Upgrade Your Amex Card and Get 1,35,000 MR Points

[coolguy1]

Amex plans to start 2024 with a grand reward of 1,35,000 MR points when upgrading to a Platinum Charge card.

Users currently holding Amex Platinum Travel, Amex Platinum Reserve and Amex Gold Charge card are getting these offers.
You can see it in the app, refer to the screenshots attached below.

For the heavy spenders, this is a great deal since you get multiple loyal hotel loyal memberships and do anything concierge service.

If you don't spend a lot of money but feel the points can help, you can still upgrade for the points.


If you don't need the points, you can get the Amex Platinum Travel or the Amex MRCC card which remains the best card for monthly spends between 6K-40K.




T&C: https://www.americanexpress.com/con...ts/IA_New_Plat_RCP_Upgrade_Q1_2024_MT_TnC.pdf

 

[anirban.choudhury]

Hot damn, on a 1L spend thats 50k points or 25k airmiles, almost enough for a RT flight to a handful of my fav countries (including korea).
A 25% airmiles is probably the highest, even with any kind of accelerator program (Atlas spending 1L on Airline/Hotel would still give 10k airmiles so 10%).

Not particularly a fan of high brands, but wife loves to shop all the way from cheap stuff to all the way high end, so that seems a very good bi-yearly gift.
I personally only prefer buying from Tokyo due to them costing way way cheaper (yen declining, no tax and overall cheaper retail), gonna run some numbers how much spending Int (3x) ends up vs how much with this 20x multiplier

-----------
Also to a lot of people, for a lot of us, the name of the game is AirMiles and not MR points. That's why Axis Atlas is so lucrative to a lot of us who like to travel more than any other spends.

1L spends get you 25K airmiles (with above 20x), a business class ticket from Tokyo to Delhi from ANA or JL costs 40k miles (retails 2.5L+) and first costs 50k miles (cannot be purchased via cash as they don't fly first class flights directly)
Economy from JL right now was 12.5k (although high fees) and Ana was 27k.
RT to korea via KE is 30k airmiles while retails for 50k+ (economy)

Although economy isn't as much as a value redemption, its still good for short notice flights or peak seasons, but business/first is something a lot of us want to do but cannot, atleast on retail prices, yet possible via airmiles.

FYI if anyone has some MR points stacked and want to try airmiles, Qatar's QSuites business class is hailed as one of the best in the world, retails 65k+ INR one way yet is just 26k airmiles.

--Update--



Quite unrelated, but Just to touch on this, found a Balenciaga tote bag to compare to.

Darveys - 1.16L
(their page says 5% cashback after delivery but don't know about that)
Amex 20x - 24000 miles (58000)
Axis Atlas - 4640 miles

Tokyo - Rs. 87800 (including forex markup)
Amex 3x - 3292 miles (6585)
Atlas - 3512 miles

So difference would be 28k Rs. and 20700 miles, in which case buying while travelling makes more sense considering you can buy most of the airline miles at Rs. 1 (virginatlantic which I gave KE example of) so 28k would get you 27-28k miles if purchased outright and some extra for those 28k spent.

The price difference was 33% and this is one of the more conservation comparisons, most of the time I have seen difference go up almost 50% and even more.
Had purchased Ipad Mini 6 and Apple Watch 6 (gold) both around 27k each, when both of them in India were 50k~.
Purchased Nintendo Switch at 16k, India it was 32k.

But everytime flying to Tokyo for buying things would be bit of an hasle 😂

I personally use Darveys for buying some low end bags like those of Kate spade and all , get them at 10-20 k INR , or sunglasses and all at Round 8-20k or luxury gifting to friends and family, as the ticket sizes are less I don't think the difference while buying then offline would be significant buy the cumulative spends can get me easily 60-70k MR, and if transferred wisely to MB can get me a night at Masai Mara or Bora Bora which retails out around 2-3 lakhs a day

 

[Sudheep]

Closed plat charge feb last week as I was offered only 25k Taj as retention. Spouse MRCC had 1.35 offer upgrade offer and she took it. I took supplementary card card for the same. all good.

but two days before my MRCC account also received 1.35L offer - Not even a month post closure of plat Charge

Not decided whether to proceed .am told by customer care that its possible to hold both primary and supplementary for the same card variant.

