Updated 8/11/20 at 8:35am: The $1.38 credit adjustment posted to my account and and I now have a $0 balance on my credit card.
Good afternoon everyone, I hope you had a great weekend and your week is off to a great start. As part of my Keep, Cancel or Convert? series, I like to evaluate and reevaluate credit cards to make sure they still deserve a spot in my wallet. In today’s post, I will review my American Express Platinum Delta SkyMiles Credit Card, which I wrote about last year in My July App-O-Rama Credit Card Results (Spoiler: 4 out of 5 Approved). I signed up for this credit card when there was a limited time sign up bonus of 70,000 Delta SkyMiles after spending $3,000 in 3 months. After completing the minimum spending requirement and receiving the sign up bonus, I didn’t put any more spend on this credit card. When the $250 annual fee posted to my account, I called American Express to see if they could waive the annual fee. Here are the results of my retention call.
I explained to the AMEX rep that I was reviewing my recent statement and saw that the $250 annual fee just posted. I told the rep that I wasn’t planning on keeping this credit card another year since I didn’t know when it would be safe to travel or when I would travel on Delta. I asked if it were possible to waive the $250 annual fee, but was told that was not possible. In addition to closing the credit card, the rep offered 3 options:
- Keep the American Express Platinum Delta SkyMiles Credit Card, pay the $250 annual fee, and receive 15,000 bonus Delta SkyMiles
- Downgrade to the $99 annual fee American Express Gold Delta SkyMiles Credit Card
- Downgrade to the no annual fee American Express Blue Delta SkyMiles Credit Card
I told the rep that I liked the 15,000 bonus Delta SkyMiles option and I asked if it were possible to get 25,000 bonus Delta SkyMiles instead. The rep said these offers were prefilled and they could not be changed. I ultimately decided to downgrade to the no annual fee American Express Blue Delta SkyMiles Credit Card and wait for an upgrade offer to the American Express Gold Delta SkyMiles Credit Card or back up to the American Express Platinum Delta SkyMiles Credit Card. The rep processed my downgrade request and said I would receive my new credit card in the mail in the next few days. A few minutes after our call, I received the confirmation email from American Express.
The next day, I logged into my American Express online account and noticed that the card icon changed from Platinum to Blue. Unfortunately, American Express processed a prorated annual fee refund of $248.62, instead of a full refund of $250. This has happened in the past and is really annoying.
I took to Twitter and sent American Express a tweet about my frustration regarding the prorated annual fee refund.
.@AmericanExpress @AskAmex can’t you just make my life easier and provide a full annual fee refund instead of prorating the annual fee for 2 days? Pretty please :) pic.twitter.com/SlTNFkuZNs
— Grant Thomas 🧢 (@travelwithgrant) August 10, 2020
To American Express’s credit, their Twitter team responded in a few minutes and instructed me to contact them through their AMEX Chat feature. A few minutes later, the AMEX Chat rep said, “I will take care of the under $2 credit, which will appear on an upcoming statement.” I will check back on this account in the next week or so to ensure that the statement credit posted. If not, I will make sure to pay the remaining $1.38 balance on this credit card and deal with the small credit balance later. The following day, the $1.38 credit adjustment posted to my account. Thank you American Express!
Do you think I made the correct decision to downgrade to the no annual fee credit card? Let me know in the comments. If you have any questions about the downgrade process, please leave a comment below. Thanks for reading and have a great day everyone.
Glad you got that $1.38 taken care of. How annoying!
I have the Delta Amex Gold and I’ve been waiting for some type of upgrade offer, but I haven’t seen anything. Any idea of when they come out? I’m approaching year 2 in a few more months.
I really have no idea when or what triggers your account to be offered an upgrade. Just wait and check every few weeks to see if an upgrade offer appears in the AMEX Offers section.
AMEX flipped me an unsolicited $50 statement credit back in May (via email) for when I renew next month. So only $200 for another companion certificate? Seems like a good deal to me. I find it unusual that articles like this often fail to mention that certificate so it can be factored into the decision…
I remember hearing about those $50 statement credits, but never got that on my account. I’ve heard that the companion tickets can be a little difficult to redeem with exclusions / limitations, but if you can get good value out of the companion ticket, it is a no brainer to keep the Platinum Delta CC.
