Credit Bust dept from AMEX called me today to tell that you have made a big purchase 2 days ago and we are suspending your account for next 8-9 days until we got clearance from your Bank of America account that the balance has been paid and not pending.
I asked her to give me a solution rather than suspending my account.
I have been their customer for 4+ years, in Australia and now in States, payed on time, no issues at all. Still such experience for a Platinum card holder.
American Express
There seems to be some key points missing from your story. I’ve made some relatively large purchases ($20k) on my Amex and had no such thing happen to me. Granted it wasn’t anything shady (luxury watch) from a well known jeweler.
So what was it that triggered this? Can’t be amount alone.
I asked their complaint department the exact question while lodging my complaint but he couldn’t figure out either. Only possible explanation I have come up so far is that I’m new in States (US AMEX opened in Dec end 2022), my credit is building here (so far 5 months in States and have 623 credit score). And the call was from AMEX credit bust dept so connecting the dots.
But even with that, you can ask me my employment contract proving my financial situation (again) or you can ask payment prior statement date (which btw I paid the full balance in full over the phone on the same call) still she said there’s nothing she can do except suspend the account until the payment gets cleared from Bank of America.
Again, no matter the issue, AMEX should have come up with a win-win solution to derisk their side but instead they chose to not give importance to the customer despite charging hefty annual fees.
How much was the purchase? What’s your normal balance?
$16k was the purchase price. Normally balance in US AMEX is ~$8k. But my card had no pre spending limit with a backend limit of $45K.
Even though the purchase price was an outlier, their reaction, at most, should have been “Sir is this purchase legit or fraudulent?” Rather than “we don’t trust you can afford it”.
She took money from my Bank of America account and when I asked her to close the account, she was you have membership reward points which you’ll lose. Had I been notified earlier during the call I would have used the points instead of paying full balance thru BofA.
My question: is this common in States? Has that happened to anyone else?