So here I am right now sitting in the Oberoi lounge at DEL, waiting with my wife for my CO flight back to Newark (15 hours!).

My wife and I just came back from Ananda (in Rishikesh) this afternoon, and needed a place to crash in Delhi for a few hours prior to boarding the 11:55 PM flight.

The Imperial and the Oberoi were booked solid, but I figured that Centurion could do something for us (after all, what am I paying $2500 per year for).

So I call the collect number, get transferred to the travel department, who not once, but twice simply does what I did before--calls both of the hotels I already tried on my own, and tells me that they cannot help.

Thankfully, I find an internet hotspot in Delhi (they are everywhere there, by the way), and find out that the ITC Mauryan Sheraton has a room. I call back Centurion travel to book it for me.

Centurion, if you are listening: my annual fee is due this month. What are you good for?

Lately it seems that they are not willing to go out of their way to do much of anything. 2 recent examples:

1) Upon boarding a recent ATL-MAD flight, I called AMEX from the plane to have them arrange a car service to pick me up in approx. 9 hours upon my arrival into MAD. The woman who answered sounded flustered, saying it was the middle of the night in the UK (I have a UK issued card) and she didn't have anyone who spoke Spanish to call the car service AMEX uses in Madrid. I gave her 2 different transporation alternatives that I myself have used in Madrid and she Google'd them and apparently found them. Long story short, prior to taking off, she assured me she would have SOME car service at MAD pick me up the next morning. I re-iterated I really needed to get to the center of town immediately upon arrival, she said it would be fine.
I arrive and there is no car service. I call back and get the �she tried, but couldn't find someone who spoke Spanish� and that one of the managers would call me in 48 hours. No one did.

2) Lifestyles has not been able to get me into a total of 6 different �hot� night clubs/restaurants in Madrid. They always keep me on hold for a long time knowing I am calling internationally, only to then tell me no. They then suggest places, but tell me that they will not be able to get me into them.

In all fairness, most of these occurences have been �after-hours�, however IMO consistency is something that is very important in a high-end product.

I would gladly pay 1500 each additional card costs.

i agree with your sentiments. the centurion service is very spotty from both a travel agent and from a concierge perspective. sometimes good, sometimes not good.

the key, i think, that bothers many of the centurion members is that we charge a lot of $ on the card for purchases for which amex makes about 3% for processing fees from the seller. we generally charge a whole lot of travel and use them as the travel agent for which they make 5% to 10% travel agent commission in addition to 3% for processing fees from the seller. then we pay $2500 a year for the card.

bottom line if we just paid $2500 for the card, i would gather that would buy some service and some perks but not necessarily a whole lot. however we place a LOT of business that could easily go elsewhere via using non amex travel agents and also could send the processing fees business to visa or mastercard. using visa and mastercard would make the merchant happier as visa and mastercard only charge about 2% processing fees. when you add up what the processing fees, the travel agent commissions and the annual fee charges generated by the centurion customer you get a perspective that the centurion customer does provide a lot of revenue AND status to amex.

as a whole i think centurion has some good ideas and some all to frequent very poor execution. their perks can be quite useful and even well worth the $2500 for those who travel a lot AND live (in the u. s.) near a major hub for continental or delta airlines (i do not live near a useful airline hub from centurion and receive no benefit from the airlines for the most part). if amex signed on with united airlines or american airlines that would be a great improvement.

once again, i am hoping the higher fees are used to improve the very mediocre service from travel agents and the mediocre concierge service i am currently experiencing. i have used amex cards for 30 years, i would like to believe in their implied image of being able to deliver the best things in life (albeit for a price) and to me that includes consistent service quality.

for example: when a centurion travel agent says: i will call you back in two hours or less, i expect the call, not me having to chase the agent down 4 or 6 hours later and being told sorry did not get the promised reservation done. when i am quoted a price i expect them to know what they are looking at and the price is accurate, not charged 2 or 3 times more with little or no apology. i expect a travel agent i am paying for via a $2500 annual fee to sort of look out for a better fare or hotel rate, not give me a high priced option when a lower priced option is readily available.

many non centurion card holders expect magic and or great service when you have the card, and if i am not mistaken amex image is trying to promote that concept. my experience has been all over the map, great service and follow through one day and above and beyond one day, the next day, it is like who are you and why are you bothering me. i never know what to expect. having been fortunate to have $$ to spend on lifes experiences does not give one the right to expect too much, however when i was much poorer the service was pretty similiar. i have been lucky to see both sides of the $$$ for many years with a limited income and many years at a more fortunate level. why is the implied image of consistent and quality service not to be found with centurion??

