It’s been quite the saga. A few months ago, there was a promotion to earn 50,000 American AAdvantage miles (or 50,000 ThankYou points) by opening up a Citigold checking account. The real kicker to this deal was the ability to fund the initial deposit with a credit card (though you can no longer do that)
(SEE ALSO: The miles from my $39,000 purchase just posted!!)
I opened up an account back in December 2015 and funded it with an Alaska Airlines card, and those miles posted shortly after. Generally in these types of situations, I recommend sending a secure message to make sure that you have enrolled correctly. In this case, I messaged Citi and they confirmed that I was enrolled in the program
Citi tries to back out
I have experience with the necessity of following up on bonuses and things like this.
(SEE ALSO: 8 months later, I’ve almost got my 25,000 Avios refunded)
(SEE ALSO: Why Aer Lingus is paying me $1306)
so once the 90 days passed with no AA miles, I have continued to follow up with Citi to see where the miles were. Then, I saw over on Doctor of Credit that Citibank was denying many of the bonuses, saying that the people were not “targeted”.
I thought I had a pretty good case, given the message I received, but I thought I would call in to see what would happen. Apparently, there have been a lot of queries, so when I told the phone agent I was calling in about this bonus, she took my information, and said a report would be emailed to me within a few days. She gave me a password to open up the PDF file once it arrived.
(SEE ALSO: Citi reconsideration phone number and website)
Success! Getting my American AAdvantage miles
A few days (and yet ANOTHER phone call) later, I got an email from Citibank with a letter saying that I was eligible and just needed to provide my AA member number, which I then did.
A few MORE weeks passed and still no miles, so yesterday, while on the Citi website, I did a live chat and asked about the miles. The chat agent said that they had posted “today” and might take a few days to show up on American’s site. How convenient I thought… 🙂
But sure enough, today while updating Award Wallet, I noticed that my 50,000 miles had (finally!) posted!
Guess it’s time to cancel my CitiGold account finally so I can stop getting those $30 monthly charges…
What about you? Did you open up a Citigold checking account and if so, have you received your promotional bonus?
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
Applied for CitiGold for my wife back in December. Met the requirements as of her February ending statement and received confirmation of the promo requirements… then, waited 90 days and sent a message the 1st of June regarding the miles and it has been “under investigation” ever since… so we shall see.
Awful. Got a numbered research letter confirming that I qualified for 30000 mile offer. And captured a chat session informing me that the miles have been credited to my account and to allow two weeks to show. Have closed my account and citi now reneging!
So you closed your account after the miles showed up? Or before?
When you wrote… I opened up an account back in December 2015 and funded it with an Alaska Airlines card…
What do you mean ‘funded it with an Alaska Airlines card?’
Thank you!
Certain bank accounts let you fund your initial deposit to open the checking account with a credit card. Citibank used to allow this (but does not any more) so my initial deposit was a $39,000 “purchase” from my Bank of America Alaska Airlines card (so I got 39,000 Alaska miles)