Success receiving credit card Retention Offers when threatening to cancel?

Only retention success I have ever had is getting a better deal from Sirius XM and Comcast.

Credit cards are a different animal. Short of them reducing the annual fee (seems unlikely to me), what do you want from them? The best you can probably do is to trade down the Sapphire Reserve to the Sapphire Preferred at a much lower annual fee.

You can downgrade to the Chase Preferred like the rest of us mere mortals!
Does the Southwest card allow for free bags now that they charge for bags?

KD, Southwest will give one free bag if you're a SW credit cardholder.
I'm just so frustrated with all of the big corporations right now. Customer service is a victim of shareholder profits.
Ba- humbug!

Pat, Understood! Sadly, I don't think they'll care if you have to cancel. But, hopeful it works out for you!

Customer service, sadly, is the #1 casualty of the Digital age.

Well, we’re in the same boat. No way we’re paying $795 plus $195 for an additional card. Time to start looking for options. Not happy with Chase right now.

I have made similar calls to ask for mercy many times. I have had some successes, but more often have been told sorry, no. Don't take it personally, it's all part of the game we play.

It depends on many factors, mostly (but not all) unknowable, and ultimately it boils down to how valuable a customer you appear to be (or not be) to them. Do you spend a shipload on that card? If so, your chances of getting them to throw you a bone improve, but that by itself is no guarantee. Having had the card for many years (using it regularly and paying the annual fee) is helpful. If you have lots of other cards with the same issuing bank that can also help. Being lucky also helps. But they're in the business to make money, not to make you happy (though they would prefer you are happy as they make money).

IME the bank here, Chase, is one of the tougher nuts to crack for this specific goal - other banks have been an easier touch. Me and Uncle Chase have had a very, very long and productive (and mutually beneficial) relationship, which I value highly and intend to continue. That said, the Sapphire cards (both of them) are going through profound and consequential changes - I have the same card as you and yes, that new annual fee is a bitter pill for me to swallow (some of the other changes are quite negative, too; I have zero interest in most of the "enhancements" offered as an offset). For me I don't have to decide until this coming fall, and I expect to agonize over the decision.

If/when you call to ask for mercy, here are some suggestions that I have found useful in the past:

• Be very well prepared for the call. Know exactly what you're going to say (and not say). Know what you are (and are not) going to do - if they make no offer at all (likely in this case) or what it would take to get you to keep the card.
• With Chase, my experience has been that they simply don't make retention offers (other banks do, sometimes easily). Plenty of people are unhappy at the changes coming to your card and they have heard from many customers (so they are expecting to take heat and are prepared to deal with it).
• Yes, the language you're looking for is "a retention specialist" but I don't use that term with them, preferring to appear less savvy. The language I use when I initiate the call (once I reach a human) goes something like, "I'm having a hard time justifying the annual fee and am considering closing the card, but before I make a decision on that, I was hoping to speak with someone who could provide me an incentive to keep the card going forward..." They'll know what you're fishing for, and should transfer you to a "specialist."
• I prefer to make this call during "business hours" (say, 9 am to 5 pm Central time - Chase is based in Chicago). That's when you are more likely to reach someone with the power to sweeten the deal for you. Off-hours I figure you get someone who's lower in the pecking order.
• The retention specialist will try to sell you on the benefits of the card, so you should already be familiar with all the details (but you should politely listen to his spiel).
• If they make an offer, it may only be an initial offer. Next offers might be better. You can haggle if you want to, or just say you need to think about it.
• They could offer all kinds of things: credit towards the annual fee (they rarely "waive" the fee), maybe a bunch of points if you spend a lot, other minor goodies, etc. Or they could just say, so sorry, it's been nice to know ya.

Do your best to keep your cool and be polite, even charming if you can. It's a giant faceless corporation, but you will be dealing with humans...humans who might be in a position to help you (or might not), if you can motivate them to do so. Go in with realistic expectations, be prepared for anything, and roll with it. The cost of almost everything is going way up, this card is just one example.

Good luck.

Not directly retention-related, but:

• banks (and companies in general) care much less about customer retention these days than customer acquisition
• OP, amongst others, does not get excited about paying higher fees for a cafeteria list of questionable benefits
• the retention offer, should you get it, will be for a fraction of the annual fee and you will still be paying a lot for a questionable list of benefits.
• so your goal might shift to figuring out the best way(s) to be acquired, multiple times.

My opinion is that the bonus that comes with a new card is the thing that makes having the cards
worthwhile. If you spend $10,000 a year on the card, you get 10 or maybe 15-20,000 points/miles.
If you spend $10,000 on two new cards, you get 100,000 or maybe 125,000 points/miles.

Paying the high fees is worth it only if you get max use of the benefits the card offers. So the value
varies by card and by user.

So if you have the energy and time to manage it, closing cards and opening new ones to get the
bonuses can be a profitable strategy. But you do have to read the fine print and know what it is
you want. It used to be that you could get new cards willy-nilly and the banks didn't care, but now
they do, and you can only get so many in a period of time, so make them worthwhile.

