topic Re: Thinking about Amex Green in Credit Cards

Thinking about Amex Green

MrDisco99 — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 19:51:38 GMT

There have been some rumors flying around about changes coming to the green card. I had the card last year but closed it. I’m thinking about getting it again to get in on the new card while it’s still sure to have no fee for the first year.

A couple questions...

I know I won’t be eligible for any welcome bonus. I’m on their no bonus blacklist already anyway. However would I still be eligible for no fee the first year even though I had the card before?

How reliable are the rumors about the new card? And how likely is it that the new product will charge a fee for the first year?

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

NRB525 — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 20:03:11 GMT

What do you expect the Green to provide you which your Gold does not already?

If you get it now, no AF for 12 months, and nothing comes of the rumor mill, when the AF posts next January what would you do?

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

MrDisco99 — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 20:24:20 GMT

If nothing changes then I’d probably close it again. Which is why I ask how reliable the rumors are.

Rumor has it the green would offer 4x on gas purchases and 3x on streaming, and another rumor said free (or reimbursed) Amazon Prime which I already pay $120 for per year. If these are true, and the fee doesn’t go up by much (say to $150 or so), then this would be a keeper card for me.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

kdm31091 — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 20:41:28 GMT

Personally I would just wait. Plenty of rumors end up not being true or end up significantly different than what was stated. No point in applying for a card that gives you no current benefit.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

jb1280 — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 21:25:51 GMT

There’s enough smoke that there will probably be a Green Card refresh in Q1 2019, but not enough fire in terms of nailing down what the refresh will look like. I’d imagine those details will come out in the coming weeks.

There’s something to be said about applying in advance of the refresh if you’re preapproved and get the introductory annual fee, but probably no immediate rush unless you really have an itching to do so.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

pinkandgrey — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 23:13:38 GMT

I’d hold off until after this supposed refresh happens. If it doesn’t happen, you’ve lost nothing. If it does, apply then and get that whole year of no AF! I hope it happens too though.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

jdbkiang — Tue, 22 Jan 2019 23:40:39 GMT

I FEEL that the $0 AF will go away when it’s refreshed, but who knows. I do think that it’s pretty much a guarantee that it’ll be changed, though I have no idea how.

Anyway, I did do the same for the Gold card though. Applied just before it was refreshed, so got the $0 AF first year, but still got the new benefits.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

MrDisco99 — Wed, 23 Jan 2019 00:21:19 GMT

Yeah if any of those rumors are true, I expect no fee for the first year will almost surely go away. That’s why I’m thinking of preempting that.

However I agree that there’s not enough substance behind the rumors right now to rush into applying just yet.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

wasCB14 — Wed, 23 Jan 2019 00:49:34 GMT

Keep in mind that when you get any card...but especially an AF card...without a bonus it takes a lot of spend to out-earn something with a healthy bonus (as in 50k - 70k miles).

Prime would be nice (no guarantee it will happen or that Prime itself won't be nerfed), but how much does anyone really spend on gas and streaming content?

4x MRs sounds nice...but the margin beyond BBP/BofA/Premier may not be worthwhile.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

kdm31091 — Wed, 23 Jan 2019 01:05:11 GMT

@wasCB14 wrote:
Keep in mind that when you get any card...but especially an AF card...without a bonus it takes a lot of spend to out-earn something with a healthy bonus (as in 50k - 70k miles).

Prime would be nice (no guarantee it will happen or that Prime itself won't be nerfed), but how much does anyone really spend on gas and streaming content?

4x MRs sounds nice...but the margin beyond BBP/BofA/Premier may not be worthwhile.

Pretty much this. Not only that, but gas is an extremely common bonus category. Most people who have many cards have one or two or six that already cover gas. So you're left with streaming. Even if you have several services (on top of Amazon Prime) you're looking at maybe $30-40 a month. Not going to rack up a huge amount of points and you have an additional fee to pay. I don't know, I'm not convinced. I think even with the (rumored) refresh the Green will remain a "starter card" and not really the best out there.

Also, good comment about Prime itself being nerfed. You may decide Prime no longer makes sense for you whether the card provides it or not. Either way you're going to still be paying for it, whether it's via the Prime fee or the Green fee. So I'd evaluate how much use you get out of Prime and expected continued usage.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

Anonymous — Wed, 23 Jan 2019 04:13:07 GMT

And as a general point, I don't know how anyone here could usefully answer the question:

"How reliable are the rumors about the new card? "

Until the card comes out, we don't know how accurate the rumors are (and if an insider tells us, we can't be certain even then).

