Centurion here I come.....

[Cruiser Elite]

Cheapest I can see is 302 those dates - am I doing something wrong?

 

[sparoz]

I must admit Lifestyle Australia (Concierge) seems to be much better recently. My last three transactions with them are excellent, and my most recent experience yesterday/today is just exceptional. I am after a set of very rare wheels for my car which is made of Duralumin (military grade aluminium alloy ), and is only available in Japan. Knowing my usual consultant is only on three times a week, and it is probably not something that in her alley, I decided to send an email to lifestyle australia around 9:30pm last night of my request, and had an auto reply stating that they will get back to me within 24hrs and if the matter is urgent, give them a call.

I was initially a bit disappointed that I haven't got a reply by the time I got home from work. However, I got some missed calls around 6pm and a message to call back as the consultant has found a place which is available and is happy to send it to Australia! I was feeding my daughter as I can see she tried a number of times on my phone, but eventually I got back to her. She was supposed to finish at 7pm but want to make sure I got the message as the next manufacturing run is in two days time, and if I missed the cut off it will be a long while before they have another run! Everything was sorted out within 5 mins, and it is going to be at my doors within 3 weeks time. On top of this, the price was a good discount from RRP and a postage about 50% of what I would need to pay if I send them myself.

This is what I call service. The consultant was Japanese and looks like they must have made some in roads in how to get the best outcome by assigning the right person to t he job. Pity I spent a whole day trying to source the wheels myself. I should have better trust in them next time.

 

[marc]

I like the idea of having an extra green card that is actually a stealth-Centurion card: it gives one a sort of reverse-prestige

That's what i have - you have to basically register yourself as a supplementary cardholder on your own account - in my case i just used my initial instead of my name and it all went through and stealth green card arrived sometime thereafter...

 

[Cruiser Elite]

Don’t you hate it when your best endeavors at humor go unnoticed?

Like when you hand over your Centurion card to make a payment and the recipient looks at blankly then retorts 'gee that is a heavy card'.

To which you automatically reply 'Yes that is because it is laden with debt'!

But then that blank look on their face clearly indicates whoosh - straight over their heads - jeez that disappoints me.

 

[Homer]

Don’t you hate it when your best endeavors at humor go unnoticed?

I've got a similar line that is also often met with a blank stare. Sometimes I'm asked "How do you get one of these?" and I reply "If your wife spends all of your money, they give you one out of sympathy."

 

[k3nnis]

So who is keeping their cent after these enhancements?

 

[Cruiser Elite]

So who is keeping their cent after these enhancements?

I will make a decision on retention post Amex FX Dept finalising their pts earn for commercial FX transactions - without that I could not justify it - Select now slaughters Cent IMHO.

 

[k3nnis]

Does select provide lounge access etc? Or only good for points earning on VISA and insurance? Actually is the select travel insurance like the amex plat charge before the enhancements?

 

[Cruiser Elite]

Does select provide lounge access etc?

Which Lounge access?

Actually is the select travel insurance like the amex plat charge before the enhancements?

NFI on that one - smarter men than me might have done an analysis.

 

[cove]

On the Select question of lounge access you do get given a black lounge access card that Mrscove and I have never needed to use. With points travelling we book first up into the minimum acceptable class whether it is Business or First. The real task is to get enough points in the multiple accounts you can run. I am sure they say the access card gets you entry to 650 lounges somewhere in the world.
Now to do this Citi Select and Westpac Platinum Altitude both allow you to warehouse points and transfer them to multiple redemption airlines.
This week I saw just how useless both Qantas and Virgin are for travelling around January 1st to Los Angeles........they want about 4 times the normal Classic points to go Business class! Lucky I have Citi to fix this!
Again I ignore the card travel insurance and run with a yearly Chubb cover. I don't need someone to say you might be covered if you bought a ticket thru us....

 

[Cruiser Elite]

Oh yes as cove points out you get Priority Pass but that only has limited value - again as cove points out J or F redemptios on FF pts via CC usage negates any requirement for Lounge access using any card.

 

[Stephen65]

I always thought PP membership was one of the particularly useless features of the Plat and Cent cards. Just how often do they expect cardholders would be flying:

- not in J or F class; and

- if in economy with no status?

