nomiiiii

I needed to make reservations at a mexico city restaurant (quintonil), and didn't speak spanish. Called amex concierge, they took the restaurant name/number etc, and basically helped make a reservation that I could've easily if i knew spanish. Overall happy with this experience, basically got a spanish speaker service for a few minutes.

standardgirl

Amex concierge has booked a variety of restaurant reservations for me, but mostly because I either don't speak the local language (in France and also in Peru in particular), or I'm way ahead of the reservation window (easier to email Amex concierge for not-difficult reservations as opposed to making sure I go back and book when the booking window opens). In any event, three reservations have been impressive so far:

• Atelier Amaro in Warsaw Poland - was a short notice reservation (within a couple of weeks) and I've already attempted to book this myself by emailing and calling the restaurant and been told that they are fully booked. Amex got me a table for two and it was actually one of the best tables in the restaurant.
• French Laundry - about 2 months ahead of intended dates (2 dates were given to the concierge). Not available online anymore for the date/time we wanted, but there was availability on the same day for a (much) later time and only for a 4 top (we wanted a 2 top). Amex concierge got us a reservation for two for the early seating.
• Kichisen in Kyoto (another three star restaurant). We wanted a reservation at a three star place in Kyoto and sent the request to the concierge. It was a last minute trip so this was only one week ahead of our trip! Kichisen only had one seat left for dinner at their sushi bar, but Amex managed to convince them to add a seat and we were then able to dine there for our Kyoto trip.

Although those reservations did come through, it wasn't as smooth as I would've hoped. Both TFL and Kichisen required me to follow up several times before we got the final confirmation. I'm not sure if this is a problem at their end or at the end of the restaurant.

squirk

Might be an off-the-wall question, but has anyone tried - and had success with - using Concierge to get hard-to-obtain FastPasses at Disney World? I know it's a little different than asking Concierge for help with hard-to-get dining reservations or concert tickets, but I figured it would not hurt to ask. I would call in to Concierge directly, but people jockeying for Elton John tickets are clogging up the phone queue.

hi55us

Will try... Wasn't able to snag any fast passes for the new Pandora ride at AK on the upcoming President's day week.

hi55us

Anyone have any luck getting Superbowl tickets through the Concierge... Crazy thought I know but not insane.

theranj

I called two weeks ago as a Platinum member, they couldn't do anything for face value tickets but work with a third party re-seller. Whether any benefit using them or doing direct I'm not sure

helsitif

Tried to get them to purchase Paris Opera tickets for me so I wouldn't have to get an account for something that I will use super sporadically, but when I called they said they would open an account on my behalf, which defeats the purpose. So I ended up opening an account myself. HOWEVER! Once I bought the tickets I realized I had gotten them for the wrong date and needed to exchange them, the exchange line is only open during french business hours, and it's also super hard to get through, so I gave my ticket info to the concierge and they did call on my behalf and were able to get my tickets exchanged, saving me a lot of money and time on the international call. So it seems like they can be super useful for certain annoying activities like that. They also seem to be very good at getting reservations, they managed to get me both a Feb 14th dinner at Le Jules Verne and a Feb 15th one at Yam'Tcha, both of which I'm not sure I could've gotten on my own.

GeezerCouple

In the distant past, the Amex Plat Concierge was invaluable, helping with almost magical responses.

The first year I had the "Inaugural" Platinum card, I wanted to get a very unusual Christmas gift for a friend.
He had an antique "music box" that played circular metal disks that had bits that stuck up, like on a cylinder on other musical devices. It was a very sentimental remembrance of an ancestor.
But WHERE in the world to get any of these? I wasn't sure what to call them, even, other than as I just described them.

So with about a month to go 'til Christmas, I called Amex Plat Concierge, and tried to describe it/them.
I got a call back asking for more info, and then another call asking for the *exact* diameter, to the nearest quarter inch. (Getting that measurement without being noticed was tricky.)

