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I don't think that you will get backdated to your parents member date.
I was added as an authorized user on my father's account back in 1989, and my card said "Member Since '89" even though my father had been a cardmember since the 70s.
When I applied for my own Platinum card in June, the card came with a member date of 2012. One phone call later I had that changed to the date I became an authorized user (1989), and when I checked my FICO reports the following month, it was reporting as a 23 year old trade line which of course gave a nice boost to AAoA.
Good luck
Historically, the policy has been that you become a cardmember when you become a cardmember--either as an account holder or an AU. So, if your first card with amex is an AU, it shouldn't matter what the account holder's member date is: your "member since" date will be the date you get the card. If you subsequently go on to open your own account, you will get backdated to this date.
The opposite is true, too: if you have you own amex, but then you later become an AU on someone else's card, your AU card will get backdated to your original member date. Example: When I got my Zync, I added my sister as an AU. She had an amex for a couple years a while back, but closed it because she didn't want to pay the annual fee. When she got her AU card, it was backdated to the date of her old card. L
From reading this board, there appear to be some grey areas. Apparently some people who become an AU on their parents' card have called in and convinced Amex to backdate them to their parents' original member since date. That seems crazy to me--by this logic, you could potentially end up with a member since date from before you were born. On the other hand, apparently some people have had trouble getting their new accounts backdated to their original member since date if their original card was an AU.
Its kind of hit or miss, We had to call in about 4 times to get the member backdated to 88 for a friend of mine....
Maybe someone can answer this? If someone added me on to Amex that was originally opened in 2004 (backdated to 1988), Then I backdate my card to 2002, would I get the actual history from 2004 or would the account just say opened since 2002 on my credit report?
@Anonymous wrote:
Sorry, I did a search and there are many topics on this but they all seem to be conflicting :s I was wondering if one of my parents added me to their AMEX card as a AU (Meaning the card will show member since 1988), and later this year I open my own account will it reflect the date on the AU account or will it start fresh? It seems that there is no clear consensus on this, some say yes, some say no and some say with some effort. Does AMEX have a clear policy on this? Thanks
While there is the rare exception, Amex closed this door last year. One of the reasons I've read about is because you could end up with a member since date from before you were even born. (If you were an AU on your parents' card, for example.) In general, your member since date will reflect the date YOU became a member. "Authorized users," (which isn't the term Amex uses) are "additional cardmembers" and not members.