Some links to products and partners on this website will earn an affiliate commission.
For a long time there was a page on the American Express website that offered 15,000-20,000 Membership Rewards Points as a bonus for upgrading American Express Gold to Platinum. That page disappeared a while ago, but it is still possible to request the offer.
I heard from a few readers who were disappointed when the page got taken down, that they had since managed to get Amex to agree to give them the Points for upgrading anyway. Initially I thought this was probably just a transitional thing and I hadn’t attempted it personally, so didn’t post about it.
Recently though, I’ve been considering upgrading to Platinum again, so thought I’d reach out to Amex through the online secure contact centre to ask if it was still possible to get some bonus MR points, and received the following response:
The key part being: “Although we aren’t offering an upgrade bonus as of today however; I have still convinced my manager in crediting your account with 20,000 Membership Reward Points once you upgrade to our Platinum Card. In order to avail this, kindly respond to this e-mail, when you have upgraded to our Platinum Card and I will immediately credit your account with 20,000 Membership Reward Points”.
Bonus Points for upgrading American Express Gold to Platinum are still being offered on a case-by-case basis, which is great news.
I don’t know how widely this is being offered or if there are any specific criteria you need to meet, but I know four people beside myself who have been offered the same offer and I haven’t (yet) heard of anyone being denied.
To a certain extent, this is one of those things that might well depend on who you are talking to and whether they are having a good day as much as anything else.
Please remember that this is a courtesy offer from American Express, so be nice when you message/call them and don’t be too disappointed if they say no to begin with – you can always ask again!
Bottom line
It never hurts to ask!
Is there a minimum spend to qualify for the 20,000 MR? It used to be £1000 when the link was working.
They said they would credit the Points straight away for me as soon as I upgrade (and I understand that’s the same offer others have received), but obviously they could potentially make a different offer involving a min spend (or no offer at all) if they wanted to.
That’s a great deal. You’ve got to love Amex, they really a class above other card companies. I’ll upgrade to plat once I’ve met the spend target on my current gold. I hope I get the same offer.
Yeah, really makes the difference for me in terms of deciding whether to upgrade or not, so smart move by Amex.
Totally agree that Amex are a cut above. While the (Philippines?) outsourcing of customer services has dragged it down a touch, they’re still generally first class.
I always get through to the superb UK call centre. I spoke to them again today and as usual they went out of their way to help. They have the freedom to do what it takes to keep customers happy. I remember calling a couple of years ago to try and transfer a few orphan MR points to Nectar. An IT issue was stopping the transfer and I was resigned to losing the points (only around 300). The Amex agent offered to credit my BA account with 300 Avios which is less than the normal minimum permitted transfer.
I wish this was the case in Australia, maybe i should write? I did recently ask for the upgrade to platinum with the 100,000 points, but, they said I’d need to wait 18 months and not have AMEX in that 18 months!
Certainly no harm in asking if they can offer something as a courtesy gesture. I doubt you’d get 100,000, but might well get something – particularly if the alternative is you cancelling the card and then not being an Amex customer for 18 months.
hi.I’m a South African Amex platinum member and Hilton honors gold .hh and amex south Africa have no link rewards programmes in South Africa.is there any way I can get linked to Amex USA or link my South africa Amex card to hh
Hi, unfortunately not that I know of – but there’s certainly no harm in asking them!
would u have a more direct email address I may send my request to .
Unfortunately not. If the the SA Amex site is anything like the UK one, when you sign into your account and click on Contact at the top of the page, you can navigate to the secure messaging centre, which is normally what I use.
Amex is run pretty independently across the various countries. Even though the website makes a big deal about offering Amex holders in one country a new Amex if they move to another… in Spain they didn’t care in the slightest about my UK Amex and turned me down repeatedly. I didn’t want to ask too hard for help back in the UK in case they took away my UK card as a non-resident!
So whatever Amex offers to South Africans or Australians can be completely different from what is offered to Brits or Americans. But what does seem relatively common is a proactive element to try and keep their customers happy and away from cancelling or churning…
A year ago they allowed you to upgrade from Gold to plat, bag 15k bonus Mr for 1k spend then not even apply the hefty annual fee for platinum. That loophole I believe has been closed now!
True, it will be interesting to see whether the plat fee is applied this time. I suspect it will be charged as it involves a human making the upgrade manually. Hopefully I’m wrong though. I believe the trick with the previous upgrade via the link was to apply during the first free year with Gold. That made the plat free as well.
I just upgraded and had free gold before so will be the guinea pig. Will report back below the line though – I don’t think a full post about it would be very smart! 🙂
It will be interesting to see how you get on. The plat fee is worth paying for some people anyway so a free year would be a bonus.
Any news on whether the Plat fee was charged on your upgrade from Gold?
Thanks!
Hi Andrew,
No fee charged yet – but it could still happen I think.
Thanks for that. How long has the card been plat? I would have thought the charge would have been on the first plat statement..
Applied to upgrade about a month ago I think. I still need to get in touch with them about applying the 20k bonus points actually!
I messaged Amex a couple of days ago politely asking if there were any bonus points on offer if I upgraded from Gold to Plat. Surprisingly, they said that they could not offer anything. I phoned the lovely CS people in Brighton but the answer was the same – no bonus points are awarded for an upgrade.
Sorry to hear that Andrew – hopefully we can get some more data points soon about what the current situation is (it’s possible that some accounts will might still get offered something).
I was speaking to a UK rep at Amex about upgrading to Platinum from Gold and the £450 would be due the next month not as some have experienced where they were given the 1st year free in line with the gold card
Yes, that’s how it’s always ‘supposed’ to work I think…:)
Did they offer you a bonus?
Lots on HFP reported over 10 months back the loophole had closed. I belive they charge the full annual fee at the end of your first month on Plat with no pro rata refunds given anymore.
I thought the that the end of pro rata refunds only applied to US issued Amex cards? It’s been a while since the HFP article but that’s how I remember it.
They definitely still offer a pro rata refund on the SPG card, so I imagine it’s the same for Gold/Plat
I’m sure HFP ran an article last year when amex uk changed the rules on pro rata refunds on platinum, long time ago now so maybe been changed back.
From the HFP review of the Platinum card, updated and correct as of 18/01/17 –
“What is the annual fee?
£450
The fee is refundable pro-rata if you choose to cancel. This is part of the terms and conditions of the card, and Amex is known for refunding fees without quibble.”
So the good news is it seems like the fee is still refunded pro rata.