Anyway, with about 10 days to go, I got a list of some of these disks, and a contact for a little place in NYC, named "Rita's Music Box".
HOW would I have ever located such a place back then (pre-Google, obviously, not that I would necessarily have known what to "Google")?
Suffice it to say that the gift brought tears to a grown man's eyes.
To borrow a term, "Priceless" !

And a few years later, we were told way too late that two grandchildren MUST have "Furbies" for Christmas. Good luck to us!
A call to Amex Plat Concierge... and we were told that the office had been forward thinking enough to send several people out to gather Furbies from a variety of nearby shops. They asked if we could "make do" with just one, as they were running low. Since one of the grandchildren was too little to realize what "sharing" meant vs. "having your own", we we happy enough to get one for the older child.
.
.
.
Fast forward to recent years, and Amex Plat Concierge has mostly been a bust, almost insultingly so.
They send a list from their own Google search, EVEN WHEN I tell them that we have *already* Googled the relevant terms.
Or I asked for help to get another clothing item that I had picked up on vacation, and the out-of-USA designer wouldn't, um, bother to help.
So, after being told this, Amex Plat Concierge got me the international phone number. Duh!

And when trying to get tickets for La Scala, for a performance that seemed to be sold out, all the Concierge could/would do was to get us the exact same information (about those semi-scalpers) that our hotel had already tried for us.

And for help with private museum tours in Italy, they send us the public contact information for the Museum. Uh, thanks. NOT!

So... what was once a cherished benefit of Amex Plat... now, not so much...

But we definitely use the Fine Hotels benefits a lot, which is well worth the membership fee.
The new benefits with the higher membership fee, such as the Uber $200? Sounded okay, until we read the fine print of only once per month, and only a small amount each month. It would be more useful if it could be used for occasional longer trips, perhaps to the airport or such.

Nowadays, given the competing premium cards and their similar benefits... Amex Plat is pushing it with their fees.
<end rant>

They used to be *very* special.

GC

ConciergeBefore

Hey everybody!

I used to be an American Express Platinum & Centurion concierge with the third party contractor that provides concierge services on behalf of American Express. Reading through all these comments, it's funny to see how little customer-facing clarification was ever given about the Concierge services. Thought I'd share some insight (I could honestly write a thesis on AmEx and Concierge).

The biggest "problem" with Concierge is our advertising and the false expectations it sets. Aside from certain restaurant and American Express presales or exclusive tickets, Concierge is essentially a service designed to perform clerical tasks for those who lack the time or knowledge to do so themselves. Mainly, American Express Concierge is meant to be a "personal assistant light" as I call it. The second problem is the self-importance and arrogance of the clientele. Platinum Concierge is essentially aimed at a class of people who are drawn to positional goods--those who want something simply because of the negative consumption by the general population, not because of innate value. Thus, it's not a stretch to say that a lot of the same people are strongly disconnected from reality because they generally don't hear "no" frequently due to artificially-inflated egos.

Restaurants
There are 3 different types of restaurants Concierge deals with:
1. DO NOT CALL restaurants. These are restaurants who have expressly told American Express Platinum concierge to NOT call them (e.g. Le CouCou). This is as legally binding as when you place yourself on a Do Not Call list. There is nothing American Express can do about this, and it is caused mainly by one thing: cardholder arrogance. Do you know how many people ask to be double and triple-booked at Michelin-rated restaurants? And then have the nerve to no-show? This is also why a majority of high-end restaurants are moving to prepaid "Ticketing systems" or heavy cancellation policies through TockTix, Resy, Reserve etc.: arrogant consumers. No, we're not brushing you off, y'all did this to yourselves with your constant cancellations, and the industry is reacting. Japanese restaurants have a particular intolerance for this behavior (flakiness).
2. Random Restaurants with whom Amex has no formal relationship. In New York, Chicago and LA, we will do what's called a "rescue" wherein we will continue to call from the moment of your request, until the cancellation penalties take affect (usually about 24 hours from the date of reservation), at which point we'll ask if you're willing to commit and want us to continue to try. Time-saving, effort, calling at odd hours internationally, speaking foreign languages etc.
3. Partnered Restaurants. There are surprisingly a lot of prestigious restaurants on this list. We have a formal dedicated dining team who are fantastic at their job. But there are LIMITATIONS. We have an entire table at French Laundry every day of the week (at least when I left). But it's only 16 damn tables in the entire place, and do you know how many people request that? Oh, you want it two weeks from now at prime time on a Saturday? Sorry, 10000 Platinum and Centurion Card Holders with higher net worths and greater social status than you ALSO requested the same restaurant since it opened its books 3 months ago. Get over yourself.

