Citi has recently added some new eligible categories to its PayAll service, allowing you to earn miles when making payments for insurance premiums and other miscellaneous goods and services including charitable donations and parking fees. Depending on which Citi credit card you hold, this opens up miles earning on a wide range of additional expenses from a cost of 1.25 cents per mile.
Exclusively available on the Citi mobile app, PayAll was initially rolled out to a select few in November 2018, but following the trial all Citi credit card customers have been able to use the PayAll option since February 2019.
The service allows you to settle expenses such as rent payments to your private landlord or education bills using your card, while in return earning Citi Miles or Citi ThankYou Points, for a nominal transaction fee.
Insurance and miscellaneous payments added
Citi credit card customers are now able to make insurance premium payments using the PayAll service. In addition, a miscellaneous payments option has become available, effectively allowing you to enter the bank account details of any recipient in Singapore for any goods or services rendered.
Citi is offering payments to 11 major insurance companies in Singapore.
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Most credit cards in Singapore, including Citi cards, no longer award points for insurance premium payments, so this is a welcome additional option for miles earning.
Once you select the appropriate insurer, you’ll be asked to enter your policy details (e.g. vehicle registration, policy number, etc.) to proceed with your payment.
For miscellaneous fees, Citi is splitting the options into:
- Utilities
- Payment for Goods and Services
- Storage
- Donation or Charity Payment
- Parking
- Transport Fee
In this case you simply have to enter the recipient name and their Singapore bank account details, adding any payment reference in the ‘Remarks’ field as appropriate.
This opens up a wide range of options and can even include payments for bills like air conditioning servicing and home improvement costs.
You can now also settle your non-electricity utilities bills through PayAll, including with electricity companies that aren’t currently supported by the app. For example, we are using Union Power as our electricity provider, however they are not on Citi’s list of options for electricity payments. Now we can settle those bills through the ‘Miscellaneous > Utilities’ function if we want to.
Cost per mile
Citi charges a flat 2% fee for PayAll transactions, so the cost per mile depends on which credit card you’re using for the payment.
| Card | Earn rate (mpd) |
Cost per mile (2% fee) |
 Citi ULTIMA |
1.6 | 1.25¢ |
 Citi Prestige |
1.3 | 1.54¢ |
 Citi PM |
1.2 | 1.67¢ |
 Citi Rewards |
0.4 | 5.00¢ |
As you can see Citi ULTIMA cardholders get the best deal here – the ability to buy miles for 1.25 cents each.
At the top end those with the Citi PremierMiles card can buy miles at 1.67 cents each, still worth considering if you need them (and use them wisely). Our upper limit to buy is 1.9 cents per mile.
Remember too that Citi Miles / ThankYou Points also transfer to 11 different frequent flyer programs, including Avios, Asia Miles, Qantas and Turkish, so they can be super-flexible.
It almost goes without saying, you can never make this work well with the Citi Rewards card and so should not consider using it for PayAll transactions, unless an offer is launched. We included it in the table above only to show how bad it is. 5 cents per mile is way over the odds!
PayAll generally comes in below the typical 2.25% / 2.4% rates you’ll be charged with payment companies CardUp and ipaymy, though it’s good to be on the lookout for discounted fee offers from those providers, with both currently offering an excellent 1.75% rate on income tax payments.
Can you now pay anyone?
Since Citi does not require you to upload evidence of a payment being required, you may be tempted to use the new ‘miscellaneous’ category to pay the funds into your own bank account, in a similar way you currently can with the ‘no questions asked’ UOB PRVI Pay facility.
Beware however, this is not in accordance with the Citi PayAll terms and conditions, which state:
“You hereby represent and warrant that you shall not, in connection with your use of the Service…
… (b) send money to yourself or recipients who have not provided you with goods or services (unless expressly allowed by us).
Citi PayAll terms and conditions
You could technically make a payment to a friend or family member, under ‘Payment for Goods and Services’ for example, however Citi reserves the right to check whether this is legitimate and refuse the payment if it believes otherwise.
CapitaLand voucher offer
Citi has also launched a limited time offer when you spend at least S$5,000 using the PayAll service between now and 30th November 2020, with CapitaLand vouchers gifted based on your total transactions using the service during the promotion period.
All payment types are eligible, not just the newly added ones.
As you can see the more you charge through the PayAll service during the promotion period, which runs from 20th August 2020 to 30th November 2020, the higher voucher denomination you’ll be entitled to. Vouchers will be paid as:
- S$250 gift: 5 x S$50 vouchers
- S$75 gift: 1 x S$50 and 5 x S$5 vouchers
- S$25 gift: 2 x S$10 and 1 x S$5 vouchers
Bear in mind that you will forfeit any value in each voucher for purchases less than the stated denomination (e.g. a S$45 purchase using a S$50 voucher will not be entitled to any refund or additional voucher credit).
Of course if your purchase exceeds the voucher value, you then simply top up with cash or card payment, so you should be aiming to do this where possible. Vouchers can be combined in a single purchase.
CapitaLand vouchers can be redeemed at stores across 17 CapitaLand-managed malls in Singapore, as follows:
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Promo terms and conditions
Here are some of the key terms related to the offer:
- Both the payment setup date and the charge date must fall within the promotion period. That means payments set up before 20th August 2020 but charged in the promotion period won’t be counted, nor would a payment set up on 29th November 2020, to be charged on 10th December 2020, for example.
- Payments made through Citi’s 1.5 mpd offer for income tax payments with a PremierMiles card, valid until 31st August 2020, will not be counted towards the eligible spend for this promotion.
- You’ll only be eligible for one of the above gifts, depending on your total spend during the promotion period. The gifts do not ‘stack’.
- Vouchers will be mailed to your primary account address within 12 weeks from the end of the promotion period, i.e. by 22nd February 2021. That’s a long wait, potentially completely missing out on the Christmas and Chinese New Year shopping periods, so bear that in mind!
- If you close your card account before the vouchers are mailed, you’ll no longer be eligible for them.
Importantly if you’re already paying large regular bills such as your monthly rent (or other expenses) using PayAll’s recurring payment option, you’ll have to cancel and set up the payments again within the promotion window for the spend to be eligible.
Full terms and conditions are available here:
Citi App
Remember the app is the only way to set up and manage your PayAll transactions, it can’t be done over the phone or via the online site. If you are a Citi credit card customer but don’t have the mobile app yet, you can download it via the links below.
Summary
Citi has expanded its PayAll facility to allow a much wider range of payment types, including for insurance and charitable donations, categories usually excluded from points earning with the bank’s credit cards (and most other credit cards for that matter).
The new ‘miscellaneous’ category has great flexibility, including some regular bills like air conditioning servicing, but do remember to keep a copy of your invoice in case Citi ask you to prove the expense is legitimate.
An added incentive for those pushing more than S$5,000 through the PayAll facility between now and 30th November 2020 is a CapitaLands vouchers gift, ranging from S$25 to S$250 depending on your total spend during the promotion.
If you’re already using PayAll to settle monthly expenses, such as your house or condo rent, this is an easy way to earn some vouchers with minimal (or no) effort, however you may not actually receive them until well into February 2021.
Don’t forget, if your payments are recurring you’ll have to cancel them and set them up again within the promotion window for the spend to be eligible for the promo.
Full details: Citi PayAll
(Cover Photo: Shutterstock)