Credit Card Offers Amex Explorer: 50,000 bonus Amex points

Earn uncapped Amex Points and enjoy a $400 travel credit every year!​

Learn more and apply for this card:

American Express® Explorer Credit Card

With the American Express Explorer credit card, earn uncapped Amex Membership Rewards points and offset the annual fee with a travel credit.

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

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What are the main benefits of this card?

1. Signup bonus: 50,000 bonus Amex Membership Rewards Points, when you spend at least $4,000 on eligible purchases within 3 months of approval
2. Earn 2 Membership Rewards Points per $1 on eligible purchases, uncapped, which you can transfer to 13 different airline & hotel programs
3. $400 annual travel credit fully offsets the $395 annual fee

Why we like the American Express Explorer credit card

This card lets you earn Amex Membership Rewards points at a solid rate of 2 points per dollar, uncapped, without the higher annual fee of the Amex Platinum card.

You can transfer Amex points to 11 airline frequent flyer programs and 2 hotel loyalty programs, generally at a 2:1 rate. For example, this means you’re effectively earning 1 Velocity Point, Qatar Avios or Cathay Asia Mile per $1 spent on the card.

The $395 annual fee is offset by a $400 annual travel credit that you can spend on eligible flights, car rentals or hotels when booking through American Express Travel.

You'll also receive two free annual visits to the Amex Centurion Lounges in Sydney or Melbourne Airport, plus complimentary travel insurance. See our card guide for the full details:

American Express® Explorer Credit Card

With the American Express Explorer credit card, earn uncapped Amex Membership Rewards points and offset the annual fee with a travel credit.

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

AFF members are welcome to discuss this card in this thread.

 

[SOPOOR]

so I used my travel credit for the first time, I ve recerntly merged my account and have(or should have $200 from plat edge and $400 from exployrer)

when I merged the $200 became visible but the $400 was not visible,

ive used the $200 today, I assume i Have to call up to use the $400 credit....

 

[daft009]

i had to call them and then they made both explorer & edge visible.
then I chose which one to use for which booking

 

[SOPOOR]

i had to call them and then they made both explorer & edge visible.
then I chose which one to use for which booking

will give that a try
right now!! , thanks!

 

[blingy90]

On a personal note and bonus points aside, I would not expect to get a annual fee refund (or pro-rata) if I had used the entire travel credit.
This is just a personal view.

I suspect you may have got lucky with cancelling yours and your partner is getting what should be given.
As always with AMEX - doesn't hurt to hang up and try again.

I had an Explorer card from Oct through until late Dec when I cancelled it. I was offered and received a full refund of the Annual Fee even though I recieved the bonus points and used the travel credit.

My partner also had this card from Oct and cancelled it today having also used its full benefits. However she was refused a refund, either partial or full and was instead offered to change to a lesser card - not sure which one as she didn't remember. I'm a little disappointed as I wanted to put the refund towards an QF Ultimate card for her as I did with mine.

Has anyone else been refused refunds on annual fees recently? Is there a change of policy that anyone is aware of?

 

[SOPOOR]

i had to call them and then they made both explorer & edge visible.
then I chose which one to use for which booking

ok I hope I didnt stuff it upI called and the
guy said that he would unlink my accounts and then I would see my credit

I was like Noooooooooooo!

but then he

reassured me that he would relink them straight away and would call me back once its done

I hope I havent stuffed myself up

 

[robtemt]

I applied for explorer this month, received the card, spent the $1500 and referred a friend all in week one. The travel credit has been applied to the card, and the refer a friend 30,000 points credited as well.

I hold the Plat Charge (and the Plat Reserve with it). I un-linked the Explorer from my Ascent Premium when activated, in the hopes the 100K bonus would be credited under the gateway account.

Today, I tried the online chat to argue for my bonus today. She said you can't have another Amex credit card, blah blah blah, and I argued (nicely with lots of 's) that I have a CHARGE card, and the plat reserve is simply a companion card linked to the charge that isn't available to applicants as a individual product. She agreed, but said since I had a Velocity and Qantas Premium Amex card that I cancelled in Aug 2016, I was not eligible for the bonus on the explorer. She actually suggested to me to "call customer service, and threaten to cancel one or all of your cards, as they can offer you a retention bonus", but she said the restriction put on them on the online platform where more strict and in any case like this they have to refer it to the call centres. Haven't tried this yet.

But...... I called membership rewards (at 2pm today), and asked to have the explorer re-linked to Ascent Premium and the points from gateway transferred over, and it was done in less than 5 minutes. I'll take that as a partial win. For now.

 

[SOPOOR]

can someone clarify something for me, about the benefits of linking your explorer to ascent

using veloocity as an example melb to europe business class return is 139,000x2=278k

if using amex MR ascent program you need 278k points to transfer,
but if you have gateway/explorer, since its a 4:3 ratio you will need 33% more points ie 370k points to do this same trip?

 

[fairbasa]

You've answered your own question.

The benefit if transferring to airline partners is you get 1:1 from your Ascent-Linked Explorer Vs 4:3 if Explorer was still enrolled in the Gateway Program. Ascent points are more valuable if transferring to airline partners.

 

[SOPOOR]

You've answered your own question.

The benefit if transferring to airline partners is you get 1:1 from your Ascent-Linked Explorer Vs 4:3 if Explorer was still enrolled in the Gateway Program. Ascent points are more valuable if transferring to airline partners.

