American Express Membership Rewards - Cancelling UK Centurion

Finally got my Ti card charged this month @ £1800 and called to tell them to downgrade me to green asap and refund the charge in full. Was told someone would call me back within 5 days to handle my request. Over the past 3-4 months I've noticed absolutely no difference in service (still on hold for up to 15 minutes each time I call travel service, still cheaper rates to be found for all hotels/flights online, still CSRs who don't seem to know what they're talking about and still mistakes being made in basic hotel/flight bookings).

Even if they offered me the old £650 rate it's just not worth it for me.

One question for the experts here - is the Platinum card worth the yearly rate (not even sure what it is) in terms of travel insurance? Or is Green good enough. All I really want is MR points and decent travel insurance.

TIA,

J

PS Does anyone know if they'll alter my credit limit or cancel my Virgin Gold membership (obtained through Centurion)?

One question for the experts here - is the Platinum card worth the yearly rate (not even sure what it is) in terms of travel insurance? Or is Green good enough. All I really want is MR points and decent travel insurance.

I don't think Amex even offers a standalone Green card in the UK any more -- I recall there was some discussion here about that a few months ago and it doesn't show up on the website.

It certainly always used to be the case that Platinum was the lowest tier of card that had the standalone travel insurance (i.e. coverage that extended beyond travel that was booked and paid for with the card). To be honest, a decent travel insurance policy is likely to be less than the difference between the Gold and Platinum card fees though; unless there are some special circumstances like an extremely large family etc.

Actually on check in detail, it doesn't look like the Gold card has any kind of medical benefit cover for travel; it's just travel inconvenience and travel accident that are covered, where the latter is pretty much defined as accidents which occur while actually on a plane or a train and is a fixed payout for specified injury or death.

I'd go with Platinum (the charge card, never understood why AmEx UK used the Platinum tag for the other products such as the credit card). The benefits of the Platinum card are well worth the £300 fee, and this has always been the problem that the delta in benefits between the Platinum and Centurion wasn't that large, and this was before the three-fold increase in fee. Knowing the AmEx mentality, they will either hike the Platinum fee or start chopping away at the benefits.

The Platinum Insurance cover is comprehensive:
https://www.iplatinum.americanexpress.com/platinum/uk/downloads/SummaryBenefits.pdf

and as per Centurion, applies to you, your supplementaries, their partners/spouses and children; includes the car rental cover too.

The 2 Prestige Priority Passes it comes with would normally be £500 on their own.

I seem to recall that you have to pay an additional ~£23 a year to earn MR points on the Green card, whereas the fee is included in the £300 annual fee for the Platinum.

On a tangent, I wonder if AmEx has wondered yet why so many people are canning their Centurion cards? When I spoke to them, they said that the fee hike wasn't a ploy to reduce the number of members.

On a tangent, I wonder if AmEx has wondered yet why so many people are canning their Centurion cards? When I spoke to them, they said that the fee hike wasn't a ploy to reduce the number of members.

Hahaha I'd be surprised if they admitted that!

I've got until November.. now I have Virgin calling me to hassle me to get their MBNA/AMEX card same kind of thing as the BA card, although I noticed in the small print as I was going through it that you only get the companion voucher when a) you have spent enough and only then when you b) buy a flight, then you get it awarded for a later flight.

Crazy

The companion voucher on the VS card is a joke - you have to buy a qualifying fare, so basically full fare pretty much - J,W,S,Y,B or L. Then of course there are the taxes to be paid on the companion ticket...

Stick with Plat for the travel insurance (although it works best if you dish out supp cards to friends and family so they qualify as well) plus the Priority Pass (not that I use mine much these days) and the FHR hotel deals. Its a shame that new Plats no longer get the BA Amex for free - that saves me £150/year and justifies keeping the Plat card even though I never use it.

Called Amex today to tell them that I didn't want to pay £1,800 for the recently received card and could I go to Platinum - agent gave the usual "a team will call you back within 5 days" but was not able to confirm whether the fee would apply to my renewal at the end of this month. Guess I'll await the call and see what happens...

10 days later and still no call, guess I'm expected to chase them to cancel / downgrade....