American Express made significant changes to their Platinum cards on March 30th, 2017 including a $200 annual Uber credit and an increase of $100 on the annual fee on the personal variations in response to the Chase Sapphire Reserve. According to an OMaaT reader who works at a property that participates in the Fine Hotels & Resorts program American Express plans to make the following changes in early 2018:
- Fine hotels & resorts bookings will earn 5x points
- You’ll be able to use Pay With Points on fine hotels & resorts. Keep in mind the business Platinum offers a 35% rebate on pay with points bookings
Obviously this is just a rumor and I have no idea how reliable this source is. It’s also possible they plan to add additional benefits that aren’t related to fine hotels & resorts and we wouldn’t be aware of these due to the nature of the source. One can only hope they don’t increase the annual fee again as well.
I have tried to come up with 35 ways to re-phrase this but can’t. I was going to say it would be nice if the personal or biz platinum had a 3x category for dining…but its like..no… theres enough Amex offers as it is, not to mention the powerful combo of the Blue business that earned 2.3x and redeemable for 1.5x on a selected airline… thats 3.45x on anything up to 50k annually. I mean I guess some would say its unfortunate that say the simply cash plus, couldnt act like a chase UR card and have its cash back credit as MRs….
So yeah I think anyone fully immersed into Amex Membership Rewards would be happy with anything. I mean again, I don’t reach for chase cards if I am out in public. Why? They get declined. Amex always works. Suspicious? Instant email text etc, done. Blah. Amex is superior to chase to me, infinitely.
Uber eats qualifies as Uber credit, so if you are not using it, give it to a family member, have order a free meal on you, and in reality on Amex…. How are you not taking advantage of that is no one’s fault but your own
“You’ll be able to use Pay With Points on fine hotels & resorts. Keep in mind the business Platinum offers a 35% rebate on pay with points bookings“. Does this mean points will be redeemable at .7 cents or 1 cent and then you get 35% back? If it’s .7 then still useless.
It’s a rebate so you get them back
Yes. But when redeeming them is it .7 or 1 cent per point? I think that makes a difference.
Wheres the beef?
Why anyone high spending would use Amex Platinum anymore beyond getting the signup bonus just boggles my mind. I do about $300k in cc spending annually and use a 2% cashback card when not getting a signup bonus on a new card or doing hotel spend with an SPG card.
MR points offer such poor value these days vs straight forward 2% cash back. Even MR transfers to airline miles with all the accompanying fees for most tickets doesn’t make it worthwhile.. particularly as airline fares have fallen in real terms. The Uber credit as a benefit is laughable for most traditional Platinum card holders outside of NYC and a few big cities. Lounge access is the only real worthwhile benefit but other cards offer Priority Pass too for $100 less and equivalent concierge services and rental car upgrades.
I had Amex Plat for many years and gave it up. The cachet is nowhere what it was either… incidentally there are 1.3 MILLION platinum card holders in the US but the $100 AF jump and the smoke and mirrors game of the last few years with benefits are for sure making people wisen up gradually. I am sure there now trying to play catch up but this piecemeal “benefit” add on is probably not going to have smart people rushing to it!
My renewal comes up in April, I’ll only renew if they give a nice bonus, what minimum would all of you suggest, 30,000 MR or higher?
If I have no plans to renew, there’s no reason to use up the $200 airline incidentals now right? Just wait until I see if they offer me anything. Thanks!
since AMEX RAT is reading all the blogs i hope they read this:
STOP DICKING AROUND AND MATCH THE CSR. END GAME.
I agree. AmEx can’t rely on their elitist brand name forever. Chase and others are slowly chipping away. Soon, AmEx will have to reorganize their entire business model.
If this is true then I might keep my business platinum which has annual fee due in April.
I changed my mind.
Is the 35% back when booking FHR with points on the bus plat part of the rumor because it is currently only for First or Business Class flights booked with points isn’t it?
It’s not part of the rumor. It is just speculation at this point.
One really disappointing DP on FHR: Ritz Carlton (Bali) had a great offer on their Sayan property publicly available on the website – 4th night free; but the FHR website showed a rate that was higher ($150/nt more); I had the impression that FHR would always give you the best publicly available rate PLUS the FHR benefits. Called in to see if they can give me the better rate and they were very CLEAR – to get the FHR benefits, you need to book our rate. Whatever rate the Hotel offers is not something we are going to offer you – whatever our system shows is the best we can do. May not come as news to some but I always thought they give you the best public rate.
They really need to step up their travel coverages before anything else. 5x on airline bookings is great but means nothing to me when I’d rather have the piece of mind that I don’t have to pay out of pocket for things when my flight is delayed or canceled.
yup. same. that’s one of the reason why i will continue to use CSR for airline booking. trip delay insurance is just too important than MR points