Citibank 0% 6mth balance transfer on existing Signature Card

tio on 14/08/2014 - 20:49

I got that Citibank Signature card a while back. And of course like any decent ozbargainer, I did a cheque to self balance transfer as soon as I got the card to enjoy the 6mth 0% balance transfer that came with it.

And today, I've just got a letter in the mail saying that the offer is back for my card. They even specifically say that even if you don't have any balance on another card, just do a cheque to self. What can I say, I'm sold.

I'm not sure if it's a targeted promo or not but you can log in your Citi online account and look under "Rewards & Offers" section. For me, I see 2 entries for the same BT offer, one showing my card number and 1 doesn't. So it could be an across the board promo.

Happy saving ladies and gents.

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Comments

  • Crazy Diamond on 14/08/2014 - 21:39

    Thanks for sharing tio. Do they state an expiry date for this offer?

  • tio on 14/08/2014 - 21:44

    End of september as shown on my letter.

  • rockman117 on 15/08/2014 - 06:58

    What's cheque to self mean?

  • donbot on 15/08/2014 - 09:52

    I had a look at mine after reading your post… Balance Transfer for 6 months @ 6.9% for me. Can't arbitrage off that.. Boo Citibank offers!

  • saneo on 15/08/2014 - 11:41
    +2

    If i'm not mistaken, if you do a balance transfer, you can't use the credit card anymore for the period of the balance transfer. Basically, it can't be used as a transaction card anymore.

    • conan2000 on 17/08/2014 - 15:25

      Yes, I think you're right, as Citibank seem to charge interest on the transactions if you do use it again. Even although the regulations changed a while back and they aren't supposed to do this any more…

      I actually hoy an email from them with another offer giving me triple rewards points until the end of the month. I'll use this for everything until then and then do a balance transfer for as much as I can off of another account.

  • tanoshiiki on 15/08/2014 - 12:13

    Thanks for the tip! It didn't work online for me, but I called Citibank. Had my limit increased(!) and I'm getting a cheque sent out soon :)

    Just a note of warning. Make sure you're very careful about paying the full balance within the 6 months, as well as the minimum monthly repayments. Don't rely on the statements to tell you when the 6 months is up. I got burnt by not being careful enough and can no longer say I have never paid credit card interest any more.

    Any purchases when you have a balance transfer will be charged interest immediately. I tried to do purchases when I had a balance transfer and transferred funds immediately and I still got charged retail purchase interest. Looks like the Citibank card continues to just stay idle in my wallet…

    • jlien on 15/08/2014 - 16:23

      How did you request a limit increase, over the phone? Did it take long? Did you get a hit on your credit file from asking for the increase?

      • tanoshiiki on 15/08/2014 - 16:54

        Yes, the credit increase was done over the phone and took all of two minutes. If it is legal requirement in Australia, I'm sure it would appear on my credit file.

    • Make it so on 15/08/2014 - 17:53

      I read the conditions. Apparently this works differently for cards issues before around 2012. It says repayments for those cards are taken off the balance transfer first.

      • tio on 15/08/2014 - 18:08
        +2

        The new banking regulations are so that whatever payment you make, it'll go towards the components that have the highest interest rate first.

        • conan2000 on 17/08/2014 - 15:26
          -1

          This is true regarding the regulation, but Citibank don't seem to follow it. Not sure how they are getting away with it.

        • chill on 17/08/2014 - 18:44
          -1

          @conan2000: Yes they do.

        • conan2000 on 18/08/2014 - 10:50
          -1

          @chill:

          I have personally been charged interest for making a purchase, was quite small, about $30 (it happened without me thinking as it was for Priority Pass Lounge). I had a 0% balance transfer deal at the time and they started charging me interest on the purchase. I didn't really care as it was only a couple of dollars. Not worth the hassle of the call centre, as I cleared the balance within a couple of months of the purchase anyway.

        • tio on 18/08/2014 - 12:26
          +1

          @conan2000: sounds like you were charged interest on your purchase while you had a positive (or negative?) BT balance, which is quite normal really. You don't have interest free period for purchases while your balance transfer haven't been paid off.