Tickets
Again, how Concierge can help is event AND venue-dependant.

1. Amex-sponsored Events. Concierge often gets an allotment of tickets available exclusively for those who call. We've had it for Hamilton, Taylor Swift, Ed Sheeran etc. It is very rare for any credit card to get complete sponsorship and tickets across the board (especially in Texas, for some reason), but we often get the majority of major metropolitan areas when we do get an allotment. Again, the limitations are like everything else: the demand even among cardholders is generally greater than the supply, therefore you still have to call in early and place a pre-order on the pre-sale. The crux of the issue for pre-orders is you need to set parameters (price, seating section) that you cannot rescind, and depending on how restrictive they are, can impede your chances of success. In this respect we try to educate people that, for example, the first sections on the floor of a concert are usually VIP packages and very expensive (and provide pricing if available). But you still get the people who want first 5 rows for 300 dollars because...."you're Amex."
2. Non Amex-sponsored Events. If you call before the general on-sale, we can double your chances while still remaining pragmatic by having a second set of hands pull tickets. This is particularly useful when you do not have a Map View and need to choose "Best Available." That way, if you & the concierge agent pull two sets of tickets, you can release the less preferred ones and pull again. We can also provide the best options for secondary market partners, usually listed in order of best VALUE (price-to-seat position) according to your parameters.

Again, please operate in reality. If American Express is NOT sponsoring an event, and 8 million people in metro NYC (and scalper bots) are going to want to purchase concert tickets at MSG with a seating capacity of 20,000, what exactly do you expect Concierge to do? Pull tickets out of thin air? AND you're calling 6 months after the on-sale date but don't want to pay horribly inflated prices?

Hard-To-Find Items
This is generally clerical help. Again, I'm not sure where even AmEx advertised that we have hidden troves of couture handbags and the latest fad children's toys, but we don't. Nor do we develop relationships with manufacturers. However, we do always put significant effort in to tracking down items worldwide, with all the pertinent details, and identify trends as a business and assign specialty teams as required. So, if we say that we know there are no NES Classics or specific handbag available without much seeming effort, it's probably because you're the 50th request we've personally taken for that item, and we have a team working on purchasing any that become available.

Other things to consider:
- We do underwrite what we purchase. Even if you know the StubHub ticket you want, we can purchase it at the same price also knowing it comes from a reputable reseller due to agreements between AmEx and certain parties. It's also far more likely you would receive a refund from, say, TicketMaster or AXS if we petition on your behalf (though we will not refund it ourselves unless there was an error on our part).
- Much of our work comes down the leveraging the American Express Platinum/Centurion brand in the same way one would flash the card in person to project perceived importance. This, in tandem with a very professional and amicable telephone manner dealing with third-party staff who are used to being condescended to, often works wonders in securing items/reservations/tickets.
- The "system" is sincerely geared towards generating a positive impression on the client. Up to 30% of the potential income of agents is dependant upon positive survey results. In a word, agents generally are trying in earnest to get you a positive result, but we're often the last resort in a less-than-favorable situation.
- Merchant disdain/non-acceptance of AmEx, especially outside of North America. No, we can't help facilitate a purchase on your VISA for European museum tickets.
- Negative reactions from third parties. We have to legally do an outbound call disclosure advising where we are calling from and that we are speaking on a monitored and recorded telephone line. Between thinking we're scammers, telemarketers, or just offput by classism, a lot of people/businesses will simply disconnect a call when they're unfamiliar with our services/business model.
- You're getting with the times. The more older folks adopt technology while simultaneously retiring, the less impressive basic clerical services become. The steps required between "I want" and "I have" are becoming much more streamlined. So what might have seemed like an impossible or impressive task a decade ago to a mind ignorant of basic google searches or StubHub now seems rather redundant when we have no exclusive access to a product or service.

