AmEx retention offer personal Gold card

[scenery_guy]

The $125 AF is coming up on my personal Gold card. Didn't really need (or want) to keep the card when faced with the fee. I have a Business Platinum card and my MR points are shared so there was no risk in losing the accumulated points. Nothing special about the card, it's not the PRG so it's 1X on all spend. Guess it's another line of credit with them but it's not really needed. 

Called the number on the back of the card, went thru the prompts and selected the close card option. Confirmed the choice and got a pleasant CSR on the line. Could have been a retention person, didn't ask. Told her strait up it's not worth keeping for $125 per year. She looked up my info and confirmed that I put about $30K on the card last year but only $7K so far this year. She did ask where my spending was going, I told her it was split between Delta Platinum and my CSP as the CSP has 2X for dining. She looked over my other AmEx cards and spending and offered a $50 statement credit to keep the card open. Not good enough, no thanks. She offered $50 credit and 5K points. Better but no thank you. FInally she offered $125 statement credit - making the card free for another year. Sounds great, thanks! WIll get credit in 6-8 weeks but that's no big deal. I should have asked for 12.5K points. Or 15K points. Oh well, there is always next year. 

Before paying that fee call and try to get an offer! Don't say I am calling to close the card, tell them you know the fee is due and you are trying to justify spending that to keep the card. Bring up another bank and card that does better, or bring up an offer for a new card by another bank with a bonus. Be firm but polite and hold out for another offer as they can always do better. 

Post some retention offers you have taken or decided not to take and closed the card. 

[Open123]

Nice!

I suspect Amex retention offers are calulated to a very large extent by their computer algorithms, which gives a CSR what they can or can't offer.  The past year, my spending on SPG was $30K+, but the CSR assured me Amex can't give me a "fee adjustment" on the SPG, but did offer to give me "fee adjustments" on my other cards, which ended up more than the $65 on the SPG.

For Plat, the prior year, I was offered 50K MR points to keep the account.  

[scenery_guy]

Was that a personal or business SPG? I need to give myself notice on my business SPG, I'll ask for the fee and see if I can get anything. I can always close it and get the personal later if it's a no go. 

[Open123]

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@scenery_guy wrote:

Was that a personal or business SPG? I need to give myself notice on my business SPG, I'll ask for the fee and see if I can get anything. I can always close it and get the personal later if it's a no go. 

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It was a personal one.  

Some around me were offered spg points as retention, usually in the ranges of 3k - 5k.  Since all of our spending and profiles are similar, I'm not sure why I was offered for a fee offset on other cards, and was never offered the points bonus.

PS - Planning to get the SPG for business if they have the October sign-up.  Any material difference between the business and personal?  Points go in the same spg account?

[scenery_guy]

As far as I know either or both cards will send points to same account. I assume it's like the Delta card where both business and personal dump points in my single SkyPeso account. I had an old SPG account from stays and I gave them that number when I got the card. Of course that didn't work out but the merge of my old and new account was a simple call. 

Both cards seem to offer same benefits. 

[mmoon24]

Always nice to get your AF waived twice in a row. I'm curious to see how many times you can pull that off. I suspect if you try that next year, they might see they waived it for you once before. Would be neat if you could get away with it twice.

[GatorGuy]

@Open123

$30K worth of spending doesn't justify a fee adjustment, what does!

[Open123]

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@GatorGuy wrote:
@Open123

$30K worth of spending doesn't justify a fee adjustment, what does!

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LOL...Well, Amex is all about profitability balanced by spending volume.  In my case, well over half of my spending were on Starwoods properties earning 5X points.  I'm sure Amex would have much rather I spent it on the non-bonus category.