Amex Additional Processing Required

[Anonymous]

In August, Amex sent me an offer of 50,000 membership rewards points if I opened a Rewards Plus Gold Card with no annual fee for the first year.  I also have a no fee Platinum Cash Rewards card and have had various charge cards with them in the past (Green, Gold & Platinum.)  I opened the card and will probably cancel it before my anniversary -  the 50,000 points are worth $500.   Today they just sent me another offer to open a Premier Rewards Gold Card.  They are offering me 25,000 membership rewards points with my first purchase and another 25,000 points if I charge $10,000 in the six months.  Again I went ahead and applied and this time was told that they need to do additional processing on my application.  Previously, I had always been instantly approved by them.  Do you think that they sent the second offer by mistake and are not going to approve me?  It seems pretty generous of them to offer me another $500 to open a second Gold Card.

[pattycake]

Hmmm- it could have been one of those preapproval offers that get sent out en masse. Call their backdoor number and see what they can do for you.

[Raziel77]

read the fine print, is there anything saying "offer valid for new customers" or "first time amex holders"?

[CHARGE_IT]

This is a new card by Amex which offers this deal on opening for anyone. It is available on the card page of the website. It has vastly better rewards than any other Amex card, but at the same time has a minimum annual charge limit for the rewards that many people would not find practical, especially if they are using other accounts.

Your past performance with the other accounts you mentioned and your present spending capacity will probably determine the outcome.

CI

Message Edited by CHARGE_IT on 10-15-2009 09:38 PM

[GomerPyle]

The one thing that is certain about AMEX is that there is nothing certain about AMEX.  Trying to figure them out, or trying to see a pattern in their actions cannot be done. If a real person acted the way this company acted we would lock them up somewhere. To not be instantly approved probably means some alarm whistle went off in their crazy computers. AMEX thinks they have all this stuff figured out but I believe their computer programs are not logical. AMEX is schizophrenia, OCD and a whole set of disorders all wrapped up in one package. Good Luck. 

[Raziel77]

LOL

[Anonymous]

About an hour after applying I received a message that my application for the new gold card was cancelled.  I called and asked "why" and was told that I already had a gold card and they wouldn't allow me to have two.  I asked how I could take advantage of the offer and, after being transferred 4 or 5 time, was told that I could take advantage of the new offer if I cancelled my original Gold Card first. Since I have another Ames Card (Platinum Cash Rewards), I would have 30 days from the cancellation date to either use my points or transfer them to the new card.  I went ahead and cancelled the original card and asked them to reopen my application for the new card.  It was approved about an hour later.  The next day I went on line and it showed that the miles on my original card were no longer there.  I called and was told that they had not been cancelled - they just didn't show up on line.  My new card arrived today and I was able to transfer the 36k points from my original card to the new account.  I will receive an additional 25 K points when I use the new card for the first time and 25k more if I charge $10k in the next six months with no annual fee for a year - Membership has it's privileges!