I was a bit surprised by the hughe difference of 100k points, and I read here that some people tried to link and didnt succeed so gave up, or were even happy with the 4:3 ratio,

since many people spend using explorer im surprised people dont push for hte linking to ascent,

i just did the maths and the difference is very significant!

im a very happy chappy!

 

[fairbasa]

I was a bit surprised by the hughe difference of 100k points, and I read here that some people tried to link and didnt succeed so gave up, or were even happy with the 4:3 ratio,

since many people spend using explorer im surprised people dont push for hte linking to ascent,

i just did the maths and the difference is very significant!

im a very happy chappy!

Remember, it's really only a benefit if you're transferring to an airline partner in the AMEX MR scheme. SPG transfers are the same in Gateway and Ascent. I'm using SPG heavily and getting awesome value, especially with Marriott's travel packages (which include airline miles) so it doesn't worry me whether I'm enrolled in Ascent or not.

This is clearly a loophole AMEX are trying to close down, but there's still the odd service agent who will process the request not realising what they're doing.

As a side note, I wish all talk relating to linking/unlinking was in its own thread. I would guess about 120 of the 180 pages so far relate to this and not specifically the Explorer card.

 

[SOPOOR]

Remember, it's really only a benefit if you're transferring to an airline partner in the AMEX MR scheme. SPG transfers are the same in Gateway and Ascent. I'm using SPG heavily and getting awesome value, especially with Marriott's travel packages (which include airline miles) so it doesn't worry me whether I'm enrolled in Ascent or not.

This is clearly a loophole AMEX are trying to close down, but there's still the odd service agent who will process the request not realising what they're doing.

As a side note, I wish all talk relating to linking/unlinking was in its own thread. I would guess about 120 of the 180 pages so far relate to this and not specifically the Explorer card.

very good point, I wasnt aware the ratios were the same for the SPG,
im still on Qantas and recently new on Velocity, so it does affect me ,

i feel lucky that my programs are linked , and hope to keep it that way

 

[Damien00]

On a personal note and bonus points aside, I would not expect to get a annual fee refund (or pro-rata) if I had used the entire travel credit.
This is just a personal view.

I suspect you may have got lucky with cancelling yours and your partner is getting what should be given.
As always with AMEX - doesn't hurt to hang up and try again.

Completely agree. I was actually quite surprised, I didn't ask for it, but rather was offered it by the CSR. I was even surprised that she offered the full refund given I had the card for almost 3 months regardless of the benefits I'd used during this time.

Still once I received this you could understand my expectation that my partner would get at least a pro-rata refund. Oh well, no biggie!

 

[SOPOOR]

ok I hope I didnt stuff it upI called and the
guy said that he would unlink my accounts and then I would see my credit

I was like Noooooooooooo!

but then he

reassured me that he would relink them straight away and would call me back once its done

I hope I havent stuffed myself up

this is what frustrates the cough out of me, just dealing with either incompetence or outright lying,

firstly, when I tried to enquire about my travel credit showing, they said, its because its linked, we are going to unlink it ,
I was like noooooo,
but then they said dont worry, i will personally follow it up for you, you wont lose the credit but we will link back together I promise

by the end of the conversation, it had changed to , oh we will link it once you have used the credit,
I was like , no other people have had their credit shown straight away,

followed by, " I can persoanlly assure you I can link it back up straight away, i will call you shortly,

two days have gone by , I checked my account and yep you guessed it
accounts unlinked, travel credit not showing,

I dont understand when every call is recorded, they still seem to not be able to place notes on the account, adn when you ask them, they are completely oblivious to it

just frustrated!

 

[albyd]

Mine isn't showing. Asked the travel guys about it they couldn't figure it out. As long as I keep getting 2MR Ascent Premium per $ spend and MR isn't devalued, I'm prepared to write it off so as not to risk it. The points earn is too valuable.

 

[daft009]

hmm, after I rang the travel guys, I had a popup appear, see attached.
listed both the $200 & $400 travel credit.



I've since used the $400 credit

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Have just completed linking the wife's explorer to her edge.
Linking took about a week to show up and points merged about a day more.

Called during the day to Australian call centre. Only took the one call. All very easy.

 

[nightelves]

Mine isn't showing. Asked the travel guys about it they couldn't figure it out. As long as I keep getting 2MR Ascent Premium per $ spend and MR isn't devalued, I'm prepared to write it off so as not to risk it. The points earn is too valuable.

The best thing to do is this situation is get them to add it in manually. Someone mentioned this approach quite a few threads back and it works. I called up late at night to inquire and forced them to add the travel credit back.

There is no delinking and linking. If they're not sure what you're talking about, speak to a supervisor.

 

[unfunkable]

When my accounts were merged my travel credit went missing for the explorer.
I rang up and they did something but it was still not there....after a few phone calls they told me they could see both, but I couldn't.
It turns out it was a graphic issue on the website, one of the credit's was invisible until I hovered my mouse over it..was the weirdest thing.
Try mouse hovering over the area where it is supposed to be and see if they ' appear'

 

[albyd]

Thanks for the suggestions guys. Will log back in first then call up Amex to have it added manually. Will HUACA if they say they need to de link first. I'll report back how I go.

 

[blingy90]

Completely agree as well. Once you know it can be done (or something has been offered) - then you half can't be blamed for expecting it again.

Completely agree. I was actually quite surprised, I didn't ask for it, but rather was offered it by the CSR. I was even surprised that she offered the full refund given I had the card for almost 3 months regardless of the benefits I'd used during this time.

Still once I received this you could understand my expectation that my partner would get at least a pro-rata refund. Oh well, no biggie!