Bad news for those who have or wanted this card.
But scrolling through the list of axed benefits, I am struck with how expensive that list would be to make a profit, as a bank, where it is often outside vendors providing the features.
@NRB525 wrote:Bad news for those who have or wanted this card.
But scrolling through the list of axed benefits, I am struck with how expensive that list would be to make a profit, as a bank, where it is often outside vendors providing the features.
I would have to believe that someone lost their job over this card, what a thoughtless set of launch benefits. I'm honesty shocked it lasted as long as it did.
People were MS'ing the crap out of this card, I know several guys that were doing 150K+ a month in just grocery stores. CNB had to be bleeding cash.
plus the air discount was supposed to require the card member to travel, there was ways around that and it got exploited.
I've heard that the Visa Air program is being shut down by Visa itself, and that Ritz will supposedly loose it as well.
@imaximous wrote:
@redpat wrote:It looks like the dream card became a nightmare.
Is Amex the only one that made their products better this year?
Yeah, but fees went up too.
This is one of those rare cases where laziness and procrastination turned out to be a good thing. I could've walked down to a branch in NYC any day, but the whole application process seemed like too much work to get a card for me.
Agreed! There are several times where the temptation was real to just get the app over with.
As far as Amex goes, while they did make many improvements, some of us were caught off guard when it comes to the Delta cards revamp. There were some great changes for those that don't have status (like being added to the upgrade list after FOs, which won't affect those of us with status unless we're literally buying a ticket at the last second and sprinting to the gate) and for those that don't also have an American Express Platinum Card. But for those of us that already have both, some difficult decisions have to made. With the Mileage Boost dropping the bonus 15k SkyMiles for each $30k of spend for example, I'm now looking at earning 1 SM per $ rather than 1.5 SM per $, so for me I'm valuing that as 2% back vs 3% back (yes I know the common value of a SM is 1.2 cents but I can be picky and only redeem when getting 2 cents or more). For me it might make more sense to just do three same-day flights to and from LAX/SFO/SEA or LHR/AMS/CDG (or a single one of those crazy business class routings like I recently saw BOS-LAX-JFK-LIM-JFK-LAX-BOS mostly in Delta One for under $800) when fares are low to earn those 15k MQMs rather than drop $30k on Delta Reserve next year.
The one silver lining for me is that if the Visa Infinite airline discount is also going away from Ritz-Carlton it does make my regret for not picking the card up before it was taken off the market slightly less.
So for a lot of us this card is certainly far less desirable now and perhaps really can't even compete with cards like Sapphire Reserve and Altitude Reserve, or (although at a much higher price point) the combo of Amex Platinum and Gold. So really the only remaining things that really sets the card apart from others would be the airline lounge membership for spending more than $50k a year and the golf discounts, right?
@CreditUp26 wrote:Literally JUST got this, glad I can get some value out of it by the end of the year but such a waste of $400 now it's essentially useless. Can hopefully go back to the CSR. This bank has always been skeezy for those who have dealt with it so not surprising. Will get value out of it this year then get rid of it. Really awful after the Citi Prestige was gutted too. Leaves very few options, I need to garden so the Altitude comes within reach.
How is it a waste of $400. Having just one AU card makes it a net positive, and you can have 5 of them. Thats $1250 in airline credits alone. Very worth it, plus depending on how recently you got it, you may have been able to get a SUB. I got 50K when I signed up semi recently.
I don't feel like CNB is skeezy at all. They do things very differently, and I don't think they ever expected the card to go viral like it did. It was supposed to be a loss leader for rich potential clients to entice them to come into a branch and get sold profitable banking products.
Hey Shadow,
I might be reading the new agreement wrong, but I think you can only ever get a max of $350 in airline credits per account per year, they are closing that AU loophole. Or are you saying you could do that this year before the change occurs?
