GTFO, American Express

About a year ago, we got an AmEx card only because we got a Costco membership. At least one of these is getting out of our life this week. In a hasty moment of anger, I Tweeted we’d be quitting Costco too, over this AmEx fubar. And we might. It’s their fault we even had the card(s).

  • In October, AmEx “gave” us a “blue” card to go with the Costco one. Except we never got the card. Or a statement. Or a letter or anything. (And since we have a PO Box, we know it didn’t get stolen from our mail box or any other excuse.)
  • Also in October, AmEx moved money owed (or allowed a charge) to the blue card that we do not have possession of.
  • In January, we got a letter saying our AmEx was overdue. huh? How? We pay it every month.
  • When E called to get it resolved, he paid the bill. He also asked why they moved us to blue; they couldn’t identify a reason.
  • A week later, we got a letter saying our blue card–again, one we don’t have physical possession of–was being cancelled. Yay, cancel the thing we aren’t using.
  • I call to make sure they haven’t dinged our credit. She says they did because the bill was 90 days past due. Cue fire shooting from my eyeballs.
  • I hear from Seth via Twitter; he says AmEx and Costco are parting ways. Oh! So this is the reason it’s all messed up! AmEx is trying to “encourage” us to stay with them eventhough the only reason we had them at all was for Costco. And, so that we wouldn’t bail immediately, they hid it?
  • I finally get to talk to someone from AmEx who can do something. He’s nice, but creepy (over Americanized foreign dude I could barely understand). He updates the credit report, gives me his name/number, and is sending us an additional set of statement so we can see what the hell happened.
  • To be clear that it’s all fine, I also call Costco. Of course, I get re-routed back to AmEx. I guess they are going to break up but haven’t yet.
  • Costco guy tells me that the AmEx partnership runs out April 1, 2016. Until then, you can use AmEx (or cash/debit/check) at Costco for shopping. After that, they may or may not have a Costco card that can be used. I explain to him that we might quit Costco over this. Their only saving grace is that if AmEx did this to us, we can only imagine what they did to Costco and maybe they are victims, too.

Ain’t nobody got time for dis.

GTFO, AmEx. Don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out.

Update: We got the statements. Every charge is legitimate and paid for. There are no fees (E took care of that when he called them). I’ve since checked my credit and there is no report on it from Costco or Amex. We just need to check E’s credit for the same.

2 thoughts on “GTFO, American Express

  1. So when we joined Costco, the rep at customer service was trying to get us the AmEx card, and I said no thank you. He was all, “We can just sign you up, you don’t have to even activate it.” So I told him that in order to apply, they would have to run my credit, which wasn’t a problem, but I didn’t want my credit run for a card I wasn’t going to use. So I’m guessing that’s what they are telling their reps? What a pain!

    • Yeah, it’s a contract and mutual agreement. I get them trying to “sell” us on the card, but we didn’t have a problem with getting the card. In fact, it was kinda handy at times. AmEx screwed the pooch…and it’s their loss. We would have put a lot on it and paid it in full each month, too. Fuck ’em.

Leave a Reply to Leigh Ann Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *