topic Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon in Credit Cards

Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

Saleen099 — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 11:32:03 GMT

https://thriftytraveler.com/news/credit-card/amex-ceo-more-fee-hikes/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0BMQABHb5D35zpr-QLa2_CqnY7jT3nbDLI9uh7HiwlD26Ltz8DU_E3mToZGJ2VAA_aem_AUK-RiiGSWg5F9b3d5pccJPEHP93l9LYegm9eI0FH78xgcYApNhhDNww22U0l4q6I2U

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

CreditCuriosity — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 12:08:42 GMT

Yes. Annoying to me personally. I will be cancelling my two Amex Delta cards one Platinum business that is on the 2nd year meaning paid two annual fees and the gold I will cancel early and they can claw back that bonus if they want as I signed up for 99 AF, not the 150 af after first year. Amex has no issues with raising AF's every few years and adds more coupons or the likes to each card it seems. I likely will just keep the Amex Prime card and Business BCE and be done with them as tired of them raising their AF's for me personally where other issuers are a bit more spread out on doing so.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

swankytiger — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 13:57:12 GMT

Waiting for my CS Plat AF to post so i can cancel, same with the gold. Im keeping my Hilton Aspire for now.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

FlaDude — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 15:32:49 GMT

Two of my cards recently AF increases and I plan on closing or downgrading before the next AF hits, Delta Gold and Amex Surpass.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

CYBERSAM — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 19:08:37 GMT

As a none Amex Delta card holder, this is a good news!

I have only BCP Amex and don't see any value for other personal cards that they offer! So revamping their lineup to be more competitive is great.

Always liked AMEX and their services, so hopefully they "revamp" their obsolete cards such as 1.5% rewards etc...

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

CorpCrMgr1 — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 19:27:14 GMT

@Saleen099 thank you for sharing.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

keekers — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 19:49:21 GMT

Thanks for sharing.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

Aim_High — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:41:27 GMT

“We look at what our customers really want and make sure that we’re adding value that makes sense to them,” he said.

Surely, their travel-loving Platinum cardholders were clamoring for a $13 monthly credit for Walmart+ and a $300-a-year, drop-in-the-bucket credit toward a $3,000-plus Equinox gym membership. What's next?

The problem for fed-up cardholders is that no matter how time-consuming it might be to track and use all the credits and benefits on your Amex cards, these tactics work like a charm for the bank's bottom line. Amex just keeps making more and more money, including pulling in 15% more in annual fees in the first quarter of 2024 compared to last year – largely powered by its increasingly expensive premium travel cards.

AMEX doesn't care what cardholders "really want." It's all about the cumbersome coupon-book credits padding the bottom line. And the frequent changes referenced (every three years or so) adds to the breakage since it's more difficult for consumers to keep track of the credits on each card as they evolve. Unfortunately, the constant changes make it very difficult for anyone to accurately predict the long-term viability of any of their AF cards, and requires existing cardholders to regularly question whether the cards are beneficial. My only AMEX cards with an AF right now are hotel cards with Marriott and Hilton which have more simple (and useful to me) credits like free hotel nights, hotel elite status perks, and the $300 restaurant credit on the Brilliant ($25 monthly) which is relatively painless as AMEX goes since it's credited by MCC and not the specific merchant. For now, I'll keep my current cards but if they make extensive changes I may have to revisit those cards. I won't voluntarily give up my AMEX TCL but I'd be willing to shift it to their no-AF cards, even if they were relatively useless except for the credit limits.

Thanks @Saleen099.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

CreditCuriosity — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 21:36:35 GMT

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

CreditCuriosity — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 21:43:33 GMT

You also know they are getting these credit or coupons in bulk at a huge discount and many of them are never used so AMEX is making off like a bandit. I think it is going to come around and nip them in their behind on the more expensive AF cards whether personal or business. As mentioned this seems to be happening changes in AF every few years and the perks change as well making it near impossible to see if a card is viable long term. Especially if terms being AF change before your first year where RAT can get involved as they say you are gaming the system, but AMEX is the one that made the change of AF midway through first year. Be an interesting fight I might be going against on their RAT team, but imho they have no ground to stand on as they changed the terms with two or three month notice? Still a lot of people will be caught up in this. Remind me of how MC d's and other fast food chains know and publicly admit how they are overcharging and seeing how far they can push the boundaries before they hit the line where people will not pay for convenience aka 15-20$ big mac combo meal or whatever when you can have a way better dining experience both in atmosphere and quality at a restaurant for the same price or very close.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

Zoostation1 — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:08:12 GMT

I don't have any of the higher AF Amex cards, only BCP and at it's current rate I'll definitely keep it (especially with the CAP discount). If it were to go up significantly and become more of a coupon book like the MR cards are I'd look into downgrading it to BCE. At that point I'd move my streaming spend and most of my grocery spend to Savor since the C1 duo gets a majority of my monthly spend as it is. I'd keep the BCE for gas, online purchases and grocery back up.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

NoHardLimits — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:10:17 GMT

@CYBERSAM wrote:
Always liked AMEX and their services, so hopefully they "revamp" their obsolete cards such as 1.5% rewards etc...

