American Express have just announced a number of changes to their personal Platinum card, the biggest changes are:
- Annual fee increasing to $550 from $450
- Existing cardholders that have their annual fee due before August 31st, 2017 will get billed $450 for this year
- Existing cardholders that have their annual fee due on or after September 1st, 2017 will be billed $550
- Addition of $200 in Uber credits per year ($15 per month and an additional $20 in December)
- Full changes can be found here
Currently you can get the American Express Platinum with the $450 annual fee and a sign up bonus of 75,000 points after $5,000 in spend. Does it make sense to get the card now and pay $100 less for the annual fee or should you wait? It’s important to remember that you can only get the sign up bonus on each American Express card once.
There are two things to consider:
- Will American Express offer an increased bonus to try and attract new cardholders?
- Will American Express just offer an increased bonus in the future?
In terms of #1, I have no idea (but I’m trying to find out from sources at American Express). In terms of #2 we’ve seen leaked links for 100,000 points in the past, the problem is that American Express have aggressively frozen accounts and issued points clawbacks for people using those links so even if another similar leak did become available I’d advise against it.
It’s not unreasonable to expect to get targeted for a 100,000 point offer in the future and 25,000 Membership Reward points are more valuable than $100, but it really depends on if you need those points in the near future or not and how long you’re happy to wait (not to mention points/miles inflation and devaluations making those points worth less in the future).
For now my recommendation would be to wait unless you do have that short term need for either the Platinum benefits or the points. Fingers crossed we see a much higher bonus on this card after March 30th when these benefits are added.