when i go to high end places i expect and happily pay for the privilege, i have no problem paying for quality service, i am not an idiot - if two flights go first class from chicago to london at a similiar time and one is $6000 and one is $12,000 for similiar airlines or even the same airline and ALL other things are equal, i want the cheaper of the two first class options. if i can find the cheaper fare on orbitz in two minutes i presume a seasoned travel agent should be able to do likewise. i have a big problem paying top dollar for mediocre service. maybe i am wrong but i suspect many centurion customers feel the same way. lets hear from some other centurion holders with their insights.

is it true what i have heard, that the travel agent system is set up so that whomever originates a record locater used for a trip gets credit for everything attached to the record locater??. bottom line if this is correct that may explain why for new originations the travel counselor is often quite pleasant and useful even if they are not our specific assigned travel counselor.

is it correct that when the travel agent makes changes to an existing record whoever does the added work gets no $ volume credit (is this how they get raises or promotions or some benefit as employees??, bottom line, do they get some reward for a certain amount of $ in travel sales and they can have issues?? if they do not hit their mininum??). in other words does modifying a record and travel arrangements (which can be quite time consuming with major changes) result in the modifying agent doing a lot of work and having nothing to show for their efforts when talking to their boss?

maybe someone that works at amex travel can confirm how the system rewards the travel agents. if i was to guess they have a poor reward and punishment system which results in the centurion customer getting caught in the middle and treated poorly.

most of the centurion individual customers are happy to pay for quality. i am still waiting to see consistent quality from amex centurion.

seeking amex travel agents input and insights to better understand this product and why it is so often mediocre.


jsq

I'm a bit confused by your rant. You asked them to check two hotels for you and they were both full. I don't expect that Centurion (or anyone else) can make a room appear on a whim. But after that did you ask them to check other hotels? You found it online, so certainly they should've seen the availability if they looked, but if you asked for two hotels and neither was available how should they know that you were willing to accept alternates? They might've asked, which would be the best customer service approach, but I'm still not completely sure they were wrong here based on your explanation.

Sometimes they are great. Sometimes they are not. There is no way they can always be great, but it almost never hurts to try and ask the Concierge for help. But, Amex should know that customer service is all about expectation setting.

IMHO, Centurion could do a better job setting expectations of what the Concierges can and can't do, and what they are more willing and less willing to do as well as the goals of the concierges.

For example, I have had trouble finding the following:
a) Does the quality of Concierge service vary depending on your charge volume or type of charges you make?
b) If you make repeated requests of the Concierge, but then don't make purchases resulting in extra income for the concierge department, does that make them less willing to help you in the future?

Maybe they should also do email-based surveys to monitor customer satisfaction for each request.

Great reply jsq!

My take on the situation is:

- as an individual, if you want Centurion you have to go off with another one of the AmEx products and first prove yourself as a viable Centurion customer; tenure, spend etc. Why is the same logic not applied to AmEx for staffing Centurion, they should only recruit existing staff who have tenure and have proved themselves to be really good at what they do (Travel, Lifestyle etc).

- I find service to be very patchy, and 'reactive'. So as an example I called last year to book some FHR hotels for a trip this Spring. Unfortunately the rates were not loaded yet. Now I am told to try calling back in a few months. What I would have expected from a high end product, is that they make a flag on my account and they call me when the rates are loaded, as surely they want the sale and commission?

I don't expect miracles, but I do expect them to get the basics right, and at times they are way off the mark. Centurion Travel have made so many mistakes or have demonstrated such bad service (I know Travel, I don't want to be fobbed off by some person that is brand new to the travel industry, nor do I want to hear 'We have new systems, so you will have to give us time'). As a result, I'd rather do the research myself, and book elsewhere (as then I know it's done right, and they lose out on commission) - there are certain things that I have to call them for such as FHR but now I can check all the rates online via the link that was posted elsewhere.

If AmEx was to provide a proper web portal where I can access and book as if I had called them, then I may be inclined to book more travel with them.

Thanks,
Richard

Centurion is a victim of its own success.

When it started out it was very good, you had some nice perks, you had excellent service and prompt response when you called them, it was indeed a special service.

