Mysterious 15,000 MQMs + 25,000 RDMs
 

I'm new to the forum and was looking for a relevant thread but couldn't find one. I'm hoping someone's had the same experience or could provide some insight into what happened this weekend. Let me back up a bit...

A few months ago I realized I was getting close to Silver status and started looking for credit card offers that would put me over the 25,000 MQM threshold, so that I'd be Silver in 2013. I was around 13,000 at this point. I found an American Express Gold offering 40,000 Award Miles and 15,000 MQMs after spending $1,000. Sounds too good to be true?

So I receive the card and promptly spend the $1,000 (much of which was on Delta flights), and sure enough my account is credited the 40,000 Award Miles (labeled "SkyMiles Amex Cobrand Credit Card") after I've paid it off (and not even at the end of the statement for that month), specifically in this order:

15,000
15,000
10,000

I wait for the MQMs to come in. At this point I've gotten so excited that I've booked 4 Delta flights over as many months, assuming I'd be Silver by then.

My Amex statement closes for that month, and even though I'd already been credited the Award Miles days prior, still no MQMs. I call Delta customer service, and they suggest I wait a few more weeks. Maybe it just takes a while for American Express to signal to Delta the MQM balance?

I wait the few weeks, and still MQMs. I call Delta back, and they suggest I contact American Express. I both call and email American Express and get the same answer:

Essentially I made up the 15,000 MQM part of the offer. They have no record of the offer I described ever existing anywhere, and not just for me. It was only ever going to be 40,000 Award Miles.

Incredulous, I went back through my browser history, emails, and any websites I could find that might have this offer listed. There were none. In retrospect I think I probably conflated several different offers from different tabs I had open into one magic offer that simply didn't exist.

Defeated, I resigned myself to the good feeling that at least it was MY fault and not Delta's. Then at least I wasn't being cheated by a company.

A few days ago (which is about a month after the above events), I checked into the first flight of what will end up being several more Delta flights this year. I noticed that my ticket read "Silver/Elite/Sky Club" at the top. That's weird. I checked my account quickly from my phone, and literally the day prior I had been credited the following:

"SkyMiles Amex Cobrand Threshold MQM Bonus"
15,000 MQMs
15,000 Award Miles
"SkyMiles Amex Cobrand Credit Card"
10,000 Award Miles

Excuse me, but what??? Not that I'm complaining! But where did this come from? I checked both my Delta and American Express accounts online, and I had no messages. No emails. No voicemails. Just randomly credited with not only what I had wanted (the 15,000 MQMs, which I admittedly made up) but 25,000 extra Award Miles??? So in the course of getting a Delta American Express Gold Card, I have racked up 65,000 Award Miles and 15,000 MQMs after spending only $1,000 (oh, and no fee for the first year).

Am I just lucky? Has anyone else gotten something like this? Is this some way of rewarding me? Did someone see my calls/emails to customer service and accidentally credited me the 15,000 MQMs I asked for, and if so why the extra Award Miles?

Delta giveth and Delta taketh away [sometimes].

Keep quiet and don't ask too many questions.

I would say you got lucky. I thought only Platinum and Reserve cobranded Delta Amex cards gave threshold MQM bonus miles.

For future reference...always take screenshots of offers, emails, etc.

Also, were you already a SC member, or did they give that to you too?

I've never seen the Gold card with a 15K MQM bonus sign-up offer. The Plat card definitely, but never the Gold card.

I purchased a 30-day membership to the Sky Club, so that part isn't so much a mystery. Sorry, I should have mentioned that.

Under the circumstances, it sounds like you got lucky. While the DL Amex Platinum card has sometimes offered 15K MQM (and 40K RDM), the DL Amex Gold has not. So, most likely someone at Amex or DL messed up to your benefit.

Although unlikely, I suppose another possibility is that someone with a DL Amex Reserve card hit their $30K or $60K spend requirement and accidently had their 15K MQM bonus deposited into your account (e.g., by inputting the wrong SkyMiles number... a fat finger error).

As posters above have said, the DL Amex Gold has never provided any MQMs in any way (bonus or threshold) to my knowledge. The MQM bumps are a benefit of the Platinum and Reserve DL cards, thus the higher AFs.

I think there was a thread a while back of amex finally giving miles that they should have given about a year prior, but their cpu messed up and never credited the miles initially.

But then many people forgot about the miles or thought they were never going to get them and forgot, and then when the miles finally came, they felt like a windfall.

So maybe these are miles you were due from a card last year or something.

here is the link for the 15k MqM offer.

https://www.deltaamexcard.com/default.aspx?et=dbu

have to have or be current skymile member

fyi - it shows gold card but once i put in my skymiles number and last name it shows up as a plat card

See Image link to image: http://imageshack.us/a/img547/4872/deltaoffer.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img547/4872/deltaoffer.jpg

Pretty difficult IME to accidentally enter a VALID SM number. Very easy to accidentally enter an INVALID one.

Can you take a printscreen of the T&C's below the offer? Looking for the offer ID. (It won't let me see it because I'm already a cardholder, and it shows my wife a gold offer since she isn't medallion).

Hmm, I like this theory, but I definitely am new to American Express as of two months ago, and I have had only the Gold card. Never a Platinum or card otherwise.

What statement?

If I were you I would remove the partial statement you provided in the above post else you may find your mysterious MQM gift removed.

As DLFan2 said: