krazykanuck

It has nothing to do with a "5/24" rule, but rather Amex's algorithm thinking you're worth their money on a sign up bonus. I am far beyond 5/24 and have no issue getting Amex card bonuses, as recently as a couple weeks ago with the new SPG card. https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/amer...ne-2018-a.html And to be clear, you weren't denied the card, you were just declined the sign up bonus. If you really wanted the card you could have probably received it sans-bonus had you proceeded with the application. @:-)

sdsearch

Amex doesn't do the pull until after you decide to go ahead even though you're not going to get the bonus.

So the evaluation of whether to give you the bonus is based on your Amex history.

But we don't know how far back they look. Datapointw so far suggest they look back at least a couple of years at card closures, maybe more, to see if yiou've been opening Amex cards for the signup bonus and then closing them afterwards (either soon after, or after "sock drawering" them for a while).

Yes, I have had an Everyday for several years and used it, and have had a Hitlon card for over a decade and used it, and I kept an PRG card open the second year and kept using it. But I closed a SPG Business card one year after opening, and closed a Delta Business card one year after opening in the past couple years. And I got eh same popup, and I'm sure it's because of those two cards I closed, despite the three cards I keep open and keep using.

So no, Amex does not have a Chase 5/24 type thing, but what do do is scrutinize your Amex card usage much more closely than anyone has ever scrutinized card usage before.

So what matters is any Amex card you've opened, closed, used, not used, etc, for who knows how many years going back.

BlueEyedBuckeye

Very interesting thanks for the note!

My history with amex is I opened/closed plat/gold/SPG with them between 2011-2014 when Chase lured me asay. I opened/closed a Delta amex in 2016. And I've kept an amex everyday open since 2014.

Seems like they're looking back a lot longer than 2 years based on my annecdotal experience.

Steve M

That's a false dilemma. If you have a current Amex account, they do a soft pull every month to check your ongoing credit worthiness. They could use information from that about your use of credit from other lenders to factor in to their bonus/no-bonus decision. I don't know whether or not they actually do that, but it's certainly possible.

Are you saying that had you gotten the sign-up bonus for the SPG Luxury card, you'd have moved most of your spending to that and away from the Sapphire Reserve card? What about the Luxury card makes it more attractive than SR, based on your situation?

robchow

I guess that if you are meeting minimum spend on an AMEX card that one should continue to get other AMEX cards as there is recent usage history. Once AMEX card is sock-drawer (minimum to no usage), your chance for sign up bonus drops to nil. So once you start AMEX cards, continue until done?

mia

I do not think we have sufficient evidence to support this conclusion. It's a contender, but we do not know the criteria that American Express is using.

BlueEyedBuckeye

Both are 150AF and both have priority pass so no reason to have both. I travel a decent amount (not as much as some here!) and am an SPG loyalist. SPG points are the most flexible so I give them a premium whereas Chase points basically are just United miles.

So yeah this was the first card in 5 years that actually tempted me. But thisnis the state of amex in 2018 - they want to be Chase so bad but just end up falling on their face.

entropy

chase points are also hyatt points which can be quite useful, particularly for suites.

mia

There are no Starpoints, only Marriott points. What sort of flexibility do you value?

bgriff

It would be pretty impressive if every company in the S&P500 managed to outperform the S&P500 average.

bgriff

If you highly value the option to transfer Marriott points to a wide variety of airline miles, there might be a case for this viewpoint. But worth remembering that 1 dollar on non-bonus spend on SPG Luxury Amex = .8333 airline miles (including the 25% transfer bonus). 1 dollar of restaurant/airfare spend on SPG Luxury Amex = 1.6667 airline miles. Vs 1 dollar of non-bonus spend on CSR = 1 airline mile with a smaller collection of airlines (or 1.5 airline miles with a smaller collection of airlines if you also hold a no-annual-fee CFU); 1 dollar of restaurant/airfare spend on CSR = 3 airline miles with a smaller collection of airlines.

Totally fine if you value the broader range of transfer options enough to justify that tradeoff, but just worth keeping in mind that it's a very different scale of earnings. If you use the CSR/CFU combo you can earn miles almost twice as fast in all spend categories except SPG/Marriott hotel spend, though with the admitted tradeoff that it's a much smaller group of transfer partners.

If you value earning miles with a variety of airlines, it could also be worth thinking about the Amex Membership Rewards family of cards, which overall (depending on your spend patterns) doesn't earn quite as many points as the Chase family of cards can, but does earn miles faster than the SPG Luxury card, and offers more transfer partners than Chase but not as many as Marriott, putting it right in the middle on both dimensions.


And if you just value earning Marriott points for use on hotels, it's just worth keeping in mind that with the value of Marriott points where it is, a lot of potential Marriott hotel redemptions will result in less return on spend on the SPG/Marriott credit cards than you would get with a 2% cash back card.

frankhi

First of all these AF amounts mean different things to different people. If, say,$95 or $150, is a lot to one person it may not be to some else. Secondly, while I'll use my CSR after I meet the bonus spending on my SPG lux card, I'll keep the SPG card for the 50k free nt.

blitzen

Not sure if I follow. 60k Marriott Points (the old 20k*3) gives 20k+5k bonus miles > 0.41666 Airline Miles per Point so 0.83 for every day (as you said) but as restaurants/airlines are only 3x it would be 1.25 Airline Miles
CSR has 3 Miles (regardless of number of transfer partners) on Travel/Restaurants which is better than 1.25 and 1 on all else (again better than 0.83)
So the Lux works for Marriott spend at 2.5 miles still below CSR > a CSR/CFU combo beats it every time
The big advantage can be the difference in transfer partners > if you want LH M&M the only way is Marriott Points

bgriff

Sorry you're right I was thinking of the 4x Marriott points on some categories on the SPG Business Amex. SPG Luxury Amex with only 3 Marriott points per dollar on dining/airfare is even worse than I said above.

And, critically, since CSR points can be transferred 1:1 to Marriott, you could also earn 3 Chase points per dollar on dining and travel and then have the option to convert those into 3 UA/SQ/AF/other miles, or into 3 Marriott points which then could become 1.667 other airline miles, if you were really desperate.

patrick.barnes