As they pushed the service to more and more people in one country, and then into more and more countries some of the organisations with whom they made arrangements either decided they were now having too many people, or Amex couldn't agree to meet the costs with those people and as such diluted down some of the "perks" and made them into local ones.

Now they have quite a few people with the card across the world, and the card is no longer as special as it once was. So, in response to that, they up the card fee, either to get people to cancel the card, or because they know people will pay it for a "black card".

Everyone is different in why they have the card, and when you see the limits that Amex expect people to go to in the US to be able to get the card its almost incredible that you can get the card in other countries by only spending a tiny % of what the Americans are expected to pay.

I mean, seriously, if anyone spends 200k a year on a card thats a lot of spend (personal spend) and ANY bank or financial company would love to have such a person using their card or service, and yet Amex then have the cheek to charge you a fee on top of that.. its all very funny when you step back and look at what is going on. Its like the lottery really.

Stupid people pay stupid fees, stupid people play the lottery.

However, those people who are in control of their finances, are well off, invest wisely.. I bet you they pay nothing for any of their cards, just a single fee for a damn good accountant or investment manager.

Lets be honest here.. I would think its a fairly good guess to say that most of us here who have the Black card have it because.. because we can, because we were offered it, because we have it. No other reason.

The perks on the card are nice, but you can get all the benefits that are worth having on the Platinum card, the only thing you can't get on the Platinum card is.. a non colour.. BLACK.

Virgin Gold access for the Americans.. really? is that really that good? its a service to and from the UK mostly.. they would benefit from a local gold on one of their own airlines really.. plus most of you who do fly Virgin are likely to fly Upper class anyway, so what REAL benefit is that card? None.

Virgin Gold for the UK or Europe.. the same, its only good for one kind of trip, transatlantic... we fly a lot of other places, so why pick an airline that is very good, but only flies a very limited number of places.

Its a mugs game, and we're all playing

----------------------

richard,

i agree totally. my wife and i are at the point where we do the travel review ourselves figuring out via the internet and the library where we want to stay and what we want to do. the centurion amex travel agents are sometimes limited in their knowledge or more importantly, less then enthusiastic about doing anything other then just booking the partner hotels or airlines if they have to do the research.

i do use the FHR program hotels at times because they fit our interest in some large cities related to location and quality of property. we do find ourselves booking more and more hotels and airlines on our own without amex involvement because it it to much effort to get amex up to speed and get the job done right the first time.

regards,

jsq

As previously noted, when Centurion first started out, it really was a unique and great product, and it truly seemed that the staff genuinely cared about the customers. As time has gone on, the quality of the product has decreased (not just referring to the annual fee rise and the benefit loss), and while there are some great people working for Centurion, there are a fair number of those that just aren't as great. If I'm on the west coast, I don't enjoy a 6am wake-up call from Centurion solely because it's 9am on the east coast. When someone pays $2500 a year for a credit card, you'd think the agents would take a look at where you're located and not call until a reasonable time.

Having said that, I don't ever remember seeing anything on Centurion that says they can do "anything." If a restaurant is overbooked, or a hotel is overbooked, sometimes there's nothing that can be done. And it can't be expected that Centurion people can magically do anything about that. Sometimes a location holds a little bit extra (an extra table or room) and that's where I would think Centurion pulls through. But, these people that work there really do work hard, and while I think some of them could be trained to understand that CENT members are expecting the highest of quality, they work hard.

I actually agree with much of what you say but I gotta disagree on this one.

Just yesterday I discovered how valuable VA Gold can be. We discovered this weekend that we had to cancel our long planned trip to Seville this week(via LHR on a VA award) When I first called I was distracted and didn't use the gold line. The rep told me that we would forfeit 100K miles for our cancelled outbound flight bc it was fewer than 7 days from our departure.

But as soon as I told him we were Gold, he apologized and the miles were immediately recredited.

On another flight they also let us upgrade our son's gf at the airport last minute when she was flying with us to London. I'm sure our Gold status helped on that one.

We fly VA a lot, but always on UC awards. We have so much more clout as G-- I think this is one of Cent's best benes.

I asked them if I could get a place to stay for 6 hours or so in Delhi prior to boarding the 11:55 PM flight. Nothing more. I had tried the Imperial and the Oberoi on my own, since they are FHR hotels.

