Frustrated with amex airline fee reimbursement

[Anonymous]

I'm getting a little frustrated that I have to always call in for them to manually credit me back on the airline fee reimbursement. I have my airline of choice selected and everything is set, and every time I upgrade my seats on a plane I wait the 2-4 weeks and it never automatically credits me I have to call Amex for them to do it. Does anyone else experience this problem? I'm not sure if it's the airline coding or what not but it's ridiculous it's a seating assignment charge which is one of the categories eligible for the airline fee credit benefit. I just hate having to call in every time to get it adjusted and it'll be way more convienent to get it automatically done after the charge. 

[Anonymous]

Please do bear in mind that per the terms and conditions of the Airline Fee Credit benefit:

"Airline tickets, upgrades, mileage points purchases, mileage points transfer fees, gift cards, duty free purchases, and award tickets are not deemed to be incidental fees."

Technically, you should not be receiving reimbursement for upgrading your seat and the system is handling your transaction correctly. The fact that CCP's are doing so manually is improper.

Hope this helps to clarify as to why you're having to manually call in to request credit.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:
Please do bear in mind that per the terms and conditions of the Airline Fee Credit benefit:

"Airline tickets, upgrades, mileage points purchases, mileage points transfer fees, gift cards, duty free purchases, and award tickets are not deemed to be incidental fees."

Technically, you should not be receiving reimbursement for upgrading your seat and the system is handling your transaction correctly. The fact that CCP's are doing so manually is improper.

Hope this helps to clarify as to why you're having to manually call in to request credit.

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When I first got my card and BEFORE I even bought preferred seats I made sure by calling Amex, in fact I called twice and spoke to two representatives who told me changing my seats to preferred seats counted as part of the credit fee as long as it's not a 1st class upgrade but the extra main cabin/preferred seats with more leg room was fine. Therefore I went ahead and did charge and therefore I expected it the credit. To add on to that after not receiving my credit after a month on the first expierence they manually did it for me and even re confirmed that it does count and is eligible so they are crediting me it. I don't know if this is part of the " seating assignment fee" that's eligible for the reimbursement or what I don't know. So that's honestly about 4/4 reps who confirmed it throughout my situation if I'm including my recent call in as well . So they are wrong? 

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately, as consistent as we aim to be, representatives do give out misinformation sometimes - myself included. Even if only moving into a premium economy seat, we would still consider that an upgrade. As far as "Seat Assignment Fees" go, an example is when airlines either charge you to select a specific seat within your fare class or changing your seat at a later time. Do you mind me asking what airline you're using this on? As you originally suggested, it's certainly also possible the transaction is not being coded properly in which case we need to make sure that's fixed.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Unfortunately, as consistent as we aim to be, representatives do give out misinformation sometimes - myself included. Even if only moving into a premium economy seat, we would still consider that an upgrade. As far as "Seat Assignment Fees" go, an example is when airlines either charge you to select a specific seat within your fare class or changing your seat at a later time. Do you mind me asking what airline you're using this on? As you originally suggested, it's certainly also possible the transaction is not being coded properly in which case we need to make sure that's fixed.

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American Airlines

[Anonymous]

I have sent you a private message in case you would like to escalate this further.