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I know this is not a new topic but since my cards have been cancelled with 2 months notice and I dont know why. I called them, no answer – just that cards are suspended and under the T&C’s my cards will be cancelled.
I had some MR points – I was told to transfer soon as possible so I did after the call.As to why, I don’t know – I am in a good job with very decent income (goes up every year too) and wife also in decent job – no changes to Mortgage etc, I do pay my card from 3 different Bank accounts in my name and I just applied for a Virgin Atlantic Mastercard which was approved with £25k limit so wanted to earn virgin points in addition to Avios following the BA changes to Exec Club (I just renewed as Gold again).
I still have my Barclays Avios Card but I liked the offers I got and some of the experiences – been am Amex member 20 years, but clearly does not mean anything if they dont like something about me.Only question – both BAPP and Platinum cards have just been renewed, will Amex refund the £650+£300 pro-rata back to me? I was told I would be sent further info in due course.
Has anyone had this and then reapplied? Or am I banned for life?Thanks
Hi,
There could be an array of reasons why Amex have closed down your accounts.
It could be they do not like your spending pattern , account usage et (purchasing from certain merchants, credit recycling to name a few)
Paying form multiple different bank accounts may also raise suspicion to them along the liens of money laundering etc.
From reading the other forums on here, when Amex discontinue their relationship with a customer, they do not accept any new applications from said customer. Otherwise, that would ultimately defeat the objective of closing the accounts in the first instance.
Clearly something had upset Amex for them to take such action. Unfortunately, they do not need to specify the exact reason why. Just that is has been in breach of the terms and conditions between Amex and the card holder.
I do pay my card from 3 different Bank accounts in my name
Likely this!
As you note, there are other threads on this topic, and they contain a lot of information about suspended accounts and what your next steps might be.
@ToneTheTraveller – I’m not sure adding £25k unsecured credit via Virgin helps either. We have seen a few of these sorts of cases and there’s most commonly some change of spending patterns, external information that’s inconsistent with that held by Amex that gives concern. There’s not much discussion to be had and nor will Amex offer reasons.
I do pay my card from 3 different Bank accounts in my name
Likely this!
If so that’s bonkers. Hardly a strange or suspicious thing to do.
While I would agree there is not necessarily anything ‘wrong’ with that it is certainly unusual, and in the modern world it is a fact of life that unusual is sometimes viewed as suspicious.
Amex are known to be a bit sensitive in that area. I don’t know anyone else who has a formal policy that you ‘must pay from a personal account in your own name’. Not always enforced or triggering a response, but some have come to grief on that one in the past.
I’m wondering what the OP isn’t telling us about how they use their cards?
All of these threads start off with info like they are in a good job, pay the balance off etc but it turns out they have been doing something that AMEX doesn’t like
They might not think paying the balance off using 3 separate accounts is wrong but AMEX might – especially if one or more is a business account rather than a personal account.
It starts to become clearer to why the OP may have been dumped by Amex if you see his recent posts on the Amex Platinum Retention Offer thread.
Same happened to me. No discussion, consideration or usual Amex good customer service.
I have been a high net worth customer with their top three cards for 50 years. My secretary paid my BA Amex card (in order to earn better avois)from my business account!!!!
Apparently a big NO NO.
What is this country coming to????
I hope other credit card companies take note and start recruiting and competing.
Peter LSame happened to me. No discussion, consideration or usual Amex good customer service.
I have been a high net worth customer with their top three cards for 50 years. My secretary paid my BA Amex card (in order to earn better avois)from my business account!!!!
Apparently a big NO NO.
What is this country coming to????
I hope other credit card companies take note and start recruiting and competing.
Peter LGreat first post.
I’ll tell you what’s also a big no-no and that’s using your email address as your publisied user name. Opens you up to bad actors registering you for all sorts of rubbish emails and so on!
AMEX have been cracking down for a while now on people paying off their personal cards from business bank accounts and business cards from personal bank accounts.
They won’t have closed your account for doing it once or twice but after warning you they will.
See this thread from 2022 for example
And it’s also on the AMEX websiteh
ttps://www.americanexpress.com/uk/customer-service/how-to-make-payment.html
Personal Cards: Payments must be made from a personal bank account in the main Cardmember’s name. This includes payments for transactions completed by Supplementary Cardmembers.
My secretary paid my BA Amex card (in order to earn better avois)from my business account!!!!
Wow! He employed a secretary to administer the payment of his Amex cards. 😯
The ‘must pay from a personal account in your own name’ requirement also appears right at the beginning of the ‘How to pay’ section on the monthly statement.
The level of enforcement may be increasing, but the rules are very clear.
It is rather ironic that unlike most if not all other card issuers, Amex don’t do name verification on outgoing payments!
Unfortunately, they do not need to specify the exact reason why. Just that is has been in breach of the terms and conditions between Amex and the card holder.
