As soon as the acquisition of SPG by Marriott was announced, everybody has wanted to know what will happen to the credit cards that Chase & American Express issue. The latest rumor was that there would be a three tiered line up, but that still didn’t give any information regarding the card issuer. Marriott International has now signed a new co-brand credit card agreement with both Chase & American Express.
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Things To Know
Here’s what you need to know:
- This is a multi year extension for both card issuers. This means that both issuers will continue to issue cards when the programs finally merge in 2019.
- Marriott expects to introduce new, co-brand products starting in 2018 with enhanced member benefits – super-premium consumer and small business co-branded products from American Express and mass consumer and premium consumer co-branded products from JPMorgan Chase. A lot to unpack here
- American Express will launch a super premium card. Seems a personal of this will be launched and possibly a new small business card?
- Chase will offer a mass consumer and premium consumer card. They already offer this with the Marriott Premier & Ritz-Carlton card, so unsure if there will be any shake up.
- Additional details will be shared in 2018.
- In the meantime both companies will retain their existing portfolio of accounts and will continue to offer their current products.
Our Vedict
From my point of view, this is probably as the best possible outcome. The more cards being issued the better and it looks like American Express will be launching a new card or two, making it possible to get the sign up bonus due to the dreaded once per lifetime rule. I honestly thought that after American Express announced becoming the sole issuer of Hilton, that they would lose their SPG portfolio to Chase. I’m not super excited for the ‘super-premium’ product offered by American Express, but that might just be because premium has lost all meaning.
