For those of you who are interested, I have a few more details regarding American Express’ new mystery loyalty program, aptly named American Express Tier One. The rumors regarding the Tier One program all started last year when Chase unveiled their new Sapphire Reserve card to compete with American Express’ Platinum Card. Overnight, the CSR became an instant success and ended up being one of the hottest premium cards on the market. People were signing up for the CSR card left and right and unfortunately, left American Express in the dust. American Express knew it had a problem and needed to act quickly to prevent further customers from jumping ship.
Shortly after the CSR was unveiled, Dr. of Credit posted a rumor about how American Express would be introducing a new product to compete with the CSR card. Monkey Miles then followed up DoC’s post by discovering American Express had filed for a trademark registration of the name “Tier One.” This lit the internet on fire with rumors and speculations on what Tier One could be. Most people assumed American Express Tier One would be a brand new, high-end credit card; whereas, others assumed it would be a refresh to the now-dated American Express Platinum card.
Then finally, some more details emerged and it turned out, American Express Tier One was nothing more than a loyalty rewards program and not another credit card offering. Similar to what American Express offers to their small business customers, the OPEN savings program, the new Tier One program is a loyalty rewards program designed to inspire more spending by their “bigger” spenders.
That was a year ago and today, I found out some more information about the Tier One program. A reader shared correspondence from American Express that reads:
Your business is close to qualifying for an extraordinary level of service — Tier One from American Express. It’s an elite status that delivers one-on-one attention, elevated experiences and exclusive gifts. You have until the end of 2017 to reach the spending threshold for this exclusive program. With Tier One you’ll receive:
- An expert team that offers personalized service.
- Solved card-related matters with help from someone who knows your business.
- Access to priority phone service for speedier resolutions, answers and information.
- A dedicated advocate
- Get answers to American Express financial service-related questions from an experienced professional
- Have account activity reviewed upon request
- Extras that come only with Tier One Membership
- Enjoy premium experiences available only to Tier One customers.
That’s it. That was the end of the letter. Talk about vague and uninspiring.
And in case you were wondering, companies have to spend a minimum of $5,000,000 a year to reach Tier One elite status. Yup, five million dollars a year. And that’s not a combined spend over all their American Express accounts. That’s just spending on one account. Once they reach this threshold, their Tier One elite status will only last till the end of the following year. They will have to re-qualify for Tier One status every year. Crazy, huh?
So what do you guys think? Is American Express Tier One all that it’s hyped up to be? Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Thanks for reading!
