Cheapest miles ever: Citi PayAll offering 1% admin fee to selected users (buy miles from 0.63 cents each)

It seems like Citibank is going all in on Citi PayAll now, as we’re seeing a positive deluge of promotions. So far there have been offers for CapitaVouchers and bonus points, but it appears there’s a third offer floating around out there, and it’s the best one of them all. 

Selected Citibank customers have received an offer for 1% cashback on Citi PayAll. This reduces the effective admin fee to from 2% to 1%, and creates an amazing opportunity to buy miles from 0.63 cents each.

That’s the cheapest price I’ve ever seen miles sold for, and despite all that’s going on, is one you should strongly consider. 

Citi PayAll’s 1% cashback promotion

This offer is available to Citi ULTIMA, Citi Prestige, Citi PremierMiles, Citi Rewards and Citi Lazada Card members. 

Registration is required, and can be done by sending the following SMS to 72484:

CPACB <space> last 4 digits of your Citi credit card number (e.g CPACB 1234)

Registered cardholders will need to spend at least S$3,000 on Citi PayAll per calendar month for a minimum of 4 months during the 26 August 2020 to 28 February 2021 promotion period. The months do not need to be consecutive; you could qualify by charging S$3,000 in September 2020, October 2020, December 2020, and January 2021, for instance. 

If they meet this requirement, they will receive cashback equal to 1% of every S$1 charged to Citi PayAll.  This reduces the admin fee from 2% to 1%, and means some really cheap miles:

	Earn Rate	Cost Per Mile @ 1%
Citi ULTIMA	1.6 mpd	1.25 cents 0.625 cents
Citi Prestige	1.3 mpd	1.54 cents 0.77 cents
Citi PremierMiles	1.2 mpd	1.67 cents 0.83 cents
I’m not showing the CPM for the Citi Rewards or Citi Lazada Card, because the earn rate is a paltry 0.4 mpd and you’d have to be mental to use it .

The 1% cashback will only be awarded for up to S$180,000 of spending during the campaign period, a threshold I think few will breach. Cashback will be credited to your account within 8 weeks from 28 February 2021. 

The following Citi PayAll transactions will be eligible for this promotion. Remember, Citibank recently added additional payment categories, including insurance and general invoice payments. 

The full T&Cs can be found here. 

Is it worth it?

In a word: yes. Simply put, this is the cheapest price I’ve ever seen miles sold for, and remember: it’s not just KrisFlyer. Citibank points can be transferred to 11 different frequent flyer programs, including some with great sweet spots like Etihad Guest, British Airways Executive Club, and Turkish Miles&Smiles.

Citibank Transfer Partners

I realise that flying isn’t on anyone’s agenda right now, but just imagine what you could do with miles bought at 0.625-0.83 cents each:

• Singapore to Koh Samui on Bangkok Airways in Business Class for S$125-S$166 round-trip
• Singapore to Europe on Turkish Airlines Business Class for S$563-747 round-trip
• Singapore to Bangkok on Cathay Pacific Business Class for S$200-266 round-trip

You’ll of course need to factor in taxes and fuel surcharges (mild for Cathay Pacific/Bangkok Airways, hefty for Turkish Airlines), but with miles this cheap it’s hard to go wrong. 

But even if you opt for plain vanilla KrisFlyer, buying miles at less than 1 cent each is flat out arbitrage. For example, you could use KrisFlyer miles to pay for air tickets at a rate of 1.02 cents each, so buying miles at 0.625-0.83 cents is like locking in a travel discount of 19-39%. 

Alternatively, you could convert those miles into Shangri-La Golden Circle points at a ratio of 12:1. Golden Circle points can be used for F&B credit at a rate of 10 points= US$1 or US$1.25 (for Jade/Diamond members), so long story short, you’d get a discount of  27-56% on dining. 

This does not stack with other Citi PayAll promotions

Citibank is currently running two other promotions for Citi PayAll, but neither is stackable with this cashback promotion:

• Citibank customers can earn 25-31% more miles/points for Citi PayAll transactions made by 28 February 2021
• Citibank customers can earn up to S$250 in CapitaVouchers for scheduling Citi PayAll payments by 30 November 2020

The cashback and bonus miles/points promotion are targeted, so if you received one offer, you won’t get the other. Likewise, once you register for the cashback or bonus miles/points promotion, you’re automatically ineligible for the CapitaVouchers promotion. 

Conclusion

A 1% admin fee on Citi PayAll is the kind of thing that’s almost too good to be true, and if I received an invite, I wouldn’t think twice about taking it up. Heck, this is even cheaper than the targeted 1.5% admin fee that Citibank was trialing with Citigold customers during the PayAll beta phase. 

There’s just so many options for converting Citi points, and even if you can’t fly anywhere, you can still spend it as F&B credit at Shangri-La through the Infinite Journeys partnership.

Did you get this offer? Are you taking it?