Citi closed applications for its premium ThankYou Rewards card, the Citi Prestige® Card, in July 2021. However, some card members, including myself, have kept the card and continue to pay its $495 annual fee because of its valuable benefits.
Our Citi Prestige Card review explains all the benefits and why you should consider keeping the card once you have it. But in this guide, I’ll discuss the unique benefits of the card: its four-night hotel benefit. This benefit, commonly known as Citi Prestige free fourth night, gives you a free fourth night for up to two stays in a calendar year. Here’s what you need to know.
Citi Prestige information is independently collected by The Points Guy. The card information on this page has not been updated or provided by the card issuer.
What is the free fourth night Citi Prestige benefit?
A complimentary four-night hotel benefit is a benefit available to Citi Prestige card members. This benefit entitles you to a fourth free night of up to two hotel stays per calendar year.
To enjoy the fourth night of relief, you must:
- Book a minimum hotel stay of four consecutive nights through the Citi Travel site or by calling 1-833-737-1288.
- Pay for your stay with your Citi Prestige card, Citi ThankYou points or a combination of ThankYou points and your Citi Prestige card.
Citi bases the fourth night’s benefit on your nightly stay rate, excluding taxes and fees. The price you pay at the time of booking includes the benefit savings for the fourth night. Additionally, the fourth night benefit has the following restrictions and requirements:
- Bookings can only be made in the name of the primary card member or the name of the authorized user.
- One complimentary night is available per stay. Citi considers back-to-back stays as one stay, so you can’t use two fourth-night benefits on back-to-back bookings at the same destination.
- For group bookings or other multi-room bookings, only one room will be eligible for a complimentary night.
- Reservations made through any agency or channel other than the Citi Travel site or 1-833-737-1288 are not eligible for the fourth night benefit.
- Discount rates such as company codes, loyalty program member rates, government rates and AAA rates cannot be used. You can only book the rates available on the Citi Travel website.
Finally, the fourth night benefit does not apply to other types of stays. For example, it does not include yachts, boats, yachts, campsites, castles, safaris, villas, apartments or any accommodation that is not bookable through the Citi Travel website.
Related: What you need to know about booking direct travel against a third party
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How to book a four night stay with patience
You can book a four-night stay in two ways: online through the Citi Travel site or by calling 1-833-737-1288. Since Citi removed the ability to book hotels that did not appear on the Citi Travel website by phone on Oct. 1, 2021, now there is no advantage in booking by phone. So, here is the process of booking a four night stay online through the Citi Travel site.
Enter the dates and destination
After logging into your Citi account and navigating to the Citi Travel portal, select “Hotels” and enter your destination, dates and number of guests before clicking “Search.”
Choose a hotel
The next page should return a list of available properties near your destination. You can filter results by property type, suite type, star rating, location, room offerings, payment options, property amenities, guest rating and more.
Choose your room and rate
Once you’ve chosen a hotel, you’ll usually see many room types available for booking.
Pay for your stay
On the next page, you can decide whether to use your four-night hotel bonus. For this stay, doing so will drop the cost of a four-night stay from $1,847 to $1,531.
Once you’ve verified your guest’s information, click “Continue to checkout.” On this page, you can choose how many points (if any) you would like to redeem.
You can use points for hotel bookings at a rate of one cent per point. But this is well below TPG’s October 2024 average for Citi ThankYou points at 1.8 cents each. So I don’t recommend using Citi ThankYou points to book hotels with Citi Travel.
Related: Citi Hotel Collection and Luxury Collection: Get free breakfast and paid perks
Higher benefits and benefits
Unfortunately, stays booked through Citi Travel are often not eligible for points and higher benefits through hotel loyalty programs. The frequently asked questions section of the Citi Prestige card notes benefits, “Frequent traveler accounts cannot be used when booking through ThankYou.com or when calling the ThankYou travel center.”
That being said, you can always ask the hotel to add your loyalty number upon check-in. Most hotels will not offer higher benefits and income if you book through an online travel agency like Citi Travel. But even if you don’t get points and stay in credit, each site can decide to give you higher site benefits.
Related: Citi Prestige vs. Citi Strata Premier: Should you keep Prestige or downgrade to Strata Premier?
Are Citi Travel website prices competitive?
The lowest rates available through the Citi Travel website are often higher than the member rates available when booking directly through the hotel’s loyalty program. Plus, you usually won’t get top benefits and earnings when you book with Citi Travel.
However, in some cases, you will find that Citi Travel offers the same rates as direct bookings. For example, booking the example stay discussed above directly with Atlantis would cost me a few cents more than booking through Citi Travel without the fourth night benefit (and $317 more than booking through Citi Travel with the fourth night benefit).
Likewise, booking a flexible membership rate at The Coral through Marriott Bonvoy will cost $1,808 – $39 less than Citi Travel without the free fourth night but $277 more than Citi Travel with the free fourth night. However, I would receive a Marriott Bonvoy bonus for my room rate if I booked my stay through Marriott.
In general, you’ll get better value from the fourth night bonus if you use it at luxury hotels and hotels that don’t participate in major loyalty programs. However, I recommend that you consider the total cost – out-of-pocket costs minus premiums and credit card benefits – of each of your favorite booking methods when deciding how to book your accommodation.
Related: Incognito mode and third-party apps: Do tour booking hacks really work?
Bottom line
Longtime cardholders will lament that the Citi Prestige free fourth night bonus no longer has the impact it once did. Indeed, this benefit was once one of the best benefits of Citi Prestige, and now I don’t use it once in many years as I appreciate getting the benefits of the hotel status and the benefit where I stay. However, the benefit can still provide value, especially if you carefully consider when and how you can use your two free benefits each year.
If you’re interested in other ways to get a free night at an upcoming hotel, remember that Marriott offers a fifth night free on all award stays, Hilton offers a fifth night free for exclusive members on award stays and IHG offers a fourth complimentary night. in the award is always select IHG cardholders. Additionally, some Fine Hotels + Resorts properties offer the third or fourth night free.
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