Amex buying things that I could easily buy for myself if I valued them (like PP membership) is a poor use of their bargaining power and simply means I end up paying via the membership fee for something that is of no use to me. Amex (and Citi) should be using their bargaining power to negotiate privileges that are not for sale to the general public.

 

[farstar]

I always thought PP membership was one of the particularly useless features of the Plat and Cent cards. Just how often do they expect cardholders would be flying:

- not in J or F class; and

- if in economy with no status?

Amex buying things that I could easily buy for myself if I valued them (like PP membership) is a poor use of their bargaining power and simply means I end up paying via the membership fee for something that is of no use to me. Amex (and Citi) should be using their bargaining power to negotiate privileges that are not for sale to the general public.

Amex and PP I am sure have done their figures and know that most people won't use their PP membership, that being the case it costs them very little to include it but Amex can act as though it is a great benefit. A few people will find it useful though and it will be a bonus for those people.

 

[pshepvic]

Amex and PP I am sure have done their figures and know that most people won't use their PP membership, that being the case it costs them very little to include it but Amex can act as though it is a great benefit. A few people will find it useful though and it will be a bonus for those people.

I use it a few times a year. In the US I've used it when flying domestic F/J flights, as they do not always provide lounge access (VX as an example). I've also used where no J/F available (eg. JetBlue) and in Indonesia (coming.back from Bali we were on JQ in J so got lounge access, but a friend with us in Y was able to use our free PP entry to the lounge).

Don't use it much though and wouldn't be devastated if they replaced with something better.

I would really prefer if they had a pool of optional benefits - eg. Maybe you could pick 5 benefits from a pool of 15 (include PP, QClub, CX diamond for both main.and supp cardholder and add some new ones) so people could pick what they need, then drop the annual fee so you're not paying for all of them. Would be good to see a Star Alliance gold benefit like the CX benefit available as well.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2

 

[TonyHancock]

I always thought PP membership was one of the particularly useless features of the Plat and Cent cards. Just how often do they expect cardholders would be flying:

- not in J or F class; and

- if in economy with no status?

Amex buying things that I could easily buy for myself if I valued them (like PP membership) is a poor use of their bargaining power and simply means I end up paying via the membership fee for something that is of no use to me. Amex (and Citi) should be using their bargaining power to negotiate privileges that are not for sale to the general public.

It is handy if you are flying J on a Oneworld flight number but non Oneworld metal at some airports. I also use it for arrivals at the Air Canada lounge, LHR T3 for convenience. There are times when I find myself flying Y on short haul internal flights overseas.


...that said it is not overly useful.

 

[greenfrog86]

I use it a few times a year. In the US I've used it when flying domestic F/J flights, as they do not always provide lounge access (VX as an example). I've also used where no J/F available (eg. JetBlue) and in Indonesia (coming.back from Bali we were on JQ in J so got lounge access, but a friend with us in Y was able to use our free PP entry to the lounge).

Don't use it much though and wouldn't be devastated if they replaced with something better.

I would really prefer if they had a pool of optional benefits - eg. Maybe you could pick 5 benefits from a pool of 15 (include PP, QClub, CX diamond for both main.and supp cardholder and add some new ones) so people could pick what they need, then drop the annual fee so you're not paying for all of them. Would be good to see a Star Alliance gold benefit like the CX benefit available as well.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2

This range of points and benefits idea is currently being done by Amex in the US... It's called the Zinc card and you can choose the types of companies you can get bonus points at or other types of benefits (like discounts etc).

Each pack has an associated cost and your annual fee builds from a low base with each pack you add on... I too would like to see this happen here. I'd also like to see their bonus points mall where they have hundreds of merchants offering bonus points!

 

[serfty]

I always thought PP membership was one of the particularly useless features of the Plat and Cent cards. Just how often do they expect cardholders would be flying:

- not in J or F class; and

- if in economy with no status?

Amex buying things that I could easily buy for myself if I valued them (like PP membership) is a poor use of their bargaining power and simply means I end up paying via the membership fee for something that is of no use to me. Amex (and Citi) should be using their bargaining power to negotiate privileges that are not for sale to the general public.

PP is far more useful overseas than in Oz.

e.g. ex LAS on AA has no A/C available, but there is a United Lounge which provides PP based entry.