American Express Membership Rewards - Amex Cent vs Nat West Black - UK

Someone on another thread mentions that they are surprised that Cent card holders put up with the often apalling service...I agree and am therefore investigating other options - of course platinum is an option but I have no reason to believe that the service will be any better though it can not be any worse - so do any of you have an experience of the Nat West Black Card in the UK or are there any other idea available in the UK which offer similar claims to Centurion but actually deliver? Thanks and look forward to reading.....

While I was resident in the UK, I got to the point with Amex where I stopped using them for anything extra (booking flights/hotels etc). I just kept the card for the insurance and PP. I reckoned it was good value just for that. So maybe that's what you should do.

Frankly... if you have a lot of foreign expenditure then definitely look for cards that don't charge a % on forex. Nationwide (debit or credit card) was the only one I could find - but I believe there are a few others now. MorganStanley sent me an offer of a card that included PP, insurance and % free foreign transactions - seemed to be a copy of the Amex plat package.

Nationwide may not seem like a "fashionable" card to carry but I've got on well with it and its amazing how many other well-to-do Brits I've met use it. They were pretty good when someone cloned it whilst I was in Taiwan. I've always found their call centres and online banking really efficient too. One guy I met who was a courier for human organs (he would travel at very short notice to anywhere in the world) swore by it saying out of all his cards it was the one that gave him least trouble in terms of being rejected by cash machines and merchants etc.

Sorry can't answer your substantive point about the Natwest card. Having cancelled Amex when I left the UK, I expect shortly to resume Plat Amex but for PP and insurance only. I'll continue to use Nationwide Visa for my payment card, and there debit card for drawing cash. In the UK I'll use the BMI MBNA card. For other "services" I'll use the hotch-botch of friendly travel agents, tame airline staff and assorted others I've accumulated over the years.

I have yet to find the "one size fits all" travel solution product.

MorganStanley sent me an offer of a card that included PP, insurance and % free foreign transactions - seemed to be a copy of the Amex plat package.


http://www.easier.com/view/Finance/Credit_Cards/News/article-94112.html

http://www.easier.com/view/Finance/Credit_Cards/News/article-94112.html

Thanks... that's the one!
Particularly the commission-free foreign stuff is attractive..

the i24 is cashback not miles

the i24 is cashback not miles

Yep. Certainly I felt Membership Rewards was hard to beat when it was at its most generous. But I did go through the mill a bit. Originally I joined SAS and accumulated some *alliance points with them on the basis they were a MR partner. Then they got dropped in favour of BMI. I went with AirFrance for a while and did a London/Asia return in C with them on the MR points from Amex - but shortly afterwards they changed the exchange rate (from 3 to 2 down to 5 to 4 I think). Also it was tough to get availability.

But in the end, it was the 2.73% charge on foreign transactions that did it for me. Almost all my expenditure was foreign and based on the figures, the miles were not worth the 2.73% extra - and that's before you consider any cash back.

Hi,

I have the natwest black after bad experiences with the amex platinum.

The fee is £250 and includes 2 PPs, Green Flag breakdown cover inc European(limited to one car), and in my view better travel insurance then the Amex plat (though im not sure, didnt the benefits get upgraded recently?) the travel insurance doesnt have an age limit on it and actually covers up to six people travelling with you, even if they dont have cards, and it covers car insurance in most countries.

The travel service isnt really any good, its outsourced to a travel agent (Apollo Travel from what I recall) and they seem to be focused on package deals, so I never used them.

There are no airline or hotel perks.

I have however found the concierge sevice to be very helpful and polite. I haven't used them to get me into restaurants etc, but they managed to find me a dentist open at 10:54pm on a bankholiday monday which was rather handy.

I do however remember reading in the paper once that someone wrote in asking for advice since their Centurion card couldn't get them into a couple of places that someone with the NWBC managed to get into.

There's vaguely interesting stuff like being able to call wine experts to ask about wines etc, but again its not something I've tried.

Anything else you want to know, and i'll try and dig out the details.

The only points you get are USELESS 'Airmiles' at the 'accelerated' rate of 1 per £15...

Overall I'm very happy with it and it fits my needs perfectly.
Cheers.