UK Amex Platinum + Gold dilemma
 

Hey team!

This question is for the UK residents who have been churning amex cards for a while.

Does anyone know if it is possible to have both gold and platinum cards together and simultaneously reap the MR bonuses of both cards?

The issue at hand:

Last weekend I applied for a platinum card but didn't get an instant approval. I thus assumed that I had been rejected. I then applied for the gold card and got instantly approved.

1 week later I am surprised but very happy to receive the platinum card in the mail.

I activated the platinum card this evening, but couldn't register it to my original online account and had to create another online account.

Both online accounts say that I will get the sign up MR bonuses of each card, but I am doubtful of this. Can anyone shed some light here? Is there a chance than amex will pick up on this and not give me the MR bonus of 1 of the 2 cards?

Thanks!

To be honest I've never attempted to apply for both at one time to give you info about receiving both bonuses.

What I can tell you is I have definitely heard of instances where people have received multiple sign up bonuses on the same card that have slipped through Amex's computer system because they used different User ID's or email addresses.

Did you use the same email address/info on both applications?

Similar to the above I have heard of people getting multiple sign up bonuses - I would try and see what happens - but I would hit the platinum spend first as that is the higher bonus!!

Would that make a difference though?

I'm unsure how Amex treats applications if you are not instantly approved. Does your cardmembership commence from the day you applied or were actually approved.

If they go by approval the gold bonus may be the only one the OP will receive as he was instantly approved for that one.

Actually re the point about the OP's online account showing the amount left to trigger the sign-up bonus, I think this will show regardless. I.e even if you cancel a gold card, wait 2 months and then reapply, I think the tracker will still show except you won't receive the bonus when reaching the spend threshold.
Happy to be corrected on that one though.

Thanks team. I opted for the safe route and cancelled the gold card, rang amex and had them manually approve the platinum bonus!

Glad to hear you'll end up with the higher bonus.

Would have been an interesting data point to know if both bonuses would've triggered though ;)

I know! I panicked on the phone and got her to cancel the gold card. Would have been an expensive experiment if the platinum card yielded no points!

Fair enough.

Out of interest did you use all the same details in Gold application as the Platinum one?

I ask because I recently heard a report of Amex automatically preventing/flagging applications as duplicate applications if applying within a short (7 day?) period.

On that occasion it was the same card being applied for but I wonder if they would have the same issue with any cards in the same 'group' (Gold/Plat) or any of their cards for that matter?

Same details. I think the issue with the platinum application failing on the the first attempt may have been caused by typo in the address line.

The gold card application, which 1 sent 24 hours later, was instantly approved.

What do you mean when you say "fail" as in you got a message saying they can't give you an instant decision and will be in touch in next 7-10 days....?

Despite having an excellent credit score, I still get those messages on my applications from time to time and am not always instantly approved. Often nothing sinister and application is still approved without issue in subsequent days.