Delta AMEX Gold vs. Plat CC
 

With the changes to the spending requirements to achieve DIA, I'm wondering, does the gold card provide credit toward spending as well?

I don't make DIA on MQD's but the waiver. Since I won't make DIA next year, and don't need the bonus MQM's I'm thinking of moving to the GOLD AMEX instead of the keeping the Plat one.

But I can't really find any good info. Does the Gold spending count towards the waiver? I assume you don't receive MQM's after reaching certain levels?

I believe any DL branded AX card is subject to the new $250k waiver.
I don't know if the Gold card gives you bonus MQM after reaching certain levels.

I would still get the bonus MQMs and roll over to next year.

here you go:
What cards are eligible for the MQD Waiver? •Delta SkyMiles Credit Card
•Gold Delta SkyMiles Credit Card
•Platinum Delta SkyMiles
•Delta Reserve Credit Card
•Delta SkyMiles Business Credit Card
•Gold Delta SkyMiles Business Credit Card
•Platinum Delta SkyMiles Business Credit Card
•Delta Reserve for Business Credit Card from American Express
•Blue Delta SkyMiles Credit Card (through December 31, 2017*)

No MQM boosts for the Gold card. The main additional benefits of the Plat card are the MQM (and RDM) boosts and the companion cert.

Thanks. I thin this is what will hurt AMEX. I usually spend 100K on my Plat AMEX. But now that I know I won't met the $250K minimum to maintain DIA, I'll just go to gold as I'll easily make PM on my trips. Don't really need the boost anymore and not worth the additional fee.

I'm a current DM and upgraded to AMEX DL reserve this year with anticipated $60K spend to qualify for 30K MQM bonus. These last two years I've also met DM MQD of $15K. With the new DM waiver, I'm looking to downgrade or cancel AMEX reserve card all together but wanted to get others' thoughts.

Pros:
SC membership+3rd choice benefit (2018)
PWM

Cons:
High annual fee
No point mutlipliers for non-DL spend

I no longer care about the MQM bonuses because I'm happy with earning with butt in seat.

Does DL AMEX blue allow PWM with no annual fee? Maybe this is a better option?

I would like to know this as well.

I have the plat but have no need for the companion fare and only used it to get the cushion of the waiver and 10K MQM for possibly lean years. I do like PWM but the other two have been rendered useless.

I think there are ton of us in the exact same situation. This move by DL has to hurt AMEX if folks like us move to a less expensive card and don't care to spend us much to get MQM's.

https://www.delta.com/content/www/en...ith-miles.html

Looks like Blue Delta A,ex does not include PWM. They’re pretty careful enumerate the Gold, Plat, and Reserve on that page and there’s no mention of it on the Amex product page for Blue either.

Some people might want to keep or get the Reserve card in order to be able to "give" the MQMs to someone else if they don't need or want the rollover.

If you have never held the gold delta amex, you should not just transfer your account from platinum. You should sign up fresh when there's a good sign up offer.

I ran the numbers for various cards based on my projected spending, and decided to drop from the Delta Reserve down to the Delta Platinum and replace the Reserve for my travel spend with an Amex Platinum. There will probably be a year where I'm under the PM MQD threshold (even though for the past two years I've been over it but not to the DM threshold), so putting $25K through a Delta-branded card is worth doing; given that, the extra $100 annual fee for the Delta Platinum card is offset by the 10K RDM boost I get at that point. (Exactly so, since 10K RDM is worth at least $100 as long as I can use Pay With Miles.) The associated MQM bump (0.01 MM :D) is a freebie at that point.

I'll lose the Reserve card's upgrade tiebreaker (so once in 100 flights I'll be #9 on the list for two seats instead of #8 ), Sky Club access (included in the much better lounge access of the Amex Platinum), and better companion ticket (not that I've had good opportunity to use the existing one). Going from 2x SkyMiles to 5x Membership Rewards points for my airfare spend will more than cover the extra $300 in annual fees ($450 for the Reserve becomes $550 for the Amex Platinum + $195 for the Delta Platinum).

This.

Current offer for gold is 50k miles with 2k spend in 3 months, and additional 10k miles for additional 1k spend in 3 months. Seems like a decent offer to me. It was just 50k when I got the card.

I just picked up the platinum with 70k skymiles bonus and 10k mqm bonus.

I may move away from a card all together. There are a lot of cards out there with less annual fee and a lot better ROI. The promise of DM benefits pushed the ROI way up, but without it it's really not worth it for me.

I agree completely that this move hurts AMEX way more than Delta. I'll continue to fly Delta and try to qualify but the loser for my paltry bit is the $25K spend that I gave to Amex.

Thanks for the input on Blue - anyone around who can test the theory?

https://www.delta.com/content/www/en_US/skymiles/earn-miles/earn-miles-with-partners/credit-card-partners/personal-credit-cards.html

No PWM on blue. No discount on skyclub access. No free foreign transactions.

Thanks!

Does anyone know if you currently have Plat and want to drop to Gold, what the best strategy is? For example, if you apply for Gold, can you get the bonus miles and $0 annual fee for the first year? Do you have to cancel Plat first before doing that or will cancelling make you ineligible?