One thing I’m surprised more card issuers don’t do is offer automated retention offers. Some card issuers do this by offering anniversary card benefits (e.g Southwest cards give you an annual points post & lots of hotel cards give restricted free night certificates) but those aren’t customizable based on how likely it is that a cardholder will cancel a card.
Customer acquisition costs for new cardholders are extremely high, so being able to retain customers long term is important for profitability. Card issuers will often give retention offers if you call in to cancel. We’ve seen American Express send out targeted spending bonuses to cardholders that will have their annual fee due during the promo period (meaning they can’t really participate unless they pay the annual fee) but this is the first time I’ve seen an offer specifically call out it being a card anniversary offer. Reader Brett W received this offer:
As you can see the length of the offer isn’t long and it’s a small bonus (maximum of 1,500 points) but it’s based around when his annual fee will be due. I’d be extremely surprised if we don’t see more of these offers in the future as card issuers build up data on when cardholders are likely to cancel and what offers will get them to keep the card.
Just got an offer of 5k points for 15k in spend on a personal platinum which is what I did annually on that card. I explained that was pathetically low and they could cancel my card. The rep went so far as to tell me that if I couldn’t see $550 of value I was using it wrong. Riiiight. Amex is going downhill fast.
If you’re only putting 15k a year on amex platinum you are probably not the type of client they would want to keep. You got the 100k signup bonus now move along..
Did they then offer you advise on how to get $550 in value? Lol
While it might me tempting to “trick” me into not cancelling, that is not a retention offer. I’d sign up and then ask for a real offer: no offer = cancel. You could say its targeting the average user but if I’m an average user looking to cancel, $15 of points isn’t going to move me and the email will just remind me I need to cancel now.
“the email will just remind me I need to cancel now.”
Exactly. I don’t think most people review their credit card statements and just continue to cough up the AF because they don’t notice it or think it’s fine.
The entire notion that nearly every card issuer is usually ready to cough up points that cover most or all of the AF is a foreign concept to nearly everyone outside the churning community.
But hey, it’s a good experiment to run. Customer service is expensive, retention offers are expensive and if automated offers cut those costs, well good for them, bad on me.