American Express is probably the best at giving retention offers in terms of frequency and amount. Usually you can get a retention offer every other year on your annual fee cards. Types of bonuses vary, and they can change week to week before and after your renewal date. 

Likelihood of Offer: High - every other year, could be more frequent if you spend a lot on the card. 

Best time to ask: Start asking a few weeks before your renewal date, but you have up until 30 days afterwards before you can't get the whole annual fee reimbursed. 

How to ask: By phone or chat - personally I see better results over chat. 

Types of Offers:

• The best offer is usually similar to a sign-up bonus - Spend X to get Y,000 points. These vary so much, so it's up to you to evaluate whether the spend is worth the bonus. Typically you'd want to get a 10 points per dollar spend rate (e.g., Spend $3,000 get 30,000 points). Some of the worse retention offers offer less (e.g., Spend $10,000  to get 40,000 points) 

• Other offers provide statement credit instead of points (e.g., Spend $3,000 get $300). While not as flexible as points, usually these can at least be thought as annual fee waivers or discounts. 

• A common, but terrible retention offer is to use points to cover your annual fee - usually at a 1 cent per point rate. If you have Membership Reward points, it's usually a lot better to use these points for free travel rather than covering a purchase. However, usually that would be 0.6 cents per point, so if you're really strapped, then you could consider this offer. 

Other Notes:

• Offers can change quickly, so if you don't take the one they offer you at the moment, but it might not be offered again. So you could get a better one later or none at all. 

• There won't be any sort of tracker for your spend, but you can contact Amex and they can tell you how much you still need. 

Citi also offers some nice retention bonuses on their own and co-branded cards. I highly encourage asking for retention offers every year for ALL of your Citi cards. See the notes section below

Likelihood of Offer: High - possible to get one every year for some cards 

Best time to ask: Start asking a few weeks before your renewal date, but you have up until 30 days afterwards before you can't get the whole annual fee reimbursed. 

How to ask: By phone

Types of Offers:

• The best offer is usually similar to a sign-up bonus  similar to the American Express set above. It doesn't seem that Citi has as high point offers, but you'll still want to look for the same ratio. 

• Other offers provide a refund of the annual fee after a spend requirement. 

Other Notes:

• Some users even report retention offers on some of Citi's no annual fee cards like the Double Cash, so there's no ever a harm in asking!

• Citi will also offer "waiting" bonuses where they will offer some miles while you wait to see if there are even retention offers available. These have no stipulations but come in low amounts. For example, while I went to cancel my Citi AA Platinum Select card, they offered 1,000 miles for me not to cancel until I hear about any retention offers. When I learned that my retention offer was to spend $1,000 to get the $99 annual fee wavied, I rejected the offer, but still got my 1,000 miles. 

Capital One isn't really known for giving out retention offers, at most it is just a refund of the annual fee. Note the timing of when to ask if you think you're actually going to cancel or downgrade. 

Likelihood of Offer: Very low

Best time to ask: BEFORE your annual fee renews, because Capital One does NOT reimburse/prorate the annual fee after you cancel/downgrade the card. 

How to ask: By phone. 

Types of Offers:

• They might waive the annual fee without any spend requirements. Some people get it often, others never - hard to say what is the trigger. 

Other Notes:

• Also note that to downgrade a Capital One card, you actually don't. Even if you're going from an annual fee card to no annual fee, Capital One calls that an upgrade. Finally, you have to have an upgrade offer available to even product change. 

Chase used to offer plenty of retention offers, especially on the Chase Sapphire Reserve, but gradually has been more strict about giving them out. Retention offers are more common on co-branded cards though. 

Likelihood of Offer: Low for Chase branded cards, Medium for co-branded cards (e.g., Marriott, United, etc.)

Best time to ask: Usually right after you get the annual fee hit.  

How to ask: By phone or secure message 

Types of Offers:

• Usually it's a straight statement credit that you'll get 2-3 billing cycles after the annual fee posts. 

Other Notes:

• Usually the statement credit won't cover the whole annual fee, but it won't change like Amex. 

Barclays co-branded cards are pretty varied and after some research, there doens't seem to be to many data point. 

Likelihood of Offer: Medium - seems to be dependent on the brand.

Best time to ask: Start asking a few weeks before your renewal date, but you have up until 30 days afterwards before you can't get the whole annual fee reimbursed. 

How to ask: By phone 

Types of Offers:

• Generally there seems to be a spend requirement to either get statement credit or points - depending on the brand. 

Other Notes:

• Some common brands that give out retention offers include JetBlue and Aviator Red. However, the Aviator Red is closing soon, so I don't know if they would still offer retention offers. 

We don't have any US Bank credit cards, so this information is pulled from online forums and comments. 

Likelihood of Offer: Medium - this seems dependent on how much you spend on their cards. 

Best time to ask: Likely around account renewal. 

How to ask: By phone

Types of Offers:

• Has the typical spend requirement for some points or statement credit, but that's basically the same thing since US Bank points can only be redeemed as cash back. 

Other Notes:

• It also seems like the offer amounts are very low - which makes sense since the US Bank slate of cards have low annual fees in the first place.