Platinum Charge - No More Relationship Managers

[perthtraveller]

Hi all

Has any other AMEX Plat Charge cardholders who have relationship managers recently received a letter notifying that Charge cardholders will lose their RM from August? Or is it just me? Yet another enhancement.

If so, has anyone managed to receive anything for this lost benefit?

Will AMEX have any good news in the future?

Cheers

 

[ftm]

Not directly related, but today I asked for our Small Business Plat Amex RM to be changed from the current (hopeless) "industry specialist" to someone in the personal team, and said that wasn't possible. Might not be possible because they aren't able to look after business cards, but maybe not possible because they are not around any more!

 

[Ricardo]

Never had an RM in 5 years of holding Plat, possibly I don't spend enough ??

 

[straitman]

Never had an RM in 5 years of holding Plat, possibly I don't spend enough ??

Me neither.

 

[wafliron]

Has any other AMEX Plat Charge cardholders who have relationship managers recently received a letter notifying that Charge cardholders will lose their RM from August? Or is it just me? Yet another enhancement.

If so, has anyone managed to receive anything for this lost benefit?

No letter, but a call yesterday from my RM saying I won't have her anymore from 31 July. She said on the same call that it's now a blanket policy that only Cent cardholders get a RM.

I'm not personally phased as I was never "meant" to have a RM in the first place - and somehow held on to her after cancelling my Plat Charge! - but I'd be pissed otherwise.

Seems rather daft of Amex given the spend thresholds normally (previously) required to get a RM. I know in my case that after all the changes and devaluations the RM was the one thing that gave me serious pause when I was deciding whether to cancel the Plat - I'd imagine plenty of other, much more valuable, Plat cardholders may think the same.

 

[Happy Trails]

What on Earth does a relationship manager do anyway?
It's just a credit card; you buy stuff and then pay your bill each month.

 

[Mal]

What on Earth does a relationship manager do anyway?
It's just a credit card; you buy stuff and then pay your bill each month.

Simply, if implemented correctly they should be able to pro actively assist with your account and deal with issues you have.

 

[oz_mark]

Simply, if implemented correctly they should be able to pro actively assist with your account and deal with issues you have.

Hmm, If I had so many issues with an account that I needed a Relationship Manager, I'd be getting rid of the account.....

 

[Homer]

What on Earth does a relationship manager do anyway?
It's just a credit card; you buy stuff and then pay your bill each month.

It's a good question. In my experience with a Centurion RM, they don't do very much! Mine seems to have come through the ranks of the travel team, so she's pretty good (but not great) with travel-related stuff. But for anything else like concierge ("lifestyle") services, she really doesn't have a clue. She's also very, very slow at getting back to me. I'm talking >24 hours most of the time.

 

[ftm]

Hmm, If I had so many issues with an account that I needed a Relationship Manager, I'd be getting rid of the account.....

You make an interesting point. Most of the problems with my account were caused by the RM promising something and then either failing to deliver or delivering it wrong.

I think Amex may actually be better off without the RMs as it implied a level if service that they couldn't end up providing.

 

[VA777]

Never had a RM been a plat member for >7 yrs I think.

 

[Ricardo]

You make an interesting point. Most of the problems with my account were caused by the RM promising something and then either failing to deliver or delivering it wrong.

I think Amex may actually be better off without the RMs as it implied a level if service that they couldn't end up providing.

Agree.....

The should go back to the 'dont leave home without it' rather than the current marketing of 'realise the potential'.....

 

[Happy Trails]

Well, to answer my own question I had a look at the American Express careers site:

American Express Global Careers

Going by the job descriptions a cynic might be forgiven for thinking that managing relationships is mostly about increasing sales.

 

[wafliron]

What on Earth does a relationship manager do anyway?

Fixes problems, answers questions, arranges stuff. Whatever you ask for, within reason. I'm not entirely sure if there's anything you can achieve via a RM that you can't achieve via the Platinum call centre, but at the very least having one specific person you can call or e-mail (more importantly for me, e-mail) is a huge time saver.

Simply, if implemented correctly they should be able to pro actively assist with your account and deal with issues you have.

This.

It's just a credit card; you buy stuff and then pay your bill each month.

Not if you have a RM ;-)

Seriously though, apart from the time saving factor (as per above), my RM was very useful / helpful. A couple of specific things come to mind other than small day-to-day account-related items and answering questions:

- got me 160,000 MR points (80,000 extra) sign-on bonus for the Plat charge card after I was erroneously promised (by two separate Amex pre-sales CSRs) that I'd also get the sign-on bonus for the complimentary Plat Reserve CC- part of the extra points were the "promised" Plat Reserve sign-on bonus, part were compensatory points for being jerked around (which I didn't as for - was just proactively given).

- urgently fixed a problem with a Amex -> Virgin Atlantic points transfer that went haywire just before the Hilton devaluation, meaning my Amex -> Virgin -> Hilton transfer came through in the nick of time. I have no doubt I wouldn't have gotten this resolved in time without my RM, which would have cost me a couple of hundred thousand HH points (and by extension, Amex points)

- without question, gave me 20,000 MR points for referring a friend for a Plat Charge card, despite said friend not using the proper referral link.

- refunded the full $900 annual fee on my Plat Charge card when I cancelled, despite me being a few months past the renewal date.

There's more examples, but that's probably enough. This is over just 12 months, too. As I said above, possibly I could have achieved most of this without a RM - but even so, it would sure a hell have been a lot more hassle.

 

[Happy Trails]

OK, fair enough, consider me enlightened.

 

[wafliron]

OK, fair enough, consider me enlightened.

I'll miss her. As a contrast there are plenty of stories of coughpy RMs around too - probably a case of can be good or bad depending upon who you get.

 

[Pukka]

It's a good question. In my experience with a Centurion RM, they don't do very much! Mine seems to have come through the ranks of the travel team, so she's pretty good (but not great) with travel-related stuff. But for anything else like concierge ("lifestyle") services, she really doesn't have a clue. She's also very, very slow at getting back to me. I'm talking >24 hours most of the time.

I don't even call my RM now I only really use them for travel bookings and I've found someone who is good that I like in the travel dept so I just email him directly with any requests and he gets back to me within 24 hours with a response. He's up to date with their "special deals" which is all that matters.