Citi Prestige Offer [Targeted]: 2,500 Thank You Points For Adding An Authorized User: Is It Worth It?
I recently received a targeted offer (via mailer) from Citi Prestige offering 2,500 bonus Thank You points for:
- adding an authorized user
- spending $2,500 on purchases between 7/1/17 and 9/30/17
The Mailer:
The Offer:
Here’s the offer (close up):
Is This A Good Offer?
I value Citi Thank You points [conservatively] at $0.01. If you hold a Premier or Prestige card, you can multiply this by the 1.25 factor, so each point is effectively valued at $.0125. By that methodology, this offer is effectively worth $31.25.
 (2,500 * 1.25% = $31.25)
Considering it costs $50 per authorized user’s card, this may not be the best deal. It would offset the cost of your authorized user to just $19.75:
($50 – $31.25 = $19.75)
It’s worth noting, you could possibly maximize this spend in a 3x category between you and your authorized user, in which case you could potentially earn 10,000 Thank You points (worth $125) if you had the need to spend $2,500 on airfare or hotel.
(2,500 * 3x = 7,500;
7,500 + 2,500 = 10,000 points;
10,000 points * 1.25% = $125)
Considering the opportunity cost of spending $2,500, I’d venture to guess you could spend this on a another 3x Travel card like the Chase Sapphire Reserve or the Citi AT&T Access More card and skip the $50 annual fee for an additional user.
The Bottom-Line: Citi Prestige Offer [Targeted]: 2,500 Thank You Points For Adding An Authorized User: Is It Worth It?
This is not a great offer, by any means, unless you were already going to add an authorized user to the Citi Prestige Card (it does come with great benefits even for authorized users) – – in which case this can offset that $50 cost by $31.25.
