Rookie Wednesday: If you cancel a travel card, how fast do your perks end? Instantly?

Welcome to a weekly feature on the Eye of the Flyer blog. Each week this series covers in a “rookie” way either a Delta or travel related theme and attempts to break down to a basic level each topic. You can read up on all the previous posts HERE. Now on to this week’s feature.

Right now one of the most amazing points offers EVER is ongoing with the non-Delta AMEX Platinum business card. As I showed you the other day, it truly offers such better value than SkyMiles that anyone collecting Delta points just has not woken up to the facts of the current state of the game.

But sometimes you just have to cancel some kind of travel card. Both the personal and business flavors of the non-Delta AMEX Platinum cards include some amazing perks. You can get BOTH Hilton and SPG Gold status (and if you then match with Marriott Gold with them too) if you hold the card. But there is a keep feature to this – you have to HOLD the card too keep it.

Notice the screen shot at the top of this post. I recently canceled the personal AMEX Platinum card and I plan to keep the business one that I have held for many years. But even so I got notice the NEXT DAY that AMEX was notifying Hilton that I am no longer a card holder and thus no longer eligible for the “free” status upgrade.

Now in my case it did not really matter as I have Diamond from the status match promo they had going earlier in the year and honestly I do not think they would have dumped my status anyway until the end of the hotel status year. The same goes for SPG but I have been told by readers that in the past SPG has in fact downgraded them from “free” gold to nothing mid year.

Both the cards we are talking about above come with individual Priority Pass membership. The card is tied to your card and if you have any PP charges for extra guests it will hit this card. Maybe this is one of the reasons you will almost instantly lose your membership if you cancel the card that came with it. Do NOT expect to get a free ride for the rest of the year as this is almost instant cancellation. Either way, you would still be liable for charges back to your closed card (yes they will bill you and make you pay).

What else? Gogo passes will not go away. They are issued at the beginning of the year and once they hit your Gogo account they are there until the date they expire. Just do not expect to get any new ones next year.

What about any pending “Offers to You” that have yet to credit. I am told, and will be testing, that you can still call and get the credit for those that can take up to 8 weeks to post (most post in a few days). Clearly if you have closed the card you can no longer spend those credits so they can send you a check or transfer the credits to another AMEX card you hold.
Lastly we have the BOINGO plan. This one I just don’t honestly know. I stopped using it because it is such a huge drain on my battery and I get great 4G service just about everywhere I go. Maybe someone can comment if they had that plan go on after card cancellation.

As a side point, talking points, if either the personal or business AMEX Platinum card is the ONLY membership rewards card you hold you MUST get your points out before you close or they too are instantly gone. Don’t let this ever happen to you! – René