        • chill on 18/08/2014 - 15:28

          @conan2000: as per tio you really don't know what you are talking about.

        • Geewhizz on 24/10/2014 - 07:18

          I may be wrong, but my understanding is that they all will consider the purchase as accumulating interest until payments covering the amount have been paid FOLLOWING it appearing on a monthly statement.

    • G5 on 02/09/2014 - 18:18

      Similarly, don't be an idiot like me and set up an automatic transfer for the remaining balance two months early…

      • tanoshiiki on 02/09/2014 - 20:29

        At least you didn't incur extra costs…

  • Make it so on 15/08/2014 - 17:55

    Can someone comment on how this works if you do a balance transfer, but also want to use it for purchases in the mean time without paying interest?
    Let's say I ask for a "cheque to self" of $5000, and do not intend to pay this off for 6 months. What if, in the mean time, I spend $1000 per month on purchases. How do I avoid paying interest? If I pay off the $1,000 each month, will that be treated as "paying the bill in full"? In other words, do I just have to make sure I pay off the bit in excess of the balance transfer?

    • tio on 15/08/2014 - 18:06

      As soon as you have a BT balance on your card, there is no interest free period, period. So to your question, no, i can't think of any trick that will give you balance transfer as well as interest free purchase period at the same time.

      • Make it so on 15/08/2014 - 18:14

        Thanks, that sucks. Makes the offer not so useful to people who actually use their card often, unless I'm missing something.

        • tio on 15/08/2014 - 18:42
          +1

          Yeah, but if you pay the closing balance in full every month then they wouldn't make a lot of profit either. There's more chance people forget to pay back the BT in time.

        • Make it so on 16/08/2014 - 01:46
          +1

          @tio: I'm an Ozbargainer. Credit card companies don't make profit out of me, I make profit out of them! Heaps of it!

  • postman on 15/08/2014 - 21:38

    I got similar offer till end of September.

  • jaybmate on 04/09/2014 - 13:13

    What is your credit limit,and how much of your credit limit could you get as a cheque to self?
    Also, does anyone know if this is available on the 'platinum' card? I didnt get the email but thinking I will call up and ask for it.

    • tio on 04/09/2014 - 13:49
      +1

      My credit limit is 15K, the min limit on the signature card. Don't think there's a min limit to request a balance transfer really. Though there is max limit of 80% of your card's credit limit.

    • tanoshiiki on 04/09/2014 - 16:42
      -1

      Just check your My Offers when logged in your Citibank account.

  • fleetoiler on 30/09/2014 - 18:06

    Hey, for people that have seen this offer in their rewards and offers section of internet banking I have a few questions (@tio / @tanoshiiki / etc):

    1. Did this only appear for you in internet banking after the 6 months had expired? And when did you get the letter relative to the expiry of your initial 6mth BT? Was it quite soon after paying off the full balance or a few days after the initial 6 months expiry period?

    2. [ignore, I answered this myself by calling them up and getting them to enable my offers after their recent systems upgrade, see below]. My Rewards and Offers section has some images with "Best Offer" and "Credit Card offers" but when I click on them it just says "Sorry, there is no available offers for you at this time. Please call Citiphone banking for more details."

    3. You mention the expiry date on your letter is end of September (i.e. today), does it have an expiry date on the offers in internet banking? I am hoping this date is just relative to your initial 6 months but can only guess without knowing when you signed up for the card initially.

    <background/ramblings>

    I called them up a few days ago to confirm the exact date of when I had to pay the balance off. I asked if I could get a new BT after this one finished but the guy was a bit cryptic. My original BT has ~15 days to go, and I have been researching other BT offers from other banks and have almost applied on multiple occasions this month (e.g. the ANZ one looked good) because I wanted to just float the balance over to the new card instead of playing silly buggers with positive CC balances.

    But… if I get offered another 0% 6 months from Citi that changes things entirely. Then I don't have to apply for a new card, new credit limit nor worry about being declined or get marks on my credit file! It would really suck if I closed this card to reduce my overall credit limit (in order to get a higher limit on a new card from another bank), only to find out citi was going to offer me another 6 month BT offer lol!

