Questions re Amex Platinum Charge Card

[wafliron]

<snip lots>

I always refused the assessment as my income would do nothing to let Amex believe that I could pay 3-4 million per year. Rather, let my payment record speak for itself.

Thanks for clarifying all of that, very helpful. My situation will be much like you quoted above, so I guess I will be refusing a request for assessment if I ever get one. It's good to know that refusing is "OK" and doesn't cause further problems.

We operate numerous cards mainly to maximise points. Qantas Ultimate is used for Qantas purchases at 2.5 points per dollar. Plat Bus charge cards earn bonus points up to 250k spend. Cent earns bonus points up to 500k spend. The more bonus points we get the more we enjoy our benefits.

Ah of course, I forgot about the extra bonus points you get from each card - sorry, was a dumb question with an obvious answer!

No it is not.

I was approved for the Plat Charge Card and declined for any supplemental Credit Card. One of the reasons that made me drop the card this week (3 months after I got it).

Thanks for the heads up skywalker... I shall have to be cautious how I approach applying for the second card - probably best to wait until a few months have passed.

Do you know if Amex re-checked your credit file when you applied for the Plat Reserve card? I figure they might, or they might just use data from the check performed during the Plat Charge application process / regular file accesses they perform.

 

[skywalkerLAX]

Do you know if Amex re-checked your credit file when you applied for the Plat Reserve card? I figure they might, or they might just use data from the check performed during the Plat Charge application process / regular file accesses they perform.

I'm sure they did but there's nothing that would have changed. Their answer was that I do not fit their criteria for the Plat Edge or Reserve. I just answered 'Interesting that I seem to fit the criteria for the product you charge 900$ for but not the one that's supposed to come complimentary with it'. After all it doesn't really matter to me because I was not planning on using that card, just getting the points and flight benefits.

 

[wafliron]

I'm sure they did but there's nothing that would have changed. Their answer was that I do not fit their criteria for the Plat Edge or Reserve. I just answered 'Interesting that I seem to fit the criteria for the product you charge 900$ for but not the one that's supposed to come complimentary with it'.

That is strange :-( What is also strange is that when I asked Amex about what I needed to do to sign up for the complementary Plat Reserve card today they told me they'd send me a "pre-approved" application form I needed to fill out.

[/QUOTE]After all it doesn't really matter to me because I was not planning on using that card, just getting the points and flight benefits.[/QUOTE]

Still, those are some relatively significant benefits :-(


As an aside, I ended up signing up for a Plat charge card - was approved on Tuesday and the card reached me today - pretty swift turnaround! Initial soft limit is only $9k though, urgh :-/ Strangely enough, Amex did not verify anything I told them in the application - no request for payslips / tax return, no call to payroll people, etc.

Thanks to everyone who answered my questions in this thread.

 

[wafliron]

Just over a month into being a Plat charge cardholder, I thought I'd update this thread with the tale of my try-to-get-a-big-soft-limit-quickly journey in case anyone else is searching for the same info in the future.

Short version: you can increase your soft limit very fast if you put your mind to it, are willing to make prepayments, and can put big $$ through the card.

Longer version / timeline:

1) Signed up for Plat charge and was approved around 16th of March.

2) Initial soft limit was only $9,000.

3) Put approx $140k through the card in the first month. For the first couple of weeks / $95k or so of charges my soft limit slowly increased - I was having to prepay 70-90% of the charges over-and-above the initial $9k soft limit, with the proportion of pre-payment required slowly decreasing each time I put a big charge through. IIRC, by the time I'd put c.$95k through the card I'd had to pre-pay about $65k of that.

Sometime towards the end of the month my soft limit shot up quickly, with the last $45k going through with no prepayment required - so at the end of the statement cycle I'd prepaid just over 50% of the totle charges that went through the card during the billing cycle.

4) Received a call from someone in Amex's credit team a few days after the end of the statement cycle wanting to discuss my usage of the card. He told me the main purpose of the conversation was to help establish my soft limit going forward, based on how I was / would be using the card. Wasn't too probing, just wanted to know whether the first month represented the norm going forward, whether the charges from the first month were business or personal (mostly business), querying the regularity / nature of charges from the couple of merchants which represented the biggest proportion of the spend, etc.

Once he established that most of the charges were business-related he did ask if I could send a copy of the businesses' financials to them so that their commercial credit team could look at "commercially underwriting" the card, but I declined. He was fine with that - asked me a couple of additional questions about the business (years established, revenue last FY, etc) which I was happy to answer, and left it at that.

5) I spoke to their credit team yesterday to find out what the soft limit would be once I'd paid the outstanding balance in full. Was told $187k, which, based on info posted earlier in this thread, appears to be the maximum they'll support without seeing tax returns / financials and performing a capacity assessment.

Overall I'm very happy with the outcome: I wanted to get the soft limit as high as possible as quickly as possible but was expecting it would take a few months of significant prepayments to reach a high soft limit, not one month

To end on a funny note: when reading the above, bear in mind that this is the same company who rejected my application for the complementary Plat Reserve CC two weeks ago, and after being pushed approved it with a limit of $3,000. $187k OK on one card, only $3k OK on another, same customer...

 

[vitagen]

Wow you are going to burn your points cap quickly you want to use mine?

Sent from my GT-I9100 using AustFreqFly

 

[wafliron]

Wow you are going to burn your points cap quickly

Bonus points I assume you mean? Yeah, will be gone this month :-(

you want to use mine?

Nice try!

 

[Foreigner]

Just been advised that Amex itself doesn't issue more than two cards i.e. with my Platinum charge card, I get the reserve credit card but suppose I was to apply for the Qantas Ultimate card, I'd have to give up the Reserve card. Would that be right?

I'm considering Ultimate card as it has uncapped reward points.

 

[RichardKopf]

Just been advised that Amex itself doesn't issue more than two cards i.e. with my Platinum charge card, I get the reserve credit card but suppose I was to apply for the Qantas Ultimate card, I'd have to give up the Reserve card. Would that be right?

I'm considering Ultimate card as it has uncapped reward points.

Unless it's a new policy, it's not correct. I have Centurion, Platinum Business, Platinum Reserve and Qantas Ultimate, plus, as supplementary, another Platinum Business, Platinum Reserve. Also plan to apply for a Centurion Business as soon as the new product is released. The only similar thing I have been told is that I can't apply for two of the same card type. E.g.; when I wanted a second Platinum Business, it had to be in another name.

 

[scheps]

I have been told that as well although my sister has 4 amex cards. So i think it is determined on an individual basis, possibly income related?

 

[mini2]

I think my income is a whole heap lower than quite a few of you but managed to keep a Platinum charge card, the complimentary reserve credit card and the edge as well. The edge was applied back in January this year so the 2 cards limit must be a pretty recent development.

 

[sparoz]

Unless it's a new policy, it's not correct. I have Centurion, Platinum Business, Platinum Reserve and Qantas Ultimate, plus, as supplementary, another Platinum Business, Platinum Reserve. Also plan to apply for a Centurion Business as soon as the new product is released. The only similar thing I have been told is that I can't apply for two of the same card type. E.g.; when I wanted a second Platinum Business, it had to be in another name.

It just needs to be in a different business name.

 

[scheps]

Maybe they see those three cards as one? Did you get bonus points for those three cards?