I have the Centurion card since its inception in Canada.
No, I don't care about the bling-bling-ness it brings. I find it justified because of the benefits I get from it.
The first year, I saved about $11000 in hotel bills, mainly from the buy-one-get-one-free offer that comes with the card in Mandarin Oriental Hotels all over the world. We travel for leisure a lot and we stay in high-end hotels about 60-80 nights a year. Then we are comped Fairmont Platinum, which comes with 2 free nights and suite upgrades. Without this card, we would have spent this amount of money in stays at the MO anyways. We might not have stayed at the Fairmont but now we do. The first year $7500 has been accounted for!
The FHR program that comes with the Centurion card is slightly better than the Plat card. We can get confirmed upgrade at time of booking for quite a few chains, including the Peninsula, Ritz Carlton, etc.
Our Amex AP Platinum cards are complimentary. And this is another $600 worth of benefits.
Yes, we are AC SEs and we can get into *A lounges. But we get Priority Pass membership which we can use at other lounges, even when we're flying *A. For example, when we were in PVG, the PP lounge was way nicer than the *A lounge and we got to use it instead.
I have yet to use the concierge.
The CSRs at Amex Centurion seems a lot more knowledgeable than the CSRs at Amex Plat. But this is just my opinion.
Originally Posted by
Shareholder
Of course, I'd love to see someone use the Centurian card at McDonald's for a $3.95 happy meal.
I haven't tried the
Tit card at a McDonald's because I never go there. I bet they won't even know what it is. But I did use it in some hotels that are not FHR properties. I have been successful to be assigned an upgraded room most of the time when I checked in with the Centurion card. I guess they tried to impress me after seeing my Cent card.
Originally Posted by
yeunganson
The bottom line (asian style)... what impresses the girlfriend's parents more... whipping out that black card? Or a print out of my portfolio? I think it is the latter.
No, whipping out the black card would impress more! Who would show people a print out of their portfolio?
Originally Posted by
Shareholder
In the meantime, I invite cdncent to one of our next Dos so he can show us how the Centurion card works while he picks up the tab...obviously he can afford to!
If you invited me, I would gladly pick up the tab! But it has to be at a convenient time to me. I've never been able to make it to any of the FT DOs because I simply can't come out during the week.