    I think now I will wait until after it expires and report back if I get sent any offers from citibank as that's going to be so much easier than applying for a new high-limit card. I called Citi up just now and had my preferences updated to make sure I receive any/all offers. The lady said since their update to systems in late August/early September that some customers have not had their offers updated so that could be why mine was blank in internet banking.

  • ozguy on 23/10/2014 - 13:08

    I've recently applied and the balance transfer has been deducted from my Citibank Visa and presumably a very large cheque is in the mail. Now, where to invest?

    Checked current rates at Canstar http://is.gd/ywWmgn and it looks like one of the very few banks paying an intro 4% is …. Citibank.

    Having got the zero interest cash from Citibank, would it be rude (or tempting fate or the T's & C's) for me to then invest in a Citibank account earning 4%? It would certainly save all the ID red tape needed these days.

    • donbot on 23/10/2014 - 15:13
      +1

      They're not that smart. If want to be double cautious, deposit it to a non-citibank account, and then transfer it across. They cant/wont know where the funds have originated from.

    • jaybmate on 24/10/2014 - 09:06

      Ubank - Currently 4.06%. just need to transfer 200 bucks per month into the account. you can make withdrawals and still get the bonus. Not an intro rate.
      How much did you get for cheque to self?

      • jaybmate on 24/10/2014 - 14:18

        Sorry, 4.02% actually.

    • harrylovevee on 24/10/2014 - 09:31

      wouldn't be an issue as I done this before.

      As tizey said, if you would like to be sure, just deposit to other banks and then transfer it to citi.

  • ozguy on 23/10/2014 - 23:11

    Yes that would certainly do it albeit with some days lost as the cheque is cleared.

  • jaybmate on 24/10/2014 - 13:30

    So it looks like from calling Citibank, you need to have had the card for awhile, they mentioned at least 9 months. I've only had the card for about 3 months. Also I'm on Platinum card.

  • fleetoiler on 24/10/2014 - 19:15

    My original BT has ended and all I have in internet banking is a 1.9% BT which sucks compared to all the 0% offers they have for new customers/cards.

    Congrats to those of you that got a second go at it, would love to know what you did to qualify!

    • tio on 26/10/2014 - 22:25

      maybe stop using it for a while? I've rarely used my Citibank card after all those free points from ANZ.

  • meumax on 31/10/2014 - 09:30
    +1

    TLDR: You can get a 0% balance transfer offer if you threaten to leave.

    I wanted another offer for my wifes card, so I told her to ring up and say she had too many cards and wanted to close the Citibank card to consolidate debt. The standard procedure for call centre staff is to refer you to their "retention" department. Because we called on the weekend and the retention dept only opens Mon to Fri they were unable to do anything and told her someone would call back on Monday.

    When they called back, she told them the story and they immediately offered to waive the annual fee. She pointed out that the card is already fee free for life. Then they offered 12 months 0% balance transfer with cheque to self option. I got my wife to tell the consultant that she needed a higher credit limit so the "balance transfer" could pay off her other credit card which she would close instead of the Citi one if she could get both a balance transfer AND increased limit.

    Said the limit increase would take a few days to process but the bal trans offer was good for 30 days anyway. Told them we'll wait for the limit increase to come through before applying for the bal transfer.

    • jaybmate on 31/10/2014 - 13:57

      Good as mate. How long did she have the card for? Also, was the card used very much beforehand? Also, what credit limit was on the card?

      • meumax on 01/11/2014 - 08:05
        +1

        Card wasn't used at all. Had it since Feb 2013. Only reason we got it was to get the initial 6 month cheque to self balance transfer which we parked in our offset account.

        Always intended to cancel it afterwards unless we were offered another balance transfer offer.

        Another good tip for citi is if your credit card balance ever goes into credit you can ring up and ask for the "excess" to be sent to you as a cheque.

        So if citi won't give you a good balance transfer offer, just find another bank who will and get them to send the transfer to your citi card.

    • Duram on 10/11/2015 - 13:23

      Thanks for this! just got my self 0% cheque to self :D.

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