Amex Gold Retention Offer

One of the tools in our miles and points tool belts is the almighty retention offer. These are offers that banks will offer cardmembers as an incentive to keep their credit cards open. Most people wait until their annual fee posts to reach out to see if they have a retention offer on their account, but you don't have to. That is especially true with Citi, who has offers on accounts sometimes multiple times a year. These offers are so popular that we even have a complete database full of them for all banks. I was curious to see if I would be offered an Amex Gold retention offer at all this time around. After a lengthy back and for chat with an Amex rep, I was finally pleasantly surprised with a just good enough retention offer.

Offer Details

Here are the details of my Amex Gold retention offer:

• Earn 20,000 Membership Rewards® points after I spend $2,000 or more in eligible purchases on my Card within 3 months.
• The $350 annual fee would not be waived

By accepting the retention offer I also need to keep the card open for 12 months from the acceptance of the offer. Not from when the annual fee posts next, but from when I accepted the offer. That can throw some people off, so be cautious there. The best way to keep track is to add a reminder to your calendar one year from acceptance that you can now close / downgrade the American Express card that you accepted the retention offer for. Downgrade is the better option if you are outside the 30 day annual fee refund window. Amex is the only bank that has this rule, although it is probably a good practice overall.

Card Earning Structure

There are more things to consider then just the bonus points when accepting a retention offer though. One of them is what other perks and earning structure does the card offer? Does that give you some value back for the annual fee as well? Or, is this all about getting enough from the bonus to offset the fee? For me, 20,000 Membership Rewards are not worth buying at $350 (the annual fee), so I needed something more out of the deal. The earning structure of the Amex Gold card is a feather in its cap for sure:

• 4x per dollar in the following categories
  • 4x at Restaurants worldwide on up to $50,000 in spend per year
    • Then 1x for the rest of the year after that.
  • 4x at U.S. supermarkets on up to $25,000 per calendar year in purchases
    • Then 1x for the rest of the year after that.
• 2x points per dollar spent on prepaid hotels and other eligible purchases booked on AmexTravel.com.
• 3x on travel booked directly with airlines and via the American Express® travel portal.
• 1x on all other eligible purchases.

Those are some great earning opportunities that have some high spend in our household. This would have probably been enough to keep the card open when coupled with the Amex Gold retention offer. It gets even better when you add in what the card offers in terms of perks too.

Amex Gold Card Perks

I can offset the annual fee even more by taking advantage of the card's coupons … err perks. Here are some of the notable ones for the Amex Gold card:

• Up to $120 annually of Uber cash distributed as $10 monthly.
  • UberEats works
• Up to $84 Dunkin' Credit distributed as $7 monthly (U.S. locations only)
• Up to $100 Resy credit each calendar year distributed as $50 in credits semi-annually
• Up to $120 annually of food credit distributed as $10 statement credits monthly (enrollment required) when you pay with the American Express® Gold Card at
  • Grubhub
  • The Cheesecake Factory
  • Goldbelly
  • Wine.com
  • Five Guys

I wouldn't use most of this each month if I didn't need to extract value, but I bet it says me around 50% of the face value on the perks. That is a little over $150 in year towards offsetting the annual fee. Would I buy 20,000 Membership Rewards points for $200 of remaining annual fee? Yes, yes I would. Throw in the great earning structure for another year and I am coming out ahead. I can do even better with some deal stacking though.

Authorized User Bonus Adds Extra Value

The thing that really made this offer a slam dunk was my ace in the hole. I had received an authorized user bonus worth 10,000 Membership Rewards points after $2,000 in spend. That means I could complete the spend required for the retention offer on the authorized user card and double dip the bonuses. Doing both at once would equate to earning 30,000 Membership Rewards on just $2,000 in spend. This made the decision super easy for me to proceed with accepting the Amex Gold retention offer.

Amex Gold Retention Offer: ToP Thoughts

When deciding on whether or not to accept a retention offer you need to look at all angles. The retention offer usually carries the heaviest load, but you also want to be mindful of the card's earning structure, perks and any other offers you can combine with the retention offer. That will give you a clearer path to deciding on whether or not to say I do. Remember that you are married to that card for another year after you say yes after all. The good news is that Amex won't take half of your points if you decide to break up down the road though. Well, if you remain a steadfast cardholder for 12 months that is. Let me know what you think of this Amex Gold retention offer, and if you would have said “I do”, over in the ToP Facebook Group.