It's getting to be "annual fee" season for me on several of my cards (various Chase, Citi AAs, AmX Delta & Hilton & biz SPG.) Didn't get Chase to budge on the Ink Plus at all a couple months ago.
Will be following this thread to see how others do and what strategies work best, and I will update here with my successes (and lack thereofs) as they happen, too.
Good luck to all of us!!
Here are some data points, hope they help:
On my two Aviator Red cards (mine and my wife's), for the last 2 years (including one call that was during the last week of Dec 2016), an immediate AF waiver was given when I called them. The calls each took less than 2 minutes. We use these cards sporadically when there are bonuses offered, so not a huge spend on them to justify the waiver. But these are the ones without the 10K annual bonus.
On my Arrival Plus, I have a LOT of spend on it, none of it MS (more than $100K last year) yet they absolutely refused to budge on the annual fee. The reason given was that it was a "cash back" card so it seemed like some strict policy. The rep even admitted that I seemed to be a very loyal customer and was apologizing that she could not do anything. The best she could come up with are zero percent balance transfer for a year with a 1% fee (decent deal since it is a very high credit limit card, but not my thing). Nothing else based on spend. Since I use the card quite a bit, I elected to use my points to pay off the annual fee (since it codes as travel and is eligible for credit at the same ratio, as well as the 5% back).
On CitiAA, for the past 4 years getting an AF waiver used to not be a problem - in fact they would sweeten the deal with some 1 year+ (14 or 16 months or something like that) double AA miles for spending $1K per month on top of the waiver (technically they never waive it but apply a statement credit). This did not happen last year for some reason - I got the credit but no other sweeteners. I think the whole Costco Citi new business was overwhelming them at that time.
On Chase. I had an unexpected surprise on the United Explorer card - last year they waived the annual fee as a "one-time courtesy" and this year they said they could not do it again. Just as I was about to hang up, the rep (who insisted there was no AF credit or waiver available) said she was able to offer something else "provided by United" - a $100 statement credit for your business. No minimum spend, not just applicable to United purchases, $100 just like that. It is a $95 AF so I was wondering why she kept insisting to say there weren't any AF waivers or credits available when they actually had a credit for $5 more than I would pay as the AF. Go figure. Of course, I took it and it went through smoothly.
On Amex Delta, the best I have received is a partial credit in years where I had decent spend on it but they have been stingy with it. On Amex MR cards, no outright fee waivers but I usually have received decent bonus MR offers based on minimum spend combined with an offer for fewer MR to apply to the AF. So it has worked out to be the same as min spend to waive the AF, with some extra MR thrown in (on top of the normal MR earned), which has worked for me as I have a lot of business spend on these cards and also value their other benefits.
Keep in mind that my situation may be different from yours - I have a fair amount of business (non-MS, real) spend to spread around, and good use for miles, free bags, lounges and other benefits offered by the cards, so I am not necessarily aiming for zero AF, but making sure I can keep the costs low while still actually enjoying the card benefits.