Eujeanie

When someone like Amex gets rid of a customer, closes their accounts, as what happened to the OP, do they keep that to themselves or do they let other financial institutions and credit card issuers know of their actions and why they were taken? In other words, does the OP and others in his same situation go on some sort of SL with all the cc issuers?

Likewise, if AA closes someone's accounts, are all airlines informed of this action?

GeezerCouple

Even if they don't annotate anything about the actual reason(s), is it noted as something "adverse" or just "closed". And is "closed" perhaps different from "closed by client"?
I'm not at all sure how these things appear to the creditors.

The specific concerns being mentioned here are supposed to be 'secret', and not even disclosed to the customer, so I'm not sure if it would be listed explicitly anywhere else.

GC

Petdog

Credit reports show late/missed payments and have notes as to why an account was closed (e.g., "Account closed by creditor").

mapleg

I doubt that very much. They sold the overdue account to a collection agency who paid them x cents on the dollar. After that the more the collection agency gets, the more they make. AMEX likely bids these overdue acccounts out to various collection agencies on a bid basis. They really don't care what happens once they no longer own the receivable.

MSPeconomist

mia

In my understanding this is standard industry practice.

Equifax says: If you’re only a few days or a couple of weeks late on the payment, and you make the full late payment before that 30 days is up, lenders and creditors may not report it to the credit bureaus as a late payment.

Experian says: If you miss the due date for a payment by a few days but then catch up, it shouldn't appear in your credit report. For a late payment to appear on a credit report, you must miss a full billing cycle. That means your payment must be a full 30 days late.

friedablass

This thread has been quite an interesting read.

Just going to give my 2 cents. I know most people are responding negatively and saying there is no chance your accounts will ever be reinstated. However, perhaps I can give you some hope. I prefer not to go into great detail, but suffice it to say that my circumstances were completely different than yours. However, I went ahead and wrote letters and/or emails to my Amex account manager as well as Executives at Amex (whoever I was able to find contact info for) and also to the BBB. I was polite but persistent and laid everything out in an organized fashion, explaining in detail why I believe that they erred and backed everything up with proof. Lo and behold, I received a letter in response from Amex stating that they reviewed my account and have decided to re-open ALL accounts (and I had quite a few with histories of well over 15 years).

No explanation as to why I was shut down in the first place and what made them decide to reinstate. I never did find out, but I've moved on and do continue to put spend on my Amex cards when it makes sense to do so.

Perhaps in your case, the previous posters are correct and there isn't any hope for being reinstated, but all I can say is that you won't know unless you give it your best shot.

MarcusK

Thanks for your advice and reply. Would you be so kind to share the contact information you were able to find? Perhaps we can chat privately on the process? You do not have to explain your situation...

captaindomon

When Amex closes all your accounts like in this thread, do they immediately call all balances due? Or do they continue on at the mandated minimum payments? Or some other version of that?
It's probably best to just pay everything immediately, but it's an interesting question as many Amex card holders carry high balances from time to time.

Steve M

For credit card accounts, they continue with the standard minimum payment terms, so it could potentially be years after account closure before you pay it off completely, if you make minimum payments. However, they raise the interest rate up to the penalty rate, so it would be very expensive to not pay off such an account. But if you are in a pinch and can make only the minimum payment, you can do so and not have the account turned over to collections or a default reported to the credit bureaus.

Rbt001

Steve M

Ah, you're right. My information predated the CARD Act.

mia

On the other hand the CARD Act likely does not apply to business cards. I don't know what American Express does when it closes business credit cards, which include Blue, Delta, Hilton, Lowes, Marriott, etc.

Rbt001

Based upon the OP's comments, I don't think he has business cards. But you raise a good point for others that may be interested. The CARD Act does NOT apply to business cards. I found an article from 04/25/18 which lists card issuers and how they treat business cards with respect to the CARD Act. According to the article, while American Express does extend CARD Act protections concerning application of payments (min pay amount to lowest balance and any amount above minimum payment to the balance at the highest rate,) AMEX reserves the right to raise interest rates on outstanding balances.

The article further goes on to mention Bank of America and TD Bank as the only to card issuers to voluntarily extend all of the important CARD Act protections to their business cards.

The article can be found here: https://wallethub.com/edu/business-c...d-study/25816/

Centurion

I think the OP will have no luck. Rules and laws are in place so banks like Amex know their customer. The fines are ten to hundreds of millions usa dollars and the USA is serious about enforcement. I