If you’ve been having trouble with Chase waiving your annual fees…

We received an email the other day from one of our readers, @Alex, who emailed:

Sir,

I was able to get my fees waived for the United Mileage Plus Club Card and the rest of my Chase cards that I applied for after coming into the service.  I did so by using my AMEX Platinum card fee waiver as leverage.  It took around 30 days to accomplish this but with $634 in fees waived it was well worth my efforts.

V/r

Alex

We, of course, wanted to know how he leveraged it, so he commented on our post:

I was recently was able to get Chase to waive the $395 fee for the United Mileage Plus Club Card. I was also able to get them to waive the fees for my other cards totaling $634! I was able to get them to do this in spite of having applied for most of these cards after my entry into the military by using my AMEX Platinum as leverage. I essentially said I was disappointed in Chase and that if the fees were not waived I would strongly consider ending my business relationship with Chase (which made me sort of sad lol because I really do enjoy their customer service and awesome benefits). I told them that AMEX waives the fees for military members on their platinum card and the fees for additional cards and any other products as well. This is what I think finally swayed chase and now I have this benefit as long as I am in the service! I must give some kudos to chase even though it did take a while, but I think chase is absolutely awesome and is definitely on the customer service level of AMEX now!

I know that several readers including @Benji and others had been denied the SCRA waivers because they weren’t cardholders before joining, so this is HUGE! I think leveraging one bank’s benefits against another is a great idea; I believe (but cannot be certain) that it was PFDigest who mentioned that “banks are whores!”. I mean that in the sense that they will really bend over backward (sorry for the awkward pun/visualization) to make more money off you by retaining you as a customer.

I was denied SCRA benefits by Citi, so I might try this strategy. Thank you, @Alex!

A couple other notes, I just got an emailing congratulating me on my Southwest Companion pass!:

Southwest companion pass offers a spouse, SO, friend, or whomever a free flight with you as long as you’re paying or using points. You need to earn 110k Rapid Rewards points. As you can see, it’s valid until the end of the following year that it’s earned. I earned it ENTIRELY with credit card sign-up bonuses, manufactured spend, and Rapid Rewards shopping portal and dining network (ie, I haven’t taken a Southwest flight this year). It is not hard at all to get, and incredibly worth it, and can’t wait to designate my wife as my companion so we can begin flying two for one!

I’m leaving for Lima, Peru, Cuzco, Machu Picchu, Lake Titicaca, and then Cartagena, Colombia this weekend, booked entirely in business class w/ United miles and using their generous stop-over and open-jaw routing rules. When I get back, I’ll be going over how to book a similar award, as well as a trip report. Have a great weekend!