IMPORTANT: American Express suspends the scrapping of pro-rata card fee refunds

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• Rui N. says:

  27 Sep27 September 13:54

  LOL

• JDB says:

  27 Sep27 September 13:55

  I don’t know what the reason for this change in policy but I doubt it relates to any “avalanche” of cancellations as suggested in earlier posts. The cadre of flaky cardholders playing or churning isn’t so huge and anyway they may not really be the customer Amex wants. They will have learnt a lot about their customers from shaking the tree.

  What’s very poor is that this ‘postponement’ has not been formally notified to cardholders. It will be interesting to see if they actually amend the terms or simply don’t apply them as not enforcing terms can be construed as an unfair term as people are entitled to rely upon the contract as it is written. It all seems remarkably chaotic. The new UK country manager has a seriously unimpressive 12 months in her role.

  • Carlos says:

    27 Sep27 September 14:11

    They have certainly got rid of their unprofitable customers

    • CarpalTravel says:

      27 Sep27 September 14:28

      I wonder if we may soon hear of an increase in the number of people’s card applications being declined. Not that I think that this has been all some “deadbeat” clearing exercise, but would seem like a good opportunity nonetheless.

      • Carlos says:

        27 Sep27 September 18:13

        Yes, they are already declining applicants who are historically unprofitable, no doubt that will cause some people to run to the ombudsman

  • Mikeact says:

    28 Sep28 September 10:15

    Was ‘she’ head hunted from the States ?

• TeesTraveller says:

  27 Sep27 September 13:57

  Cancelled platinum at 11:30 morning and the agent clearly did not know about this change of policy as I explained that the ending of pro-rata refunds was why I was cancelling now.

  I had already received a 35,000 points retention offer a couple of months ago and now have free Gold for a year. No regrets at all as I was struggling to justify the Platinum cost as I don’t live in London (small village miles away from any major city), I have status with BA/KLM and I have travel insurance through HSBC Premier.

  Sure I will miss the sexy card but not for the best part of £50 a month…

• xero says:

  27 Sep27 September 13:59

  My Amex Platinum is due for renewal in November, anecdotally, when’s the best time to try and cancel to get the best retention offer possible, is it on the day or shotly after the annual fee posts?

  • W6 says:

    27 Sep27 September 15:01

    Mine is due early October, I rang to cancel mid September and was offered 35,000 points to stay, not sure if is the best time but it is when I did it.

  • David says:

    27 Sep27 September 15:14

    I stroke yesterday. I would say with this turmoil, today. As many people will just leave because on the U-turn alone.

• HM007 says:

  27 Sep27 September 15:27

  Chuckles as a non churner

• BJ says:

  27 Sep27 September 15:38

  Pro-rata refunds are here to stay but once in a lifetime sign-up bonuses are coming this way 😀

  • JDB says:

    27 Sep27 September 15:45

    Why not both?

    What’s for sure is that the hugely increased SUBs like 60 to 70k on BAPP are not really sustainable on a two year gap basis particularly since they had one in Jan/Feb and now another which makes the standard 25k already equivalent to one year’s fee seem very paltry, even with a referral on top. Doesn’t feel too clever.

• Nick G says:

  27 Sep27 September 15:39

  I just cancelled my wife’s two weeks ago and surprisingly AmEx showed the account in credit and no pro active of a refund until we pressed for it. First they offered a cheque then agreed to a bank transfer but then stated they couldn’t do a transfer as the direct debit was cancelled……we certainly didn’t cancel it for this reason!

  Now its allegedly 7-10 days for a refund….

  Funny how they are quick to take the yearly charge but cause nothing but grief to get a refund!

  • ken says:

    27 Sep27 September 15:44

    never personally had a problem with the credit being processed, but its always been 7-10 days for me which is fine.

    • zapato1060 says:

      27 Sep27 September 19:42

      Same. They have sent it through as a cheque and straight into my account without a problem. I wasnt eagerly waiting for it so thats maybe what happened here.

• Ruth says:

  27 Sep27 September 15:40

  Well I cancelled mine today. Had ill health recently so won’t be doing any travel anytime soon, couldn’t justify the fee anymore. Plus the offers on Platinum were very poor compared with my BAPP.

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