 

[anirban.choudhury]

Closed plat charge feb last week as I was offered only 25k Taj as retention. Spouse MRCC had 1.35 offer upgrade offer and she took it. I took supplementary card card for the same. all good.

but two days before my MRCC account also received 1.35L offer - Not even a month post closure of plat Charge

Not decided whether to proceed .am told by customer care that its possible to hold both primary and supplementary for the same card variant.

Yes you can hold both

 

[Rdspam]

P

what is Darvey ?

Puchna padha matlab Platinum card is not meant for us. Even I didn’t know what it was 🤣

 

[shubhank008]

But everytime flying to Tokyo for buying things would be bit of an hasle 😂

I personally use Darveys for buying some low end bags like those of Kate spade and all , get them at 10-20 k INR , or sunglasses and all at Round 8-20k or luxury gifting to friends and family, as the ticket sizes are less I don't think the difference while buying then offline would be significant buy the cumulative spends can get me easily 60-70k MR, and if transferred wisely to MB can get me a night at Masai Mara or Bora Bora which retails out around 2-3 lakhs a day

Definitely true, but its more like IF you travel and plan around for it, I know most people wouldn't have that flexibility due to jobs or time constraints but for us, we find that way the best, making our big purchases while travelling or travel if we want to make a big purchase.

But yes, I see your point as I also checked some 10-20k items on Darveys and they seemed very good value, was thinking to get a surprise gift too

Out of curiosity, I see a lot of people preferring MB while I personally cannot find value in it, for example, although also personally interested, just one night in masai mara would drain 100-125k MR points.
But what next then ? If you are taking a trip to Nairobi, surely wouldn't be 1 night, normally how would you stay/plan for other days then ?
Asking out of genuine curiosity how others spend their MR points or manage stays at MB.

 

[Sudheep]

Definitely true, but its more like IF you travel and plan around for it, I know most people wouldn't have that flexibility due to jobs or time constraints but for us, we find that way the best, making our big purchases while travelling or travel if we want to make a big purchase.

But yes, I see your point as I also checked some 10-20k items on Darveys and they seemed very good value, was thinking to get a surprise gift too

Out of curiosity, I see a lot of people preferring MB while I personally cannot find value in it, for example, although also personally interested, just one night in masai mara would drain 100-125k MR points.
But what next then ? If you are taking a trip to Nairobi, surely wouldn't be 1 night, normally how would you stay/plan for other days then ?
Asking out of genuine curiosity how others spend their MR points or manage stays at MB.

on the MB part,

IMO every metro city in India will have atleast one marriott property, which offers 08-1.5 value for MB. I personally ensure redemption at atleast INR 1 value, works for me being titanium elite .

 

[anirban.choudhury]

Definitely true, but its more like IF you travel and plan around for it, I know most people wouldn't have that flexibility due to jobs or time constraints but for us, we find that way the best, making our big purchases while travelling or travel if we want to make a big purchase.

But yes, I see your point as I also checked some 10-20k items on Darveys and they seemed very good value, was thinking to get a surprise gift too

Out of curiosity, I see a lot of people preferring MB while I personally cannot find value in it, for example, although also personally interested, just one night in masai mara would drain 100-125k MR points.
But what next then ? If you are taking a trip to Nairobi, surely wouldn't be 1 night, normally how would you stay/plan for other days then ?
Asking out of genuine curiosity how others spend their MR points or manage stays at MB.

MB points are very usefull and majority of my Amex conversions are into MB or Asia miles.
Obviously for luxury properties you need to manage the points atleast for 2-3 nights, where you can just relax.
For the one at Mara ,I made a booking for 5 nights at 4.24L MB and used Marriots 5th night free on redemption.

With Marriot you can also get around 0.8-1.2 Rs value on lower end properties like say did a booking at Element Ubud which came at 11k MB + 12 usd per night and revenue rate was around 12k so around 1 rs value I got

 

[ALOAK]

Good some have differnet perspective on usuage. Mine is mostly travel and stays for 2nor 3 days in bharath at marriot or taj oberoi property just to see what services arenlike and an experience. Otherwise i usually use budget hotels like holiday inn marriot for my office visits of course now that they made it mandatory weekly thrice took a rented haus for 9k 1bhk at banglore which works out well and in a quarter i can stay once or twice in taj or oberoi for 1 or 2 days to relax and enjoy as they have somw good properties some times i visit jaipur to experience palace hotels of taj . Oberoi yet to. I have plans to take my mom to lake palace for 2 days for her solely to enjoy. Now thay amex is asking income doc even for gc i would pass it off and enjoy with plat travel and gc year end when renewal comes will close mrcc.

