The 80,000 Hilton Surpass offer is no longer offered. The regular offer is now in play for 60,000 points. But, that is for new accounts. It is possible to upgrade just about any American Express credit card to the same Hilton Surpass and get 50,000 points – even if you have already had the card!
Upgrade To Hilton Surpass For 50,000 Points
Let me say first, if you go this route, you will not be able to take advantage of the extra 10,000 points of the current offer. But, we will look at some reasons later why you may want to go the upgrade route.
It is very easy to upgrade a current American Express card to the Hilton Surpass card and get 50,000 points. Also, it does not have to be a regular American Express card that you are upgrading from – co-branded cards such as the Delta Amex cards work fine for upgrades.
To upgrade, you need to visit this American Express website – here – and enter your username and password of your account (or you could enter your card number you wish to upgrade from). Once you are in, it should offer you a box similar to the one below indicating which card is available to upgrade to the Hilton Surpass card.
Just click to Continue and it will give you an option to add an additional card user. Click to continue again and it will submit it. It should come back within 5 seconds with an approved message.
Note: Any card that you have opened or changed in the last 12 months will not be eligible for an upgrade. You must wait a period of 12 months before changes can occur.
Earning the 50,000 Points
To get the 50,000 points, you will need to spend the same $3,000 in 3 months that you would if you went for the 60,000 points. You will also be assessed an annual fee of $75 (since this is an upgrade, you will receive a prorated amount of the card you are upgrading from) within 45 days.
This card comes with Hilton Gold status so it is a nice perk to add to your new account.
Why Upgrade Instead Of Open A New Account?
Already Received A Sign-Up Bonus
Earlier this year, American Express changed their policy to allow you to receive a sign-up bonus once per lifetime. That is really an unfriendly policy to cardholders who may have held a card sometime in the past and now wish to open a new card to take advantage of different travel patterns. If you cannot receive the sign-up bonus, there is really little reason to sign-up for most cards, especially since this one comes with an annual fee of $75.
But, upgrading a card does not carry that same policy. If you have held the American Express Hilton Surpass in the past, you can upgrade and get the 50,000 points instead. It does not matter if you have already received a bonus on the Surpass before – an upgrade allows you to receive this 50,000 point offer.
Maxed Out The Amex Limit
American Express allows you to have a total of four credit cards (does not include charge cards) per account. Some have been able to get more since this policy was put in place, but it is a policy that stops many at four. If you had four before the policy went into affect, you are fine.
So, if you have the maximum of four cards, which is not too hard to believe, you would most likely be denied for a new American Express Hilton Surpass card. You would then need to call in and close one of your accounts and have them resubmit the application for the Hilton Surpass to get it. It is always possible to cancel a card preemptively, but there is still no guarantee you will receive an instant approval on the card.
By upgrading a current card to the Hilton Amex Surpass, you do not have to call in and you can simply trade out one card for the Surpass. This is also helpful if you have a card coming up that has an annual fee that is higher than the Hilton Surpass card. Upgrading allows you to stay within the Amex limit. It is a great way to trade out those unwanted Delta Amex cards for a Hilton card! 🙂
No Hard Pull Depending
This one is somewhat up for debate. When I have upgraded before for offers such as this, I did not get a hard pull on my credit report. Some people have mentioned that they have received a hard pull for the upgrade. From various things I have read, it appears that, if there is a hard pull, the process is to do a soft pull during the upgrade. If you are approved, it then does a hard pull but backdates the hard pull to the date the original card was opened.
A hard pull is what shows up on your credit report that other creditors will see when running a check on your credit report. It shows that you have made a request for credit. A soft pull is more of an identity check and the soft pulls can only be seen by you.
So, the chances are very good that upgrading through this offer will only do a soft pull (since you are only changing products and not getting any additional credit). That has been the case for me in the past. Worst case, they would only do a hard pull if you are actually approved for the card upgrade. If you are denied, it will not show up on your credit report as a hard pull.
If you have been through this process before, I would be interested to know what your experience was with the soft pull/hard pull. Feel free to comment below.
