American Express Lowers Minimum Spend Requirement To $3,000 On Business SPG Card

Contents

1 The Offer
2 The Fine Print
3 Our Verdict

The Offer

Direct link to offer (you need to click “are you a business owner” for the business offer to show)

Receive a sign up bonus of 25,000 SPG points when you spend $3,000 or more within the first three months

The Fine Print

Annual fee of $95 is waived first year, no annual fee for addition cardholders
Earns at the following rates:
- 2x points on all SPG purchases
- 1x points on all other purchases
5 nights and 2 stays each year toward SPG Elite status

Starting August 11th, card will also come with these benefits:

No foreign transaction fees (currently 2.7%)
Premium in room internet at all SPG hotels
Boingo internet access for up to four devices
Sheraton Club access

Our Verdict

The standard bonus on this card is 10,000 points after first purchase and another 15,000 points after you spend $5,000 in three months, this deal is better as I doubt anybody is going purely for the 10,000 first purchase bonus and the total required spend is lower. American Express and SPG usually offer a higher sign up bonus of 30,000 points once per year (last year it was offered in late May) and it’s been possible for some to get this offer making a dummy booking or creating a new SPG account. It’ll be interesting to see if they offer a similar bonus this year or not, if they do I imagine they’ll time it to go live with the new card benefits in August – although I’m not convinced it’ll be offered this year.

American Express just renegotiated the terms of their SPG deal and in all the negotiations I’ve heard of, it’s the travel partner that has wielded the power rather than the credit card issuer – which means American Express is more likely to be paying a premium on SPG points compared to the past (this could have lead to the higher annual fee to help recoup some of these costs). In any case, I don’t think this 25,000 point offer is going away any time soon so just sit tight and hope for a 30,000 point offer!

Hat tip to Freequent Flyer Miles