 

[ALOAK]

Is plat charge even worth??? 72k annual fee is wayyyy too much...

It all depends on what benefits you can derive from it. Traveller like it because it has lot of hidden benefits. Purchase protection insured well forninternational travel disputes are faster and safer on amex. Medical coverage which isnissued by icici lombard 20x accelarated rewards which depends what one wants. Loss of checked in baggage internation 50000 loss ofnpassport 50000 loss of baggage accompanied domestic 50k delayed checkin baggage internationalb50k overseas medical for first 7 days 50k usd air accident tocketed on plat charge 5cr insured all of these.apart hotel memberships and airline loyalty.

 

[ALOAK]

However it depends on individual life style or what they look into it some have their choices. If they cant they will close the card simple

 

[Tay]

Today i receives call from amex rep majid who said need incomw doc to process application to plat chg from gold chg. I said their tnc says straight upgrade without income docs but he said it is standard rule, then i had to mention my colleague has plat chg and is income is near 10lkhs how did u give to him honestly i said my income is almost same and i have other income meet the criteria but cant give docs for it. I said follow one rule it is not some have to meet criteria when they can pay fees and others without critwria they get how come then is your rule as standard for everyone. I said i can vouch that many have plat chg without meeting their first critwria 25lkhs and how did u process theirs and my cousin too has it but does not meet their income criteria. Then he said i will make a note and i said no point in trying for this plat chg if u keep insisting for 25lkhs

Do let us know if Amex allows a direct upgrade from Gold Charge to Plat Charge without any additional application process

 

[bvc19296]

Do let us know if Amex allows a direct upgrade from Gold Charge to Plat Charge without any additional application process

Yes if you get an upgrade offer on Gold charge card.

 

[Tay]

Yes if you get an upgrade offer on Gold charge card.

Is it a direct upgrade without any additional application process ?

 

[ALOAK]

Do let us know if Amex allows a direct upgrade from Gold Charge to Plat Charge without any additional application process

Bad luck amex guy asked income doc

 

[Random123]

Regarding income docs, unfortunately looks like it is to their discretion. The tnc shows below text in 6th point

Upgrade to American Express® Platinum Card would be processed after the Cardmember provides all the necessary information required to process this request including providing the necessary KYC documents, if required. American Express® may also request for the additional KYC/Income documents, including when available with American Express®. American Express® reserves the right to decline any such requests for an upgrade in case a Cardmember does not provide the KYC/Income/other documents as asked for and, in the manner, as acceptable to American Express®. Additionally, processing of all such upgrades would be subject to internal criteria as decided by American Express®

 

[Tay]

Regarding income docs, unfortunately looks like it is to their discretion. The tnc shows below text in 6th point

Upgrade to American Express® Platinum Card would be processed after the Cardmember provides all the necessary information required to process this request including providing the necessary KYC documents, if required. American Express® may also request for the additional KYC/Income documents, including when available with American Express®. American Express® reserves the right to decline any such requests for an upgrade in case a Cardmember does not provide the KYC/Income/other documents as asked for and, in the manner, as acceptable to American Express®. Additionally, processing of all such upgrades would be subject to internal criteria as decided by American Express®

Thanks for sharing this

So it means that even an upgrade from Gold Charge card is subject to acceptability of Amex and not a straight forward upgrade always

 

[Venky]

So I guess the upgrade was successful as my MRCC was replaced by this Plat Travel. The last 5 digits are still the same but still no bump in the limit. 🤣🥲

 

[anirban.choudhury]

If this is your card actually, I suggest you hide card number and other personal details

Card number is dummy
Amex app doesn't show actually card number

 

[ALOAK]

Card number is dummy
Amex app doesn't show actually card number

Its says member since 95 looks dummycard.

 

[Rdspam]

Does the 135k points upgrade to plat make sense for someone who doesn’t spend much and especially doesn’t spend on luxury brands? Sorry if the question is dumb but wanted to know since amex has so many point conversion options