I think the companion certificate is the deal breaker for me now that I live overseas. It is too hard to use since it’s only good for US domestic flights! I know it can be used by family, but still, too hard to redeem when I’ve tried. I wish they would offer an alternative to those who live overseas…like a credit voucher instead of a companion certificate for a domestic flight.
Hi Sarah, yes, that would be a great feature for cardholders who live outside the US.
You can not use the companion to fly to alaska or hawaii even through the are u.s.
Hi Kristi, that is disappointing to hear. I think the companion certificate is really restrictive.
I called and got 100 statement credit for renewing the card – I think the companion pass, more that makes up for the 250 dollar credit, so the card is a keeper for me.
The $100 statement credit is a good offer. If you were offered $100 statement credit vs. 15,000 Delta SkyMiles, which would you have taken? I’m glad you are able to take advantage of the companion certificate :)
I’ve had the biz version of this card for about 15 years. After my retention call last week, I agreed to renew again when they reduced the annual fee by $175 from $250 to $75. I have enuf DL miles & didn’t ask for more. (My complaint was the AF.) In recent years, I’ve used the card to earn it’s max 20k bonus MQMs toward Diamond status. The biz version also offers 1.5 miles per $ spent each time you spend $5k with a merchant in one charge.
That is a nice discount on the annual fee. I don’t care about Delta MQMs, so these cards are not very exciting to me.
I also received the $50 credit – that combined with Amex offers (I’ve already maxed out the $50 on small business), the 4X grocery thru July and the companion certificate make it a keeper for another year – then, we’ll see …
Hi Mary, I’m glad you are getting a lot of value out of your CC. It is good to re-evaluate the value you get every year to ensure you are getting enough value to justify paying the annual fee.
I put a lot of spend on my AMEX Gold and AMEX Blue Business Plus, so I use these cards most often for the AMEX Offers.
My friend also recently switched over to the Blue one and actually loves the Blue look over the Gold.
I carried the Gold a while back but didn’t have the option of downgrading to Blue as it didn’t exist back then.
Hope you enjoy the Blue with no fee.
Thank you Mitch, I think the Blue card is relatively new (less than 1 year old) and it does look nice in photos, so hopefully it looks equally nice when it arrives in the mail :)
Does delta forfeit any bonus miles? My card is 11 months old and i’m thinking to change it from Gold card to Blue (no fee)
No, once the Delta SkyMiles have posted to your Delta account, they are yours to keep and use, regardless if you keep, cancel, or convert to the Delta Blue CC.
We are ready to downgrade from Platinum to Blue also because of the $250 fee. Unfortunately we will be losing 3 companion tickets – two we have been unable to use because of travel conditions. If we renew we will be getting the third ticket. Doesn’t seem right that we will lose the two that have already been earned.
Hi Judy, have you tried calling AMEX and Delta to see if they can renew or extend your existing companion tickets? If not, downgrading to the Delta SkyMiles Blue CC seems like a good idea. You can always upgrade again when you are comfortable travelling.
I called and got 30K miles for not cancelling or downgrading.
Hi AJ, that is a great retention offer you received :)
Delta gold amex, long time member but 0 travel last year and will not be traveling this year either. No offers for keeping gold, just to downgrade to Blue so went ahead and downgraded as well.
Hi Tes, that sounds like a good decision. You can upgrade to AMEX Gold when you are ready to start traveling again.
We, too, have two companion fares sitting in our account and no plans to travel. If we downgrade to Blue Amex do we automatically loose them?
Hi Claire, that is a great question. I’m not sure. Are the codes shown in your AMEX account or in your Delta account? Maybe I am wrong, but do you need to pay for the flights using your AMEX Platinum Delta CC?
They are in your Delta acct. Even tho Amex says they will cancel them, it’s my experience they don’t. You will need to use an Amex to pay for the non-free tkt, but the good news is that it can be any Amex.
Hi Rick, thank you for providing that helpful info. Sounds like you can cancel or product change your AMEX Platinum Delta CC and still keep the companion fares. Good to hear that you can use the companion fare with any AMEX CC.
FYI, the Amex card you charge doesn’t have to be a Delta Amex. See https://renespoints.boardingarea.com/2021/02/18/best-amex-card-delta-companion-certificate/
Thank you for the link, Rick. Have a great day.