This is an optimal strategy if you can acquire enough points/miles and use them efficiently (another
aspect of this game) to sit in the front of the plane on overseas flights.

I would, though, also try to keep one card that gives value. Sapphire Preferred is a good example.
Just so you have a go-to card for whenever you travel.

I failed to mention in my earlier post that I have the Sapphire Preferred card and I like it, and I never contemplated upgrading to the Reserve card before, and with the latest price hike, I have zero interest in it.

However, anticipating more travel in my future, I got the Amex Platinum card early in 2024, got a massive sign on points bonus (175k), and I thought I would find value in the card. My favorite feature of the card is I get 5X points for airfare purchased directly from the airlines, and when I do buy tickets, I buy business class. Other than that, though, I don't get enough value from the card to justify the fee.

Other "benefits" of the card are pretty useless to me, starting with their restaurant reservation app, Resy - it is absolutely useless to me, I get far more use from OpenTable and The Fork. Also, because I fly business class now, I get access to the airline lounges, and I have zero need for the lounge deal Amex offers (Priority Pass) and similarly I don't fly through airports with AMEX Centurion lounges, never even seen one. Finally, I am sick of cards where I have to sign up for individual 'deals' to get kickbacks, or pick quarterly categories (Chase Freedom) - it is too much trouble to me. I also don't want to go through the Chase or Amex travel platforms to make hotel reservations and airline ticket purchases, so I am foregoing additional "benefits".

Having said all of that, I am doubtful I will keep the Amex platinum much longer, I am not doing enough charging on the card outside of airfares to earn back my high annual fee...

We have the same conundrum. We have several questions that we will ask the representative: if we switch from Reserve to Preferred, will we lose any Chase points that we currently have with Reserve and what will the travel insurance look like with Preferred vs Reserve? I always ask open-ended questions before ending the call such as "What can you tell me about positives or negatives that I haven't asked you or that we haven't discussed in this conversation that might impact me?"

I've called Chase card services twice in the last month to 'downgrade' our 2 cards from United Explorer (yes, those new 'perks' at $150 per year don't work for us either), to United Gateway cards. I didn't mention cancelling or retention offers. Both customer service agents were delightful. Each took about 10 minutes including reading a long blah blah. The new Gateway cards were mailed within a week, with new CVC and expiry numbers. The cards immediately updated on Apple Pay, I've even had a few long-time merchants see the new information automatically. Totally worth a savings of $300 per year!

The best option is usually to cancel and then get the sign up bonus again later, 24 months for United and SW, 48 months for the Sapphire gang and American, Delta it's whenever they send the next customized offer with a private code (every 2-4 years).

Downgrading to a free card without any bennies except extra points for booking tickets with it isn't worth the bother.

The best option is usually to cancel and then get the sign up bonus
again later, 24 months for United and SW, 48 months for the Sapphire
gang

Nope, at least not in this case. Among the changes recently rolled out for the Sapphire clan: sign-up bonuses are now officially "once in a lifetime", so sadly no more slow churning for these. We don't yet know how long a Chase "lifetime" actually is (for Amex, 7 years is often alleged, but Chase might be different). So the old strategy to kill the card then get it again is no longer operative for this bunch. So far, that policy does not seem to have gravitated to other Chase cards, but for those who watch them closely, it seems that some of what has just been served up for the Sapphire cards may eventually roll out for others - we'll see. But at least for Sapphire cards, the old ways of killing then re-upping no longer apply. It's a different world.

Downgrading to a free card without any bennies except extra points for
booking tickets with it isn't worth the bother.

Perhaps for you. Others would strongly disagree, at least in some cases.

In any case, this thread is way in the weeds for this forum's target users - the subject requires lots of attention to detail and a very large number of variables which do not lend themselves to valid generalizations for all. A better place to learn about and discuss all the nitty gritty of the subject is over on Flyertalk (warts and all).

Chase Sapphire Reserve picked the worst possible time to raise their annual fee to $550 back in early 2020. I knew back then I wouldn't be traveling anytime soon so I downgraded my card to Sapphire Preferred a couple months after that.

To this day it's still the best move I've made :)

Really the bennies on the cards just aren’t worth the annual fee for me. I’m happy to take a free lounge pass the first no annual fee year but I am not going to pay the annual fee for a couple passes. A free bag is nice but across all airlines AFAIK gate checking is always free so I just do that. Double miles for air tickets purchased with that airline’s card— blecchh, just peanuts.

I have waited the 7 years twice for Amex so can confirm that is their “forever” timeline.

I know plenty of slaves to the Delta card and they try to hit the $20,000 annual spend for a companion pass. But is forgoing a sure thing 1.5% rebate ($300) worth a companion pass? Likely not.

The Chase everywhere primary auto insurance is a good thing, using it again in 2 weeks before canceling. For some reason my United renewal is $99 not the $150 I’ve read about. With 2 car rentals coming up, 1 in Ireland, that $99 may be worth paying, contradicting my first line.

Thank all, I have a lot of fine print to read and digest, than a decision, and take action!