Summary
While 50,000 Hilton points will not get you as much as it once would, it is still a decent offer to upgrade a current card and not have to worry about opening a new account (for the reasons above). These 50,000 points will cost you the $75 annual fee, but you will get Hilton Gold with the card (which can be valuable since it gives free breakfast). Plus, if you are already in the middle of a year with a card that charges an annual fee, that fee will be prorated towards this annual fee.
If you have already received the Hilton Surpass bonus once before, this upgrade is a nice way to fill up your Hilton account with 50,000 more points for use down the road.
Interesting. I just applied for the Surpass before it expired on 2/28 but this is a great tip to keep in the back burner for next time!
I have a couple of questions:
a) If I get a new hilton surpass now with 60K bonus and cancel it a few months down the line, can I still upgrade a different card to hilton suprass and get the 50K bonus?
b) How many cards can I upgrade to hilton surpass and get 50K bonus?
-Abhi
As I mentioned in the post, you can only change cards that have been active for a period of 12 months, so the first scenario would not work. You could drop you Surpass down to a no-fee Amex and then convert it after that.
For the second question, when you login using the link above, it will show you which cards that you have are eligible for an upgrade.
Your first paragraph implies one can have more than one Surpass card at the same time. Is it the case?
Not sure if you can or not. I was alluding to the fact that you could get it even if you had already had it. If the upgrade link shows you eligible, you should be able to go ahead and do it. But, it may give you an error before completion if it doesn’t allow it.
interestingly, I downgraded my surpass to a regular last week, and now your link is showing me I can upgrade back to a surpass. Any thoughts as to what will happen if I do that? I’d be surprised if they gave me the bonus.
Hmmm, I am not sure what would happen with that. If the offer is there, you should be just fine. It may not let you go all the way through, but if it does, you should be eligible.
If you decide to try it, screenshot everything and call them after receiving the new card to make sure the offer is tied to your account. Or, put the $3K on it and then call if it doesn’t post. There is no language on the upgrade offer as is on the new member bonus offer about not receiving it.
approved for the change. well see if the pts post
Does anyone know if this process would keep the ‘account age’ intacted from the previous account? For example, I have an optima card I opened a long time ago and only keep open because I don’t want to lose this old credit line. Will the new Hilton card read as ‘member since 2002’ or ‘member since 2015’? Thanks!
Yes, with Amex cards, your member since date goes back to the original date your Amex account was first opened. Even though I have since closed the card that was my first (I know, mistake), it still reads that on all my Amex cards.
I keep getting the error message: “We are unable to process your request for a product change at this time. Please call the number on the back of your card. Thank you for your continued interest in American Express Card Membership.”
I have cards open >1 year. Looks like some cards (i.e. SPG, Blue, etc.) may not be eligible?
I know it does not appear on my SPG card and I just checked a Blue and it was not there either. It may be just for certain co-branded cards but not SPG (which would make some sense, I guess, since it is a hotel product).
I’m actually looking to downgrade from my Amex Platinum Mercedes Benz. Can I downgrade ?
Since it is a charge card, you wouldn’t be able to downgrade to a credit card. You would have to downgrade to a charge card instead.
Sorry, won’t work with DELTA Amex’s.
Yes, it does. I did it.
Same here—I keep getting the error message: “We are unable to process your request for a product change at this time. Please call the number on the back of your card. Thank you for your continued interest in American Express Card Membership.”
I tried for my Delta Platinum open for 5 years!!!
Try opening it in a private browser session, something like Chrome’s Incognito. For some reason, I have better success with Amex doing that.
Charles, I might be interested in doing this with my regular HH card which I have had for maybe 5 plus years. My seniority will not be lost, right? Now, you mention someone can have the 50K bonus again with Surpass with the upgrade. What if you recently cancelled the Surpass, say, within the last 6 months? BTW, as someone else posted, the message that I need to call in also happened when I clicked your link. Sometimes websites are slower at night or are in for maintenance resulting in random messages. I can try again tomorrow…..
If the offer is presented to you, you will be eligible for the bonus. Your start date with Amex will carry over to the new card. Try opening the link in Chrome Incognito or a similar private browser session to see if it works like that.