Free Money for those who got a Citibank 0% Mailing

Quite a few of my friends have seen Citibank offering 0% on balance transfers for 12 months if you sign-up for their gold card. Here's how to take advantage even if you don't need it:

Transfer the amount of the credit limit Citibank gives you to another credit card. Then withdraw that cash from your other card, put in a 12-month money market or ING investment savings account, and you'll earn money for nothing!

Here's a detailed example:

1. Get $10,000 limit on your new Citibank Gold card
2. Transfer $10,000 to a different bank's MasterCard (or Visa/American Express)
3. Take a $10,000 cash advance from your other MasterCard (you'll pay a small cash advance fee, unless it's MBNA which is 1% of the amount)
4. Invest the funds and make sure you DON'T make any purchases using the Citibank card! Just make sure you make your minimum payment to your Citibank card each month.

Voila, hundreds of free dollars! (if you are lucky enough to have received the mailing that is...)

Make sure you read the fine print on account closing fees, and annual credit card fees.

If your 1 day late paying back the $10K, you could be in for a shocking interest rate charge for the $10K for one year at 18-20% = ~$2000!

Cool...but I didn't get this offer in my mail....

good points benf. but there is no annual fee and no account closing fee. you are definitely up the ol creek if you miss your payment, but if you set up a preauthorized debit with your chequing account you can take them for a lot of money!

Originally Posted by colinz

Here's a detailed example:

1. Get $10,000 limit on your new Citibank Gold card
2. Transfer $10,000 to a different bank's MasterCard (or Visa/American Express)
3. Take a $10,000 cash advance from your other MasterCard (you'll pay a small cash advance fee, unless it's MBNA which is 1% of the amount)
4. Invest the funds and make sure you DON'T make any purchases using the Citibank card! Just make sure you make your minimum payment to your Citibank card each month.

Voila, hundreds of free dollars! (if you are lucky enough to have received the mailing that is...)

Are you sure that this is the right interpretation of the deal? Usually balance transfer means that you transfer your high-interest existing credit card balance INTO your new card (Citibank Gold card in this case) with low or no interest for 6 months or so (12 months in this case).

How would you transfer $10000 from your new citibank card to a another master card (step 2)? The only way I see is by taking cash advance from citibank. This would trigger regular cash advance fee and interest charges, and NOT the promotional 0% interest.

May be I am missing something here.

/N

Seems like a lot of work for $250. Plus, having that high of an outstanding balance on the Citi card would definately hurt your credit rating.

All a "balance transfer" does is send a payment from one credit card to another. Citibank doesn't care whether the payment they are sending to your other card is going to pay off a balance or will create a big credit balance on your other credit card. it may not seem worth the effort to certain people but in my mind a couple points off my credit score (the impact would be very tiny) is totally worth a 0% loan for 12 months.

Originally Posted by colinz

All a "balance transfer" does is send a payment from one credit card to another. Citibank doesn't care whether the payment they are sending to your other card is going to pay off a balance or will create a big credit balance on your other credit card.

Interesting. I did not know that.

Thx.
/N

Balance transfer means that you transfer your other debt to them (citibank). The way to do it is to get cash advances onyour other cards and then transfer your debt balances onto you new Citi card. The way you proposed is backwards.

if you take the cash advances before you "transfer" the balance you will pay interest. the way to do it without paying interest (on your non-Citibank card) is how i proposed it, by creating a huge credit balance on your other card.

Originally Posted by colinz

Transfer the amount of the credit limit Citibank gives you to another credit card. Then withdraw that cash from your other card, put in a 12-month money market or ING investment savings account, and you'll earn money for nothing!

Originally Posted by colinz

2. Transfer $10,000 to a different bank's MasterCard (or Visa/American Express)

the problem here is your wording. you are saying "to" when you mean "from".

I have this offer and spoke to many reps from Citibank, they claim that they send you 3 cheques with your new card, just write yourself a cheque for your full credit limit(on the Citi card) then just use it however you want !! You don't need to send it directly to another credit card !

I got this type of offer from Citibank last fall, and the flyer had a code which one could use on their web-site to apply for the offer on-line.

I'm now interested in trying this, but the offer I received expired sometime in 2004, and I have not received a new offer in the mail. Does anyone know of a similar code for the current offer?

He did not write that wrong.

1. Get $10,000 limit on your new Citibank Gold card

This is nothing wrong.

2. Transfer $10,000 to a different bank's MasterCard (or Visa/American Express)

You write a Citibank Gold card cheque and deposite to another credit card. Hence, 'transfer'.

3. Take a $10,000 cash advance from your other MasterCard (you'll pay a small cash advance fee, unless it's MBNA which is 1% of the amount)

If the other credit card did not carry any debt, you will have positive balance in the 'other' credit card.
Since you have positive balance on the 'other' credit card, cash advance from this credit card should not cost you anything.