What's going on with Diners Club Mastercard?

Hi everyone,

I recently visited the DC website and noticed that there's no way to apply for the card right now. Strange.

I did some further digging and found out that while it says on the wesbite that the company is owned by Citibank, recently reports online suggest that BMO MC has purchased the company - so perhaps that's it -

Does anyone know if this card is being cancelled or on hold or something?

(Reason: I'm asking is that this seems to be the only non-Amex card other than CIBC that you can get free lounge access). :P

You have to buy that lounge access with the CIBC cards. so that is not free either. Try BMO elite card, get 3 free lounge visits yearly. Only other non-amex I can think of is MBNA Alaska Airline, gives 2 free passes, but I believe that is only a one time sign-up bonus thing only, so BMO elite is probably your best bet for non-amex lounge access

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For at least 6 years now, Diner's Club Canada and Diner's Club USA have been closed to new applications from individuals. This is because Citi decided to focus on their Corporate clients for this card to the exclusion of individuals. If you already had a DC card as an individual you got to keep it, but they refused any new applicants that were not corporate accounts.

Diner's Club USA (which includes Diner's Club Canada, and is different from Diner's Club International) was bought by BMO specifically for the corporate card business. There is no indication whatsoever that BMO intends to offer DC cards to consumers again, and in fact they've made every indication that their goal is to continue to expand their corporate client base.

It is possible that they may open it up to consumers again, but it is more likely that they will keep the status quo, and focus solely on corporate clients.

The cards they want to compete with are these, which are the two players in Canada at the corporate level:

AmEx Canada Corporate Cards & USBank Canada Corporate Cards