Citi Hilton HHonors Visa Credit Card Review

One of Three Hilton HHonors Card - Hilton HHonors is actually one of the few entities that has relationships with two credit card issuers in the US. Both American Express and Citibank issue their credit cards. Hence, the Citi® Hilton HHonors^TM Visa Signature® Card is one of the three cards available to consumers to choose. But how does this card compare with the American Express version? Find out more..

Do You Earn Lots of Hilton Points? - You earn 6 HHonors Bonus Points for each $1 spent at a participating hotel within the Hilton HHonors portfolio.* including Hilton®, Conrad®, Coral by Hilton, Doubletree®, Embassy Suites Hotels®, Hampton Inn®, Hampton Inn & Suites®, Hilton Garden Inn®, Hilton Grand Vacations Club®, Homewood Suites by Hilton® and Scandic hotels. You also earn 3 points for every dollar you spend at supermarkets, gas stations and drugstores. You earn 2 points for every dollar you spend on other purchases. You also get a signing bonus of 40,000 points after $1,000 in purchase within 4 months. New cardholders also get a complimentary Silver VIP Hilton HHonors membership for one year.

Fees - There is no annual fee for this card.

It so turns out that Hilton HHonors also has credit cards with American Express. In fact, there are two versions - the regular Hilton HHonors Amex Card and the Hilton HHonors SurPass Card (which comes with a $75 annual fee) and is the most "elite" Hilton card among these three.

Compare To Amex Hilton HHonors - This card is essentially almost identical to the regular Amex version. They both have no annual fee. They both allow you to earn 6 Hilton HHonors points for every dollar that you spend at Hilton Hotels. The Amex version also allows you to earn 6 points on everyday purchases like and everyday purchases like gasoline, supermarkets and drugstore versus 3 points for the Citi version. The Amex Hilton allows you to earn 3 points on every other regular purchase while the Citi version (Visa) allows you to earn 2 points on regular purchases. The Amex version also offers a 2.90% intro balance transfer for 6 months whereas this card offers no balance transfer deal.

Compared to the Amex Hilton HHonors Surpass Card - The Amex Hilton HHonors Surpass Card is the elite version among all these cards that come with a $75 annual fee. The key difference is that you can earn 9 points on Hilton Hotel spending versus 6 for the two regular cards. The Surpass version also lets you earn 6 points for "everyday purchase" items and 3 points for regular purchases. It also comes with a 2.90% for 6 months balance transfer offer.

Compared to Other Hotel Credit Cards - The big plus that this card has over other hotel affinity cards is that there is no annual fee! The Marriott credit card charges $30 and $65 on their two cards. Starwood has increased their annual fee from $45 to $65. The Hyatt credit card has a $75 annual fee. So the fact that this card comes with no annual fee is a breathe of fresh air for the hotel affinity card segment.

Verdict - Hilton HHonors is one of the rare hotel reward program which allows members to earn both hotel points and air miles at the same time. It is also the only hotel frequent guest program with two affinity credit cards, one from Citibank and the other from American Express.

Compared to the regular Amex version, this version falls slightly short in terms of earnings for "everyday purchases". But the big advantage they have over Amex is that Visa is more widely accepted than Amex. I personally would not let that deter me from getting it. In fact, the fact that Hilton has cards with two issuers means that you can apply for both and take advantage of sign up bonuses at the appropriate time. For frequent guest members of the Hilton HHonors program, this is one of the cards you can choose to earn faster Hilton HHonors points.

Citi HH Application Page - If you decide to apply for this card (and if you click on the application link on this page), you will be taken to Citi's page (see below). All you have to do is to click on the "apply" button and fill in the necessary detail.




Related Articles

Other Opportunities To Earn Hilton HHonors Points