Originally Posted by
Skywise
Have been a long term Personal Platinum holder for 10+ years and just got the Schwab platinum which should arrive tomorrow. My older card billing period closes on April 15 at which point I'll get my annual fee added so I want to close it before then. There's one offer I have linked to the older card which I intend to use in the next day or two (oddly I didn't get the same offer on the new card) but once that's done I plan on closing the account asap.
Any gotchas I should be worried about? I'm presuming once I've got the new card activated I can transfer the recurring billing, close the old one and pay it off. I shouldn't have any problems with my existing MR points as they should just carry over?
You can close the personal after the annual fee hits, they'll credit you the balance, just pay off the rest of the card. So when you go to close, have a $550 balance on the card, and AmEx can credit the annual fee and then close it out.
Alternatively, pay it all off, and AmEx will credit your annual fee. Then you can call in and have them cut you a check (what I usually do), or have them apply the credit to another AmEx card.