FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Upgrade/downgrade = new card... worth it?
Old Mar 13, 2013, 5:10 pm
  #4  
sj22
formerly sahiljain22
 
Join Date: Apr 2011
Location: BOS;NYC;YVR;YYZ;DEL;BOM
Programs: Amex Plat; HH Diamond; SPG Plat; Hyatt Diamond; United 1K; National EE; HSBC Premier
Posts: 532
Originally Posted by tritofly
Wife and I currently have personal Plat (1 each) and Blue (1 each), a biz Gold Rewards (1 each) for one business (call it CPH), and a Gold Rewards (1) and Green Rewards (1) for a different business (call it CRL; with an infinitely smaller spend).

We do about 3-5K/month on the personal (combined, 99.9% on Plat), and an average of 30K/month (and probably going up for the next couple years as we grow) on the CPH cards. The CRL does so little I'm considering downgrading it to something with little/no fee.

We've been getting hounded with the "upgrade to biz plat" ads/mailers from Amex, and, now that they stopped the 20% bonus for Travel booking on personal cards, I'm thinking about taking them up on the upgrade offer, then switching the personal Plat to PRG.

I guess this is a two part question, then: 1) Will upgrading/downgrading count as closing/opening new cards? If so, I'm hesitant to do this as these are our oldest cards, at about 10yrs for personal and 6 for biz. If not, are they any tips I should be aware of, getting fees comped or points to make up for it (stupidly I never even knew it was an option until recently - I'm new the points game)?

And 2) Is this even a good idea? We've been essentially exclusive Amex users (aside from a shite TD Bank Rewards Visa) for that entire time. But we did just get the Chase Sapphire Preferred and Ink Plus (and about to apply for Ink Bold). And probably going to try to each Ink for each biz. So the monthly spend will drop, maybe by up to half, but not go away.

And thus ends my first novel: "Rambling Thoughts of the North American Noob"

Thanks.
As the other poster said, don't cancel and apply for new ones. Amex shows you your relationship start date and never changes it till atleast 1 card is active.

My wife and I just upgraded our Gold biz rewards to Biz Plat to get the 25k points & $200 airline credit for this year, and next year. Before the annual fee posts again next year, we plan to downgrade to something else.

Pros & Cons of doing so for EACH of us
+ avoided the Biz Reward renewal fee that was coming up
+ 25k points
+ $200 airline credit x 2 (we just buy gift cards)
- $450

You can keep going up and down within the cards to avoid annual fees.

As long as you hold 1 MR earning card, your MR account stays the same. We plan to keep holding our Platinum personal cards.

BTW: upgrading to a preapproved Amex card does not touch your credit report. No credit pull at all.
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