This June it was announced that Hilton would be entering into an exclusive credit card agreement with American Express as of January 2018. Previously Hilton was in a unique position, as they had co-brand cards issued by both American Express and Citi.
Just last week American Express revealed that they’ll completely be revamping their portfolio of Hilton cards, including improving their existing two cards, and also introducing two new cards altogether.
Up until now, another way to earn Hilton points has been through two popular transferable points currencies. Specifically, you could transfer both American Express Membership Rewards and Citi ThankYou points to Hilton at a 1,000:1,500 ratio.
I guess this shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, but it has just been announced that Citi ThankYou points will no longer be transferable to Hilton Honors after December 13, 2017. I was expecting this to happen, given that Hilton is otherwise cutting ties with Citi.
The way I see it, this isn’t a huge loss. Personally I value Hilton Honors points at 0.4 cents each, so even with the 1:1.5 ratio, you were still getting at most 0.6 cents per Citi ThankYou point, which is less than half of what I value those points at. In the past we’ve even sometimes seen promotions on points transfers from Citi ThankYou to Hilton Honors, including a 33% bonus, which made the transfer ratio 1:2. Even then I didn’t consider that to be a good deal.
So while it’s always good to have options, personally this was never one of the best uses of Citi ThankYou points. Personally I’d much rather transfer those points to Air France-KLM Flying Blue, Etihad Guest, Singapore KrisFlyer, etc.
As a reminder, here’s the current list of Citi ThankYou transfer partners:
| Transfer Partners | Transfer Ratio |
|---|---|
| Air France-KLM Flying Blue | 1000 : 1000 |
| American AAdvantage | 1000 : 1000 |
| Avianca Lifemiles | 1000 : 1000 |
| Cathay Pacific Asia Miles | 1000 : 1000 |
| Emirates Skywards | 1000 : 800 |
| Etihad Guest | 1000 : 1000 |
| EVA Air Infinity MileageLands | 1000 : 1000 |
| JAL Mileage Bank | 1000: 1000 |
| JetBlue TrueBlue | 1000 : 1000 |
| Qantas Frequent Flyer | 1000 : 1000 |
| Qatar Airways Privilege Club | 1000 : 1000 |
| Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer | 1000 : 1000 |
| Thai Airways Royal Orchid Plus | 1000 : 1000 |
| Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles | 1000 : 1000 |
| Virgin Atlantic Flying Club | 1000 : 1000 |
| ALL Accor | 1000 : 500 |
| Choice Privileges | 1000 : 1,500 |
| Leading Hotels of the World | 1000 : 200 |
| Preferred Hotels & Resorts I Prefer | 1000 : 2000 |
| Wyndham Rewards | 1000 : 1000 |
Will anyone miss the ability to transfer Citi ThankYou points to Hilton Honors?
(Tip of the hat to Doctor Of Credit)
Membership is free and takes no more information than commenting as a guest. Earn status points for good contributions, and see fewer ads as your status grows.