Amex Platinum and Morgan Stanley Platinum: Overview of Card Details and Ts & Cs.

adaadat

Hi, everyone, I’m new these boards, so, please, treat me like an idiot.

My current, long-term (10 years) credit card (paid, in full, every month) is the bog-standard Barclaycard.

As I’m new to the ‘‘cash-back’ credit-card’ game, I thought I’d try to help others in the same position as me and detail what I’ve gleaned, thus far, from these boards and searching on moneysupermarket.com, thisismoney.co.uk and fool.co.uk:


American Express Platinum Credit Card/Amex Platinum [APR: 14.9%]

3% cash-back for first 3 months (one-off introductory rate, i.e. not available in the 2nd, 3rd year, etc.).
Rest of the year: 0.5% for the rest of the balance, if any, up to £3,500;
1.0% for the balance, if any, between (and inclusive of) £3,501 and £10,000; and
1.5% for the balance, if any, above (and inclusive of) £10,001
e.g.: spend, in first 3 months, £3,000 and you’ll be awarded 3% on that (because of the introductory offer), with 0.5% on the remaining £500, if you spend it, and 1.0% and 1.5% on any debt between the other values. The normal rates, of 0.5%, 1.0% and 1.5%, will apply for the rest of the year and the following year, etc.; 3% is an inducement.
Spend £5,000 in the first 3 months and you’ll be awarded 3% as cash-back, followed by 1% on any spending between £5,001 and £10,000, etc.
The cash-back used to be automatically sent to you, as a cheque, but you may now have to request it.
You must earn a minimum of £5 cash-back in order to receive any cash-back.
The cash-back (referred to, in their literature, as a ‘rebate’) is paid annually, i.e. on the 12-month anniversary of you opening the account. If you close the account before this date, you will not receive any rebate.
The account can be managed on-line.

Question 1: If I pay the balance/debt every month or transfer the debt, each month, to another card (one that gives 0% on balance transfers), will I still get the cash-back?
Q2: Is there an annual fee for this card?

Morgan Stanley Platinum Mastercard [APR: 15.9%]

If you open the account before 1.8.’07, the rates, below, are tripled.
Cash-back: 1% for purchases which take your card balance up to and including £2,000; and
0.5% applied to the balance above £2,000.
Cash-back Bonus is stated, explicitly, on each month’s statement.
Cash-back is payable, only, in multiples of £15 (A £29 cash-back award will only result in a £15 payment, with the remaining £14 being carried over as next year’s cash-back award. You’ll, basically, have to wait another year to get it!).
Cash-back is paid (only when you request it) by cheque or in to a bank account, named by you.
So-called ‘cash-substitute’ purchases, such as travellers’ cheques and postal orders and any payments as part of a betting or gaming activity are not entitled to cash-back.
Strangely, if you pay the monthly debt, in full, by “Direct Debit”, it has to be within 15 days of the statement date, rather than the usual 28 days.
Morgan Stanley has added a £20 annual fee to its “Classic” card and, according to postings in the past few days, to this card also.
Ensure the bank account, the details of which you give, by way of reference, when applying, is one you have had for over two years.
[Some of this info. can be found in the “Morgan Stanley Card Conditions” document.
See “Key Financial Information, C.”, “10.3” and “Cashback Bonus Award Programme Rules”, sections “6.f.” and “8.”]

Q3: How long does this tripled rate last? One month? One year?

General points about these two cards:
The Amex card gives you 3% cash-back for all of your spending, up to your credit limit, in the first 3 months, whereas Morgan Stanley will award the cash-back for only the first £2,000.
The Morgan Stanley card seems easier to get, although card companies appear to be schizophrenic in terms of who they’ll allow as card members.
From what I’ve read on these boards, Morgan Stanley seems to have very good customer services.


General questions about ‘balance-transfer’ cards:

Q4: Is there a limit as to how many transfers, in any year, or, even, any month, can be made?
Q5: Once a payment has appeared on my statement (checked on-line), can I transfer it immediately to my ‘transfer’ card?
Q6: What other cards would you recommend if I’m refused either of these two? Someone has mentioned a Yorkshire Building Society cash-back card.

Check moneysupermarket.com for a tabular list of each card’s basic terms and conditions.

CopperPlate_2

adaadat wrote: »

Hi, everyone, I’m new these boards, so, please, treat me like an idiot.

My current, long-term (10 years) credit card (paid, in full, every month) is the bog-standard Barclaycard.

As I’m new to the ‘‘cash-back’ credit-card’ game, I thought I’d try to help others in the same position as me and detail what I’ve gleaned, thus far, from these boards and searching on moneysupermarket.com, thisismoney.co.uk and fool.co.uk:


American Express Platinum Credit Card/Amex Platinum [APR: 14.9%]

3% cash-back for first 3 months (one-off introductory rate, i.e. not available in the 2nd, 3rd year, etc.).

Question 1: If I pay the balance/debt every month or transfer the debt, each month, to another card (one that gives 0% on balance transfers), will I still get the cash-back?

Q2: Is there an annual fee for this card?

Morgan Stanley Platinum Mastercard [APR: 15.9%]

If you open the account before 1.8.’07, the rates, below, are tripled.

Q3: How long does this tripled rate last? One month? One year?

General points about these two cards:
The Amex card gives you 3% cash-back for all of your spending, up to your credit limit, in the first 3 months, whereas Morgan Stanley will award the cash-back for only the first £2,000.
The Morgan Stanley card seems easier to get, although card companies appear to be schizophrenic in terms of who they’ll allow as card members.
From what I’ve read on these boards, Morgan Stanley seems to have very good customer services.


General questions about ‘balance-transfer’ cards:

Q4: Is there a limit as to how many transfers, in any year, or, even, any month, can be made?
Q5: Once a payment has appeared on my statement (checked on-line), can I transfer it immediately to my ‘transfer’ card?
Q6: What other cards would you recommend if I’m refused either of these two? Someone has mentioned a Yorkshire Building Society cash-back card.

Check moneysupermarket.com for a tabular list of each card’s basic terms and conditions.

Q1 - Yes, as long as you've spent the money on the Amex card in the first place it doesn't matter that you then balance transfer the debt away to another card, other than you might incur a % fee charge on the receiving card for doing this.

Q2 - No (not at the moment anyway).

Q3 - You've answered your own question. Any account opened up until 1 August 07 will receive triple the normal cashback rates for the card up until 1 August. So open it in July and you've got until 1 August to benefit from the triple rate. Read the small print it's only triple their normal rates i.e. 3% on first £2000 and then 1.5% thereafter until 1 August then reverts to 0.5% for remainder of year.

Q4 - Probably not, but then you might incur % transfer fees on receiving cards.

Q5 - Yes.

Q6 - The majority of other cards only pay 0.5% and the difference between YBS paying 1% on first £2000 and then 0.5% thereafter works out at a tenner. Not worth getting hot up about really. Check uswitch.com or moneysupermarket.com for lists of all cashback cards, etc.

HTH

Cobertizo

CopperPlate wrote: »

Q6 - The majority of other cards only pay 0.5% and the difference between YBS paying 1% on first £2000 and then 0.5% thereafter works out at a tenner. Not worth getting hot up about really. Check uswitch.com or moneysupermarket.com for lists of all cashback cards, etc.

And there is always the Egg Money option (which is different to Egg Card - beware!) which pays 1% up to £20,000. There's no guarantee on how long this will last though (well, they've guaranteed it up to Jan 2007, but that's of somewhat limited relevance now...).

adaadat

Thanks for your help, CopperPlate and Cobertizo.

Now, to see if I meet the banks' requirements.