I have no problem doing my own booking--in fact, I travel quite a bit and know my own tastes, so I usually do everything on my own anyway. It is a request like the one I made (find me a day room in Delhi at a decent hotel) that is the test of their travel service to me.

Centurion makes a big deal about their "personal concierge" service--that is something platinum does not have.

I like Centurion generally for the ariline and hotel upgrades--that alone is worth the $2500 per year to me.

The concierge has generally been excellent (I asked for three psychics in Pittsburgh last year for a surprise birthday party with 24 hours notice and they came through).

Where I believe they fail, and miserably so, is in the personalized travel department. I merely wish that they could get some sort of "travel concierge" who can do things, with Centurion connections, that I cannot do myself. I don't need a typical travel agent--they are a dime a dozen--and other than making FHR reservations (which I now can do myself anyway), I am not sure of any value from that service.

I do not have a Centurion card, but the pattern of complaints I read here suggests that the artificial distinction between...

Customer Service
Travel Agent
Concierge

...is a core problem, aggravated by the apparent outsourcing of two of these functions. Is it too much to expect that one American Express employee could be trained to perform the Customer Service, Concierge and at least routine air/car/hotel booking functions? I can understand needing to deal with a "specialist" if booking a round-the-world airfare, cruise etc, but otherwise it seems Centurion ought aspire to approach the same level of integrated service that you would obtain if you hired an assistant.

I understand your point MIA, but from experience these are really different services.

Customer service handles credit card issues, benefits (like elite levels) assistance with promos (like gift certificates) etc. Their position is comparable to the csrs who help you with any credit card. I have found them to be as good or better than any credit card customer service rep I have ever dealt with. They answer the line promptly (no hold) are efficient and courteous. I'm probably 10 for 10 on requests. They are definitely a step up from most credit card customer service reps. I believe Amex when they call them "the top level of Amex customer service."

Concierge handles restaurant and ticket bookings. This is outsourced through a company in Canada/Boston. I have also had excellent experiences with the concierges. They are friendly, efficient and seem well informed about restaurants and events (or willing to do the research) They are not miracle workers but they have come through for me on dozens of occasions. (secured opera tickets before they went on sale/ helped me with hard to get restaurant rsvns./ made interesting suggestions etc) For me, the concierge service has completely lived up to my expectations.


Travel is my big disappointment. Only once, back in 2005 did I have a rep who I thought did an outstanding job (she helped arrange our trip to Barcelona, got us an 8 am checkin and an upgrade to a huge view suite at the Hotel Arts + more) but since then I have not found a rep who lives up to the Cent hype. When I call the travel line I am often put on hold, the agents don't seem familiar with the program (I recently had an agent who insisted that Post Ranch Inn was not part of the FHR program), they don't follow up on requests etc. etc. I recently complained and was just assigned a new personal travel rep and I'm hoping that she will break my bad streak, but so far she hasn't wowed me. (I'm willing to give her a chance though)

I don't understand why Cent gets this part so wrong when Starwood Plat, for instance, is able to find outstanding plat concierges. I imagine that there are more Starwood Plat members than Cent members, yet the Starwood Plat reps seem to genuinely care-- they take time to know their clients-- are great about staying in touch-- are familiar with the various properties-- and go out of their way to be helpful.


I am probably more satisfied than most Cent members, but IMO the Centurion Travel Counselors are the weakest part of the Cent program.


I've thought about this and wonder if A) there is a hierarchy -- where the "top" customers get the "top" agents or B) there is a system of compensation that works as a disincentive or C) it's simply incompetence


It seems to me that focusing on improving this area of customer service would be ultimately profitable for Amex. I know I've given Starwood more of my travel dollars bc of the excellent service the plat concierges provide.

I've been considering CENT and this discussion has been really helpful so thanks for all of the comments. Nothing I've read says that now is the time to pull the trigger.

One thing I wonder: are the problems with the travel service just symptomatic of larger problems with Amex travel? I worked for a company a few years back that used Amex as the exclusive travel agent. They were terrible in every sense of the word. Terrible service, terrible attitude and a truly shocking number of mistakes in bookings.

Have they improved? I'll put it this way -- for years I've done most of my family trips for free using Amex points by booking through Amex travel. Now, (and I know how this sounds) part of me is actually glad we are out of points so that I can book through Orbitz or directly and avoid the hassles, errors, and the comically bad website.

Perhaps the CENT personal travel reps are the best they have and that is just not very good?