX on this one: $100 statement credit for the first eligible AA purchase made within 12 months of cardmembership, 50k AA miles after $3,000 in purchases within the first 4 months, 1 Companion Certificate after you become a cardmember.

Instant approval on both. :-)

Thanks!

ukinny2000

Another data point (and a hearty thank you to everybody on this board / in this community):

Opened (and still have) Citi AA Platinum Visa in 11/2010

Using same browser, but clearing cookies before each application, I applied for both the Visa and the Amex today via the links in post #1 : $100 credit, 50k miles after $3K in 4 months, 1 companion certificate

On both I got decision pending, handed-off into a chat with CSr's from Citi, and then approved only after asking a few questions confirming identity and getting my cellphone number.

Thanks to one-and-all! ^^^

CVG_Kid

Appreciate the data point. I have two personal Cit AADV from Oct 2010: one open, one closed. I was waiting till October for breathing room. Good to know I'll be ok.

Happy

You cannot do the Biz every 60 days. Therefore you can NOT have 3 cards every 60 days as you claimed, ditto PedroNY's statement has some mixing up there - yes, you get 3 or 4 cards but that happening can NOT be every 60 days. Let's say, your first round is 2 personal, 1 biz - the next round after 60 days, the biz card drops out of the picture - you could only have 2 personal at the 2nd round. Then either you wait till the 3rd round to do 2 personal + 2nd biz, or the biz had its own cycle.

My point is you cannot have 3 cards every 60 days like what you and PedroNY claimed - there is a difference in the cycle so you could have one for 3 cards, then a few cycles later, the personal and the biz merged again on the same cycle then the biz went off again on its own... Over a year's time, you may just have one cycle that you could do all 3. The rest would be off. That is where I said you can't do 3 EVERY 60 days.

The personal and the biz would not merge together anyway because they came from different entities.

For us, EX did not merge the personal's inquiries because as I mentioned in another post somewhere, the PO Box number looked like a transpose, everything was the same, except one is PO Box 62741, and then the other one is 67241 - and they did not merge - this lasted for 18 or more months so every pair of personals left 2 inquiries on my report. In fact, I was denied an application in Summer of 2009 due to too many inquiries. It so happened Citi Fraud Alert also called because they saw 4 applications coming from the same IP address. The Fraud Alert guy wanted to know were they all from the same household because according to him, "there are some outfits claim to repair people's credits and do applications all from the same place...." I verified they were all ours and then asked him the statuses of the applications though I already knew 1 was approved 1 was declined - he looked and said, looked like it was declined due to too many inquiries. I said but they were all from Citi, weren't they? He said Yes, I saw now. This might work in your favor. When I pressed, he would not commit, only to tell me to call next Monday. I got an email approval on the declined card over the weekend. Incidentally, the declined one was the 7th inquiry in 6 months, hence the decline.

But because of the Citi address issue, I could not do the Biz card the way I wanted ever since Citi switched from EQ to EX since early 2008 - because I lost the benefit of merged inquiries.

Sometimes you would just need to take what you get and be done with it.

Since then I got one more pair of personal card in late 2009, and that was the end of good old days.

Mysteriously, the EX inquiries returned to "mergeable" since 2nd half of 2010. God knows what was the reason why I suffered the "transposed" address. I knew one FTer who lives in NY state also has the same issue - when I asked about the problem here, he was the only one said he ALWAYS had inquiry for EACH pull no matter what but he never looked at the details until we compared what were shown on our reports - he and us were the unfortunate souls that suffered this SNAFU. So that did cost me some biz cards because I would fill up the inquiries slots just from personal cards alone without the merge benefit but that was nothing I could do.

My real regret was I did not do Citi diligently between 2006 and 2007 because at the time I was very happy flipping UA card every month until Chase finally put in the mechanism to stop it - you got the card, but no bonus. Had I put in the same effort with Citi, I would be LT PLT instead of LT GLD now. SIGH.

As for the goal post - currently it is pretty clear that the time lapse between personal cards are getting longer, as we have seen 18 months no longer a safe bet. We dont know how the biz card would become - as we dont have enough data points after Citi has put in some "hassle" factors such as requiring people to provide proof for their businesses, that seems to at least deter some applications so not enough data points to be truly reliable. Besides, the biz card application is even more YMMV than the personal cards. I would say if one can sustain a hard pull and be able to meet the spend, it does not hurt to keep test the water. For us, our true spend tends to be a lumpy type that goes with our travel schedule as all our travels are on our own dimes. So I usually time our apps with anticipated spend because I dont want to use gimmicks to meet spend. Therefore our app schedule do not necessarily go with the XX days span. However for the higher probability of success, the XX days rule still apply in most cases.

djflier

@ma91pmh

Great blog! I'm looking forward to doing some travelorama now. I'm going to use the links on your blog to sign up. I had a couple of questions :

1. Right now we have a joint Alaska (free companion airfare deal and $75 a year) card with $15k limit and a joint amex costo card with no fees. If I closed the Alaska and transferred the balances to say four new cards (2 for my wife and 2 for me) with a combined $15k limit does that hurt your credit score given you lose the history of the old card?

2. With all of these cards the points have nothing to do with whether the card is still active? For example if I cancelled the alaska card the mileage accrued would still be valid and stay in the mileage account? I remember with my last Amex card Amex told me if I closed the card then you lose the points that's why I am asking....

3. The plan is very clear now to get the cards and then plan the annual family spend around the required minimums to get the points.

Priceless guys, priceless!

Cheers
DJ

AsanteSana

travelpye: Post #1 says that this offer expired as of April 30. How did you get it through?

In hindsight, I realize that it is a silly question... I guess all the links on there are 'officially' expired

GREGSS

Just finished applying for both via the links in the OP

Instant approval on both