Citi Clear Credit Card

Pauline Hatch

Pauline is a personal finance expert at CreditCard.com.au, with 8 years in money, budgeting and property reporting under her belt. Ask Pauline a Question about this card.

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Editor's Review: What I love about the Citi Clear Balance Transfer credit card

Citi isn’t holding out with its Citi Clear card. It got out the fine china and Nana’s ornate cutlery to dish up a genuinely massive 3-year balance transfer offer, where you’ll pay zero interest for the promotional period. Honestly, I’m excited about what this feature could do to help people move out of debt, especially since Citi is one of the few banks that let you balance transfer a Buy now pay later balance and personal loans like car loans. It opens up a lot of opportunities.

Just remember the 0% balance transfer offer ends 25 October 2023, so there isn’t much time left to jump on it. It could be a nifty way to pay off the last bit of Christmas credit card debt you’re currently paying interest on.

I’m often surprised and impressed by the offers Citi presents with its credit cards and the way it includes a few standard extras that other banks don’t. The Citi Clear card’s big drawcard is the super-long balance transfer offer, so I’ll go through those first.

• The 0% Balance Transfer offer: Balance transfers (where you can transfer over debt from other credit cards) are already a pretty good deal if you’ve got debt to get rid of. Usually, you’ll see 0% interest offers of 6 months or 12, sometimes even 18. Rarely does a card have a whopping 3-year interest-free balance transfer period.
  
  Citi is one of the few banks that also allow balance transfers from personal loans and lines of credit (including some Buy now pay later services like Zip Pay - any service that has a BSB/Account number or BPAY Biller Code). That allows a much bigger scope for debt consolidation.
  
  The balance transfer deal makes this card an honest-to-goodness financial tool in a debt-reduction strategy. With that kind of extended timeframe, you can create a workable repayment plan, paying off bite-sized chunks of debt without being snowballed by interest every month.

Other deal-sweeteners and perks

Citi Clear isn’t a rewards credit card, but you can still earn points and cashback using some of Citi’s extras. For instance, you can use Citi PayAll to make online payments that normally don’t earn points, such as rent, childcare and education fees, and taxes. You’ll earn 1 Citi point or 0.5 Qantas points per $1 spent.

And, Citi has introduced its My Cashback program. As you shop using your Citi card, you’ll automatically have personalised cashback offers sent to your app from participating merchants.

Here are some other extras you’ll get with the Citi Clear credit card:

What's not so great

Ultimately the biggest drawback is the caveats around balance transfers, all of which are industry standard (but important to know). First, if you don’t pay off the balance transfer before the interest-free period is over, you’ll be slapped with the cash advance rate of 22.24% - and that sucker is much higher than the card’s standard variable rate of 14.99%.

Second, there are still minimum repayments with balance transfers. Citi expects either $30 or 2% of the balance each month, whichever is greater.

And third, if you have a balance transfer and use your card for a regular purchase, you won’t get the 55 days interest-free period - you’ll pay interest on it immediately. Yes, Citi Clear’s interest rate is lower than standard, but if your goal is to pay off debt then you'll get better overall value if you use it for its balance transfer deal than as a regular credit card.

Moral of the story: use the gift of 36 interest-free months wisely and pay 👏 off 👏 that 👏 debt.

Here are some other terms and fees to know about:

Complimentary insurances. You’re only covered if you use your Citi Clear card to pay for your travel and retail purchases . If you have a balance transfer, just make sure you pay back your purchases ASAP to avoid paying interest and to keep your card costs down.

International transaction fee. You’ll pay 3.4% of the amount for any retail transaction or cash advance (money withdrawn from your credit card) from a merchant overseas. There’s also an international cash advance fee of $5 per withdrawal.

Cash advances in Australia. A 3.5% fee (charged at a minimum of $3.50) is charged when you withdraw cash from your card in Australia.

Overall Rating

You can use the Citi Clear card in a multitude of ways: as a first-time credit card user who wants to test the waters with a low credit limit, to keep as a fairly low-cost card that comes with some money-savers like insurance, or to pay off debt using its epic 36-month 0% balance transfer deal. This card is virtually unbeatable in the market for the length of the balance transfer period.

It doesn’t earn rewards points except for payments made through Citi PayAll, but you’re also not paying a rewards-card-sized annual fee, either. The annual fee of $99 is reasonable for the extras you get, and weighs up well if you use all the insurances and the My Cashback program to your advantage.

If you’re after a debt consolidation strategy, the extra-long balance transfer offer (that includes other lines of credit and loans) will likely trump a personal loan with interest, and provide a way out of debt if you’re savvy about the repayments.