Hey all, I was recently approved for the Amex Platinum, and here is my experience. There is a TL;DR at the end 
Plug: I also created a thread on my interesting experience in being approved for the Chase Sapphire Reserve. You can find that thread here, though I think this experience with Amex is more interesting.
Short Background: I went 120 days late on my student loans back in 2018, and had been rebuilding my credit until May 2019 (13 months since last late), when I was approved for the Amex Gold Card, for a pre-approved 50,000 bonus points offer. A month later, I applied for the Amex Platinum, but was declined due to a short history with Amex, according to their reason codes (soft pull). Interestingly enough, I was approved for the CSR on the same night, with an EX Fico score of 689, and a bankcard score of 696
Application: I didn’t really plan on applying for the card, but I would check the card offers page every so often just to see what was available. The Platinum card never had a pre-approved offer, so I didn't apply. One day I noticed that the Amex Platinum card just wasn’t there anymore. No kidding – if I was logged in, it would not show up on the list of cards that I could apply for, and the Gold Card appeared as the top tier card. If I manually went to the platinum card’s page and logged in, it would tell me that the offer wasn’t available at the moment. This went on for over a week – I even messaged Amex to inquire as to why the card wouldn’t show up, but none of the reps could explain why.
One day I got curious and accessed the website through an incognito window. I got to the card page (not logged in) and found that it was actually offering a 75,000 point sign up bonus, instead of the normal 60,000. I had heard that the 100,000 point offer was out there somewhere, but I reckoned that because I was already a card holder, I couldn’t really get that. Nevertheless, I figured that this new bonus was probably why the card wouldn’t appear for me, since I already got a boosted bonus for the Gold card… but that’s where things got interesting….
I got even more curious and logged into the Amex website through the incog window, and then backtracked to the application page for the Platinum card. To my great surprise, not only was I now able to apply, but I was pre-approved for the card, with the 75,000 point bonus. At that time, my EX score was 687, with a 699 Bankcard score.
I figured that I had nothing to lose since a denial would be a soft pull for me as an Amex cardholder, so I pulled the trigger. I was instantly approved, for the bonus and everything. Color me shocked.
But that’s not all – it gets better. I have Experian Credit Works, which gives me a notification anytime there is a hard pull on my credit. To my added surprise, I never got that notification. I checked my updated EX score the next day, and no change. No hard pull. I was approved for the card with a soft pull ^^
For the record, these were my stats when applying:
687 EX Score/699 Bankcard Score
2 Inqs in last 12 months (Amex Gold+CSR)
AAoA: 2y7m
AoYA: 1 month (CSR)
15 accounts, 2 closed, 6 credit cards, 2 store cards, 5 revolving
2 Month history with Amex
Just wanted to share this experience and datapoints for anyone interested in getting the card and/or possibly getting a increased sign up bonus. For what it’s worth, I checked the bonus again the next day and the 75,000 point offer was gone, and just the normal 60,000 point offer showed up, so YMMV. If it helps, I conducted this search at just after 12 am CST 😊
TL;DR:
- Early May: Pre-approved for the 50,000 point Amex Gold, 689 Fico Score
- Denied for Amex Platinum exactly 1 month later, 676 Fico Score, -11 points due to no revolving credit balance (lol)
- Approved for CSR on the same night (727 CARS score)
- Mid June: Amex Fico score updates: 687
- Late June: No Pre-approved offer for the Amex Platinum card
- Early July: Amex Platinum card disappears from card offers (when logged in) offer said to be not available
- Accessed Platinum Card application through incog window; 75,000 points offered
- Logged into incog window, 75,000 points still offered, pre-approved
- Approved for Amex Platinum, 75,000 bonus points, no hard pull.
Congrats on your Amex Platinum approval! Enjoy the travel perks! 
@Anonymous wrote:
@FicoGuy2019 wrote:Congrats. Amex doesn't do a HP once you already have 1 card with them. If you want to find out your current internal limit the credit services department will tell you.
Is that so? I knew that they would only do a soft pull if you were declined, but I thought that an approval usually meant a hard pull...
I think it's really just a miscommunication. Technically, approval is based on a SP from their monthly pulls of your credit. It doesn't mean it will be your up to date score. They could approve or deny you based on a 2 month old SP. They can still HP on occasion, and could even pull an additional bureau on top of EX. Chances are higher for an HP in the first couple of months after opening an account for the first time with them as they haven't started pulling your reports yet. You're usually safe from an HP by your 3rd month, but it can still happen.
Congrats on the approval!
