Think closing acct may be good - need advice ASAP

[cl33]

My husband and I were recently upgraded from an AMEX Gold to Platinum.  We cut up the gold cards upon receiving our new ones and honestly thought the gold acct would be rolled in to the platinum; now of course we're stuck with two accts.  I consider myself fairly educated w/respect to credit and should have realized that would not be the case.  

My husband wants to close the gold accts because we have a large credit due to a vacation we had to cancel it and he'd like the money back.  I think we'd be crazy to close the account because we'd lose the history.  I am more worried about our score than the credit (tho it is over 5k.) I have the card # memorized so we can use the credit or have the cards reissued.

An article I read recently mentioned AMEX looking poorly on your credit report compared to other cards because there is no set limit.  1) Is that true?  2) If I close by customer request and note it was closed due to upgrade will that negatively affect my score?  If so by how much? 

Please help! 

Message Edited by tallgirl375 on 05-31-2007 03:32 PM

[fused]

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tallgirl375 wrote:

My husband and I were recently upgraded from an AMEX Gold to Platinum.  We cut up the gold cards upon receiving our new ones and honestly thought the gold acct would be rolled in to the platinum; now of course we're stuck with two accts.  I consider myself fairly educated w/respect to credit and should have realized that would not be the case.  

My husband wants to close the gold accts because we have a large credit due to a vacation we had to cancel it and he'd like the money back.  I think we'd be crazy to close the account because we'd lose the history.  I am more worried about our score than the credit (tho it is over 5k.) I have the card # memorized so we can use the credit or have the cards reissued.

An article I read recently mentioned AMEX looking poorly on your credit report compared to other cards because there is no set limit.  1) Is that true?  2) If I close by customer request and note it was closed due to upgrade will that negatively affect my score?  If so by how much? 

Please help! 

Message Edited by tallgirl375 on 05-31-2007 03:32 PM

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You might want to ask Amex to convert your existing Gold card to the Platinum.  Use same the account number but it simply turns to Platinum and you still have the same TL and all of its aging.  Closing the Gold will hurt your score but I am not sure by how much.  Hopefully, they will conevrt it and you don't have to pay extra AF's for keeping th gold open after you have the platinum.  Your other question is a good one as it is something I am concerned with as well.  I just received my AMEX Gold Rewards Plus card in April but it is not reporting yet.  I hope it does hurt my scores.  By the way, do you know your FICO scores?  And do you have other cc's.  This could give an indication of how the cra's are treating you with your current Amex TL.

[Tuscani]

The general rule is to leave accounts open unless they are costing you money. The notation "Closed by consumer" or "Closed by credit grantor" will not hurt your scores.

How old is the account you are considering closing?

[cl33]

The idea of converting the gold to platinum is a good one, however, we've already started using the new platinum card, but only for one billing cycle.  I'll give them a call and see what my options are.  I have other credit cards in good standing, mortagage, car, etc and my FICO score is good, little over 700.  Not great, but decent.  My concern with closing the gold account is having that drop.  I want it to stay above 700.

[cl33]

The gold account was opened June 2006 so it's fairly new, but there's been a lot of activity since that time (a lot of points available.)  I'm not as concerned about the points as I am with the history. 

So, if I am the one closing the account and it's always been in good standing and I include a note that it was closed due to an upgrade that shouldn't affect my score drastically, should it?  Is a better option to see if they'll convert the gold to platinum and then cancel the platinum cards we have.  We just received them.  Will that look worse?  Closing a card you just received, or irrelevant because it was at my request?  I would rather not close anything, but with the gold about to renew and a large credit pending we need to do something.  I'd rather not keep the gold open and pay a yearly fee if we're not going to use the card, but at the same time don't want to hurt my FICO score.

Is it true that AMEX is looked down upon becuase it does not have a limit.  Do they take in to consideration that it's a gold or platinum card and you wouldn't have recd it in the first place if you didn't qualify?  

[Anonymous]

Call them. They will know exactly what they can and can not do.
Tell them what you would like-