American Express Membership Rewards points do not expire as long as your account is open and in good standing. There is no clock counting down and no minimum activity requirement to keep a balance alive. What you do need to watch for are the specific situations that can wipe out points anyway: closing your last eligible card, falling behind on payments, or reversing the purchases that earned a welcome bonus.
The One Rule That Keeps Points Alive
American Express confirms that Membership Rewards points have no expiration date.1American Express. Do Membership Rewards Points Expire? You can carry a balance across billing cycles, years, or longer without a reset. That sets the program apart from some airline and hotel loyalty programs that require periodic earning or redemption to keep points from lapsing.
The condition attached is simple to state and easy to miss: “no expiration” applies only while your account stays active and current. The moment either of those breaks, the terms allow forfeiture. Everything below is a version of that same rule.
Closing Your Card
If you close your Membership Rewards account and don’t have another eligible American Express card or checking account, unredeemed points are forfeited immediately.2American Express. What Happens to Amex Points When You Cancel This is the most common way cardholders lose a balance. They cancel a card without realizing the points go with it.
New York cardmembers have a limited safeguard. As of December 10, 2023, they may be able to redeem points for up to 90 days after receiving notice of account closure.2American Express. What Happens to Amex Points When You Cancel Cardholders elsewhere aren’t guaranteed any grace period, so redemption or transfer before closure is the safe assumption.
How to Protect a Balance Before You Cancel
The simplest fix is keeping at least one other Membership Rewards-eligible card open. When one card closes, points stay pooled in the program and remain accessible through the card that’s still active. If you’re canceling to escape an annual fee, ask about downgrading to a no-annual-fee card that still earns Membership Rewards. Not every American Express card participates, so confirm eligibility first.
Transferring points to an airline or hotel partner before you close is another option. Once transferred out, those points live under the partner program’s rules, which may include their own expiration or activity requirements, and they cannot be moved back into Membership Rewards. Read the partner’s terms before you pull the trigger.
Missing a Payment
Miss a payment by its due date and you forfeit the points earned during that billing period. Your existing balance stays intact, but the new points from that cycle are gone.3American Express. Why Didn’t I Earn Membership Rewards Points and How Can I Reinstate Them? If the account stays past due, you also lose the ability to redeem any accumulated points until it’s brought current.
Reinstatement is available. You can pay a $35 fee per billing period per card account to recover the forfeited points, and you have 12 months from the statement closing date of the missed period to do it (6 months for corporate cards).3American Express. Why Didn’t I Earn Membership Rewards Points and How Can I Reinstate Them? After that window, those points are gone for good. If the account is eventually charged off or sent to collections, the entire balance is typically canceled, not just the delinquent period’s points.
Returns and Welcome-Bonus Clawbacks
Returning a purchase or canceling a transaction reverses the points you earned on it. That’s routine for an ordinary return.
It gets more painful when the return affects a welcome offer. If you earned a sign-up bonus by hitting a minimum spending threshold and then returned enough to drop below that threshold, American Express can reverse the entire bonus. If you already transferred those bonus points to an airline or hotel partner, the reversal can push your Membership Rewards balance negative. Future points you earn then go toward closing that deficit before you can use them for anything else.
What Happens After a Cardholder Dies
When a cardholder dies, the estate or a family member generally needs to contact American Express to manage the account and any remaining points. The executor or next of kin will typically need to provide a death certificate and may need to supply legal documentation such as letters testamentary. What can be done with the points — redemption, transfer, or conversion to a statement credit — depends on the circumstances and account status.
Speed matters here. Because points are forfeited when an account closes without another eligible card linked, the estate risks losing the balance if the account is shut down before points are addressed. If the deceased had an authorized user who has been active on the account for at least 90 days, transferring points to a loyalty partner through that user’s access may be an option worth raising with American Express directly.