Any good reason why they don’t have too (bar the law not mandating them to do so)? Any reasons why this shouldn’t be the law given all the recent de-banking sagas we’ve seen recently?
Not sure why they don’t need to give a reason but they never have.
They have their terms and conditions if these are breached then naturally they are within their right to suspend accounts.
With regards to paying personal Amex from business account etc. The way to overcome this issue would be to pay from the business account to your personal account (classify as expense reimbursement) then pay from your personal account to your personal Amex and vice versa.
There is clearly something here that has upset Amex, the OP should follow it up with them if they wish to pursue further.
Unfortunately, they do not need to specify the exact reason why. Just that is has been in breach of the terms and conditions between Amex and the card holder.
Any good reason why they don’t have too (bar the law not mandating them to do so)? Any reasons why this shouldn’t be the law given all the recent de-banking sagas we’ve seen recently?
Because some of these controls are also used for anti money laundering purposes and they don’t want to reveal anything. The same applies for all banks where they don’t have to disclose. Its a valid and genuine reason, but unfortunately some innocent customers get caught in these rules.
Thanks for the replies
I’ve been an Amex holder for 20 years and initially used it to manage work travel costs.
In the last 6 months aside my main account I opened another two so that I could build relationships with other Financial Institutions and open an account for my son, it was a short notice trip away that required a debit card so opened a Sterling acct and got him a debit card off my main account in 7 days. My existing current acct wouldn’t schedule a face to face for this for 2 weeks. At the same time opened a Santander acct for him too again with me first and then him.
In terms of Amex balances I had no balance on one card with a £25k limit and £5k on my BA Amex and £600 on my Platinum
charge Card.I didn’t realise multiple accts payments would be an issue but these accts are in my name and personal accounts.
The more I think about it I believe the additional £25k availability of money spooked them.
When I called to close the Amex Plat and Amex Cashback they asked why I was closing – they had no idea I was shut down!They refunded the Amex plat fee too. They will do a refund with the BA Amex but I have a holiday to clear off on a Plan it (£1900 left).
Slowly unsubscribing from the multiple emails and uni going all my different billings with Amex to my avios card.
It starts to become clearer to why the OP may have been dumped by Amex if you see his recent posts on the Amex Platinum Retention Offer thread.
Is that a thing?
I’ve been a platinum holder for 8 years I never played the game of cancelling but I was on the verge of it this year because it’s not been as useful as it was in previous years.
Asking for a retention bonus- seen a lot of people do that and not seen anything negative come off it.@ToneTheTraveller nothing you have done in isolation looks particularly contentious but, when taken together, the overall picture may not look great through an Amex lense.
You have recently opened a few new bank accounts, which will flag for them. You have also taken out a Virgin card with a £25k limit recently. Then you have your BAPP credit balance on a PlanIt payment scheme.
I have no particular insight in Amex’s internal scoring systems but all these things will have negative connotations and it isn’t hard to see how all of this in a short period of time could have tipped the balance. Once the trigger event occurs then the decision to terminate the relationship may be automatic.
It is rather ironic that unlike most if not all other card issuers, Amex don’t do name verification on outgoing payments!
I haven’t noticed V or MC checking the name on card payments either.
If you pay Amex by debit card that avoids this name on account problem (unless one or more of your Amex transactions is refunded and you want Amex to pay you back)
@ToneTheTraveller nothing you have done in isolation looks particularly contentious but, when taken together, the overall picture may not look great through an Amex lense.
You have recently opened a few new bank accounts, which will flag for them. You have also taken out a Virgin card with a £25k limit recently. Then you have your BAPP credit balance on a PlanIt payment scheme.
I have no particular insight in Amex’s internal scoring systems but all these things will have negative connotations and it isn’t hard to see how all of this in a short period of time could have tipped the balance. Once the trigger event occurs then the decision to terminate the relationship may be automatic.
This is a good point. I triggered a financial review either last year or 2023, I forget, but it coincided with (and I presume was caused by, because nothing else changed) a very large and sudden increase in my unsecured debt load (lots of 0%, no fee offers).
Once I proved my income source, which proved I could carry the debt, as well as that I had enough £ in UK accounts to pay it all back immediately if it was recalled (and was producing more in income than the debt was costing), I was cleared. But something clearly triggered it, so they are monitoring the CRA feeds it seems.
None of the debt was with Amex, but Amex’s limit was/is high, so they were, I suspect, covering their own backs in case I was debt stressed and moved on to them next.
It is rather ironic that unlike most if not all other card issuers, Amex don’t do name verification on outgoing payments!
I haven’t noticed V or MC checking the name on card payments either.
If you pay Amex by debit card that avoids this name on account problem (unless one or more of your Amex transactions is refunded and you want Amex to pay you back)
Agree, name doesn’t seem to matter – one thing Amex do differently to the others is address verification – Amex don’t use addy verification, Visa/MC issuers generally do.
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