I have perhaps the most obsolete of Amex's offerings... the "Amex EveryDay" card. That's the one that earns Membership Rewards points, and should not be confused with "Blue Cash Everyday". It's rewards program is hardly worth putting any spend on, but it's my third oldest card and has my highest single credit limit. I'm keeping it alive for its outsized contribution to my FICO profile, but I live in hope that it will eventually be refreshed into a more competitive product. I would love a consumer version of Blue Business Plus.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

K-in-Boston — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:24:41 GMT

@NoHardLimits wrote:
I have perhaps the most obsolete of Amex's offerings... the "Amex EveryDay" card.

I'll see your ED and raise you my American Express Blue, which came with a handy card reader for shopping on the world wide web at all of today's biggest merchants like Circuit City and KB Toys, that plugs into my printer port (LPT, not USB) and also gets me 30% off CDs at Virgin Megastores!

#AmexLifer My cards aren't going anywhere.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

GZG — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:36:29 GMT

conflicted, hoping to see the Amex gold refresh before too long, my AF is coming up

hoping to get a not completely terrible retention offer, I've seen like 10k points for $3k spend, which might as well offer me nothing instead

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

Zoostation1 — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:39:49 GMT

@GZGYou sure you want a refresh? If it's too much of a coupon book now it's only going to get worse imo.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

Wu-Credit — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:40:48 GMT

Almost guaranteed the BCP and EDP go up to $150 AF.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

GZG — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 23:42:56 GMT

@Zoostation1 wrote:
@GZGYou sure you want a refresh? If it's too much of a coupon book now it's only going to get worse imo.

in the sense that I want to know what the refresh is before I pay the AF

as opposed to thinking that the card should be refreshed

card is great where it is, wish the dining credit was less restrictive, adding more partners to that would be nice, but grubhub is good enough for me

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

Aim_High — Tue, 23 Apr 2024 00:13:59 GMT

I'm not against the high AFs, per se. And I'm not against having credits that help to offset it. The overall value of a card in the end is what matters. But IMO, the whole idea with an AF and credits should be to motivate the consumer to USE their card more heavily and make it a daily driver. So the way AMEX approaches the AF/credits is disingenuous. I feel like they are purposefully trying to work against their customers to optimize AF spoilage while an opposite tactic would be more motivating to many of us. I've often posted about this on the Blue Cash Preferred, where no one ever gets a NET return of the advertised 6% (GROSS return) on groceries between the burden of the AF on one end and the $6K cap leading to 1% returns on the other. Before streaming, it's only 4.41%.

For another example, they've shown they can make money off a high AF card like the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant ($650 AF) that credits $25 monthly or $300 annually on non-specific restaurant charges monthly. But the Gold card dining/ride share credits are much more narrow. If they did the same thing on the Gold card while perhaps adding at least one other useful annual credit (maybe $200 airline fee credit, similar to what they used to have when I first got the Gold and before they shuffled the credits?), it might be worth it to pay as much as $500 for the Gold instead of $250 and you wouldn't feel like they were playing so many games. Then maybe enhance the rewards a little so you'd get not only 4x dining + groceries, but also 3x on ALL travel, 2x everything else with a higher AF and more useful credits. The Gold just wouldn't have the 5x airfare and lounge benefits of Platinum. Maybe offer some upgraded travel protections and that would be a killer card, even at that high AF.

Whatever they do, I think they need to stop making such frequent changes to their cards if they want to build more card loyalty. Its no wonder they accuse so many of churning the bonus by cancelling their cards when they keep the targets moving.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

redpat — Tue, 23 Apr 2024 01:08:06 GMT

Well I made out better with the last Delta Res change w/ the new $200 hotel credit. I'll wait to see if any changes happen to Plat but I'm not going anywhere, I only have 4 personal cards and if there are changes it wouldn't bother me as much as it would others.

Let the games begin.

Re: Amex CEO: More Card ‘Refreshes’ (& Fee Hikes) Are Coming Soon

NoHardLimits — Tue, 23 Apr 2024 01:15:11 GMT

@K-in-Boston wrote:
@NoHardLimits wrote:
I have perhaps the most obsolete of Amex's offerings... the "Amex EveryDay" card.
I'll see your ED and raise you my American Express Blue, which came with a handy card reader for shopping on the world wide web at all of today's biggest merchants like Circuit City and KB Toys, that plugs into my printer port (LPT, not USB) and also gets me 30% off CDs at Virgin Megastores!

#AmexLifer My cards aren't going anywhere.

Ha ha. I think my EveryDay was originally a Blue with Membership Rewards Express. I product changed it after the EveryDay was introduced. I'm surprised that you still have your Blue after all this time.