topic Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date in Credit Cards

Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

elboullee — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 02:24:21 GMT

Completely trivial but I am curious nontheless.

I got the Green Card as a freshman and carried it through grad school. I then upgraded it to the Plat c.1999 and kept that card until 2003 and then canceled it in good standing.

Does anyone know, if I were to get a new Amex card, would they use the date I got that first Green Card?

Thx.

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

K-in-Boston — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 02:47:14 GMT

While purely cosmetic (since they stopped backdating accounts in 2015) in your account and on the card, yes the Member Since date will carry over. Sometimes the initial card doesn't reflect it, but replacement cards will. Even having 3 of my Amex accounts continuously opened for 20 years I still usually got Member Since 201x or 202x on my initial card after applying for new ones while logged into my account.

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

coldworld — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 03:22:06 GMT

@K-in-Boston wrote:
While purely cosmetic (since they stopped backdating accounts in 2015) in your account and on the card, yes the Member Since date will carry over. Sometimes the initial card doesn't reflect it, but replacement cards will. Even having 3 of my Amex accounts continuously opened for 20 years I still usually got Member Since 201x or 202x on my initial card after applying for new ones while logged into my account.

What do you mean by "backdating" in this context?

Here's my data point: I have not had an Amex in over 10 years prior to this summer. I applied for a Platinum card and a bonvoy brilliant on the same day(plat first, then bonvoy). My platinum card showed up with a member date of "23", whereas my bonvoy brilliant showed up with a member date of "05" (my actual first date)

I'm not too proud to admit I had replacement platinum card made to reflect the 05 date

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

Anonymous — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 03:33:07 GMT

@coldworld wrote:
What do you mean by "backdating" in this context?

In the good old days (maybe up to 5 years ago) the "Member Since" date would also be reflected on the credit report. It used the following strange algorithm (I don't know why). Suppose you got your first Amex in say 1995. In April 2015, you got a new Amex. This would appear in your credit report as being opened April 1995. If you then opened one in Feb 2016, this is reported as opened in Feb 1995 (i.e. earlier than the other). Basically month of opening/year of original card.

This has a great impact on score, so I show three Amex dating back to 1987, even though they are much younger. Amex has stopped doing this, reporting the correct opening date like everyone else, but those who were backdated in the past remain backdated.

Even earlier, AUs inherited the opening date, leading to children having Member Since (and the corresponding credit report) date from before they were born.

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

coldworld — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 03:57:04 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@coldworld wrote:
What do you mean by "backdating" in this context?

In the good old days (maybe up to 5 years ago) the "Member Since" date would also be reflected on the credit report. It used the following strange algorithm (I don't know why). Suppose you got your first Amex in say 1995. In April 2015, you got a new Amex. This would appear in your credit report as being opened April 1995. If you then opened one in Feb 2016, this is reported as opened in Feb 1995 (i.e. earlier than the other). Basically month of opening/year of original card.

This has a great impact on score, so I show three Amex dating back to 1987, even though they are much younger. Amex has stopped doing this, reporting the correct opening date like everyone else, but those who were backdated in the past remain backdated.

Even earlier, AUs inherited the opening date, leading to children having Member Since (and the corresponding credit report) date from before they were born.

Thanks for the clarification!

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

SouthJamaica — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 20:56:49 GMT

@elboullee wrote:
Completely trivial but I am curious nontheless.

I got the Green Card as a freshman and carried it through grad school. I then upgraded it to the Plat c.1999 and kept that card until 2003 and then canceled it in good standing.

Does anyone know, if I were to get a new Amex card, would they use the date I got that first Green Card?

Thx.

On the card it well might say "Member since 1995" (or whatever the year was). But in your credit reports it will be reported as a new account.

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

BuckyB — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 06:13:12 GMT

Yes it will be dated as of your very first account with Amex. I know because when I was back in college, someone stole my SSN and opened an Amex card (as well as several other banks' cards) in my name fraudulently. Several months ago I opened my first actual Amex card and the "Member since" has the year that the fraudulent card was first opened in my name, 20 years ago

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

Anonymous — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 13:45:18 GMT

@BuckyB wrote:
Yes it will be dated as of your very first account with Amex. I know because when I was back in college, someone stole my SSN and opened an Amex card (as well as several other banks' cards) in my name fraudulently. Several months ago I opened my first actual Amex card and the "Member since" has the year that the fraudulent card was first opened in my name, 20 years ago

If they were still backdating (or if this happened just a few years ago) this would be a rare case of benefitting from being a victim of fraud!

Re: Question About AMEX 'Member Since' Date

Shooting-For-800 — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 14:30:14 GMT

You should get your oldest card date.

GL!