As an exercise for the class: look at the recent Gold refresh. Where there rumors that this was happening, and if so, how close were they?

(Note from my past corporate experience: there are also cases where rumors WOULD be very accurate, but some exec makes a change at the last minute for a good/bad/no reason. Then the leakers look wrong, but the info they were given WAS accurate, just changed by circumstance)

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

Anonymous — Wed, 23 Jan 2019 04:53:39 GMT

Personally the Green Card in it's current iteration is just there because it's a legacy AMEX card. No one should sign up for it unless they see the 25K MR/$1000 spend on it. Worse comes to worse, wait out on the refresh and see what happens, the most you lost is AF waived.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

UpperNwGuy — Wed, 23 Jan 2019 12:07:10 GMT

Don't get the current Green. It is a useless card. And don't rely on rumors.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

Anonymous — Thu, 24 Jan 2019 19:32:06 GMT

I will be paying attention to this one depending on how the reimbursement is done. $10 each month when you use Amazon seems like something Amex could do.

More info here-
https://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/Rumors-about-AMEX-Green/m-p/5445204

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

wasCB14 — Thu, 24 Jan 2019 19:47:04 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
And as a general point, I don't know how anyone here could usefully answer the question:

"How reliable are the rumors about the new card? "

Until the card comes out, we don't know how accurate the rumors are (and if an insider tells us, we can't be certain even then).

As an exercise for the class: look at the recent Gold refresh. Where there rumors that this was happening, and if so, how close were they?

(Note from my past corporate experience: there are also cases where rumors WOULD be very accurate, but some exec makes a change at the last minute for a good/bad/no reason. Then the leakers look wrong, but the info they were given WAS accurate, just changed by circumstance)

I tried a few search engines and all article/thread dates were on or after the day people reported seeing the dining credit on their Benefits page. Plus, there are many rumors about Amex that never come to fruition or are wildly off in timing. Remember the "broad travel and dining" new product that was supposed to rival CSR in 2016?

There were some rumors in advance of the 5x on Platinum's airfare, but they were vague. CSRs were telling customers something vague like, "You might not want to cancel just yet." I'm not sure about any rumors before the Uber/$550/metal changes.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

NRB525 — Thu, 24 Jan 2019 19:48:43 GMT

The personal Green is closely related to the common Corporate Green.

I would guess the millions of Corporate Green cards, used for business travel spend, are a driver of the “high transaction value” stats that AMEX relies on.

Green may be improved, is not going to be retired.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

FlaDude — Fri, 01 Mar 2019 17:02:39 GMT

It's the first of March and still no news. Hopefully they will announce something soon so I can decide to keep mine or not. It's one of my oldest cards, but I have three others that are 24-25 years old. Since closed cards affect AAoA for 10 years, closing it won't have much impact there.

I used to use it a lot for reimbursed travel expenses. The closing date is two weeks different than my Gold card so switching between them based on getting the longest float meant I would usually get my expense check before the charges were due. I don't do as much biz travel now and also have plenty of float on cards with better earnings so now it's mostly just a placeholder.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

Anonymous — Fri, 01 Mar 2019 17:32:48 GMT

Amex isn't a charity, it's hard to believe somehow they will provide you a simple AF reduction in the form of prime membership every year. They don't do simple AF reduction for neither gold or platinum.

Prime membership, if true, I am gonna predict it's a one year deal, and first year AF will not be waived.

Definitely wait until it comes out, instead of app now.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

Anonymous — Fri, 01 Mar 2019 17:59:50 GMT

@wasCB14 wrote:

Prime would be nice (no guarantee it will happen or that Prime itself won't be nerfed), but how much does anyone really spend on gas and streaming content?

4x MRs sounds nice...but the margin beyond BBP/BofA/Premier may not be worthwhile.

Depends what they have in that category. If they have Directv Now, Vue, Sling or the like, you're looking at about $50-$70 a month for a lot of people. Then add on Netflix, Hulu, AMC premium, CBS All Access, or any combination of the standalone streaming packages, and you could be hitting over $100 easily.

Clearly $3-$4 a month wouldn't be earth shattering, but certainly getting to a point worth considering as a favorable feature in some cases.

Re: Thinking about Amex Green

Peteyglad — Sun, 03 Mar 2019 17:17:03 GMT

I am curious about this rumored change as well. Still no news that I have seen.