For CitiBank, everything is negotiable, at least for its Credit Protector Program.

I blogged about the program four weeks ago. I cashed out a $15 check to enrol in CitiBank Credit Protector program with 30-day free trial. I made it clear in my blog that I will cancel the membership within the first 30 days because by common sense, the program is an expensive (85 cents per $100 new balance) insurance that provides only minimal coverage.

Today I called CitiBank to cancel the service and it becomes interesting as of how the conversation went. The service representative tried very hard to keep my business. He first offered to lower the monthly fee from 85 cents per $100 dollars of new balance to 69 cents per $100. I pushed back. Within a second, he improved the offer again: now the cost is only 49 cents per $100. I made it clear that I think it is a better idea to use the money to buy life insurance and continued to say no. Knowing my resistance, he threw in $100 rebate, saying I can mail in any receipt from charging this card to get up to $100 rebate in cash, and since the terms have changed, I have 30 more days to try the service for free.

$100 sounds like a good enough deal for me so I cheerfully agreed to the new terms. I'm not waiting for the new paperworks to come in. While I will pay out a few dollars to keep this program for some time while I collect the $100 rebate, I can prepay most of the balance before the statement date to minimize my expense in this program.

After all, it is not bad at all to earn $100 with a 5-minute phone call.