ma91pmh

No, unless you buy them from a bank, and I am not aware of any banks selling Vanilla Reloads yet. Citi considers any purchase at a financial institution a cash advance. So if you spend money at Nationwide loading a VisaBuxx card, it will be a cash advance, because Nationwide is a financial institution. But if you buy a $500 reload card at CVS Pharmacy (oh my god I said the name not Charlie Victor Sierra! I will be struck down tonight) then that will post as a regular purchase

rdover1

Quote:
Originally Posted by indietrav
Hello FT's. I am barely getting into the game but been a lurker for a while now so please be gentle. I was wondering if anyone knows how Citi applies Vanilla Reloads purchased at a CVS? Do they consider them a cash advance? Thanks
But... the counter point is that even without Level III reporting it is pretty easy for Citi to see 1,000's of spend at CVS as perk abuse as this is clearly not 'normal'.

frogdog51

Loaded $500 on my USB Buxx w/ Citi A.A. (July 10)
Loaded $500 on my NW Buxx w/ Citi Hilton Reserve (July 8)
Statements closed and I earned points for both. They were both classified "standard purchases" not cash advances.

ma91pmh

And?

There are numerous reports of citi citing the rule that purchase from fi is cash advance, and none on purchase of vr. i've bought $10k in the last week or so with no cash advance fees. so the answer is NO

craz

Citi cant consider them a CA since they really dont know what makes up your purchase. If the store where they are purchased codes it as a CA then Citi will most likley do so as well.

So far I dont know any store that does that. As others have said if you purchase something from a financial insitution of some kind be it Travelers checks,GCs etc etc then Citi will consider it a CA. If Goldman Sacks was selling hot dogs in its lobby and the charge went thru their reg readers most likley Citi will ding it as a CA, simply cause it was via Goldman and its a Financial insitution, Citi wont call up to see if the charge was for anything other then Goldmans main stay Money. Thusly they view anything from any reg vendor as non-financial at least thats how all the CCs are doing things what will be tomorrow, who knows

pier11

A big bank's inhouse cafeteria is categorized as fast food with Chase. (Amex thinks it's "Business Services - Other Services".) Never tried with citi

ma91pmh

that's probably because it's outsourced. big banks are not in the catering business, they hire outside contractors to come and run them.

pier11

It is outsourced. But bank's name is in transaction description...

craz

does the name of that big bank show up as the name of the vendor? Although I tend to agree with pier11, and its not runned thru the reg card reader of that bank

pier11

yes. Strangely so.
Cafeteria business is outsourced. So naturally I'd guess cash registers belong to that business. But bank's name as a vendor, not that outsourced company. (Same with many different CC I used there.)

hmmurdock

Why not just call Citi and set cash advance to zero. Pretty much ends any debate.

craz

many wont do that any more.They assign a certain % of your CL as a CA amount. forget if Citi will do it but Ive stopped asking after getting the SOL from them about being able to do it

FlightNurse

I wish this thread was closed, it's been reported in all the blog's and in this thread that VR are not considered cash advances by Citi... But of course there are people that want to scare the new people into thinking this....

hmmurdock

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself...and the cardinals.

Zooter

For all my cards I call up the issuer and ask them to put a note on my account that I will be putting about $1000-$1100 a week at CVS. They usually apologize that they can only have the note go out about 4 weeks, sometimes 8, and say I'll need to call back to add the note again. However, after 4 weeks of consistent spend, the pattern is established enough that the algorithms don't flag my account for fraud.

I always buy $1k of VRs at a time per credit card and throw in one other item so I'm never at $1007.90.

I did $1k a day 6 days in a row at CVS on my Citi Dividend card the last week of Q1 when Pharmacies was a bonus category. Maxed out the rewards ($6k spend for $300 cash back) for the year in that one week and had no problems as I had them note my account that I would be doing these purchases daily upfront.