Troopers

Thanks @ConciergeBefore, I've always had great experiences with Amex concierge.

ConciergeBefore

I'm actually happy to hear that. While the job became grating after a while, it was not because of the customers who were generally very pleasant and professional.

If anybody has specific or general questions, if I'm able to answer them, I'd be happy to.

gooselee

I truly appreciate the insight, though to be honest it took me a little bit to get over the tone.

I will add - the single part of your post that I quoted is I believe the specific source of some of the frustration you see in this thread.

Amex very loudly and visibly promotes to Platinum Card customers, with very little qualification, things like "exclusive access" to concert tickets, "help you find anything, anywhere" skills of concierges, getting restaurant reservations nobody else can, specific recommendations, etc. While many of us in this thread have come to understand otherwise and take the concierge service for what it is, the majority of people attempting to use the service, perhaps for the first time, are relying solely on what the concierge service is sold as - people who can access or accomplish things that would otherwise be impossible (or at least extremely difficult). To that end, Amex is setting people up for disappointment.

And...even just using concierge as a personal assistant has mixed results.
- I wanted to send flowers to Mrs. Lee's office for our anniversary a while back - sent an email to Concierge a week in advance with what I thought was a decent set of details, I got a response a day later saying they couldn't find any florists who could deliver on such short notice (in Atlanta..which even at the time was a pretty significant city). The next day I spent 20 minutes on my lunch break poking around on Yelp and making a phone call and just did it myself.
- Another time, I was talking to Concierge about restaurant recommendations for a big group. Ironically given the part of your post about people holding multiple reservation, the concierge actually suggested to me and proactive booked under my name eight different reservations for the same event - saying they would just cancel them once I decided and that most of them didn't have a no-show penalty anyway. Mind you, this was the concierge who suggested and did this...I wouldn't have ever thought to secure a table with no intent of actually using it, and it actually took me multiple follow-ups and one direct call to the restaurant on my own to make sure they released all the reservations we weren't going to use.
- When all was said and done for that restaurant reservation, I actually had an idea for a future event at one of the places we ended up not going with - so I asked the concierge to send me a reminder email with those details (I was on the phone in a cab, so figured I'd have them just send a note vs. me trying to remember it). Despite the enthusiastic promise to send me a note about it, the note never came - I remember because I booked the subsequent event elsewhere and upon arriving at it, finally remembered that I had had this other idea and kicked myself for not remembering it, which then triggered me to remember I had asked the concierge to send me the details as a reminder.

So, while I hear you and completely agree that the concierge is meant to serve as primarily a clerical service, I think the two problems are over-promising in advertising (as you said), but more importantly failure to deliver on even the simple clerical tasks they're intended to do.

Suffice to say, I've completely stopped using Amex concierge - at this point it's a lot of hassle for almost negative value.

Gasolin

Thanks for the insight @ConciergeBefore. At the end though, it seems like it was a classic case of over promise and under delivery...

Cardboard55

Exactly. The beef should be with American Express and how they talk about this service, not the customers. Most people can't be expected to read a FlyerTalk thread to learn which things the concierge actually can or can not do. As an "aspirational" card, a big part of the marketing is all of the amazing things you'll get access to. "Membership has its privileges," after all. I think most of us here are experienced (and perhaps cynical) enough to not take those promises at face value, but I don't think that's reasonable for the average customer.

nyc2cal

I don't think AMEX is over-advertising the concierge. In many cases, they have relationships that enable things such as restaurant reservations that would not otherwise be obtainable in a given time frame. In other cases, they try really hard and sometimes are successful. It should be self-evident that since performing the task by definition involves a third-party cooperating, that cannot be successful every time. I found the Platinum concierge to be very helpful, the dedicated Centurion (AMEX employee, not outsourced) more so in terms of responsiveness and effort, but the AskAMEX app will just look on OpenTable to see if a reservation is available.