The Offer
- American Express is offering 5,000 Membership Rewards points when you add an authorized user to your American Express Platinum card. That authorized user must also spend $500 within three months. You can add a total of 4 authorized users as part of this deal and get a total of 20,000 Membership Rewards points.
The Fine Print
- SSN is not required over the phone. Keep in mind American Express is good at linking accounts so I wouldn’t do this for somebody worried about their 5/24 status.
Our Verdict
Easiest option is to add gold authorized users, this has no fees and gives the following:
- Fee Credit for Global Entry or TSA Pre✓ (yes, each individual authorized user [up to 99 total] get their own credit. Yes, I’ve confirmed this)
- Card earns at same rates as primary cardholder:
- 5x points per $1 spent on purchases made with airlines or with American Express Travel
- 5x points per $1 spent on hotel bookings made directly from the American Express travel website
- 1x points on all other purchases
The other option is to add platinum authorized users, the first three cost $175 (for all three, not per cardholder) and an each additional cardholder is another $175. That means the best ‘value’ would be to add three authorized users for $175 and get 15,000 points (requiring $500 spend per cardholder). In terms of what the authorized cardholders get, you can view those in full here but there are some useful benefits:
- Lounge access:
- Centurion lounge access
- International American Express lounge access
- Delta SkyClub lounge access
- Priority pass select membership
- Airspace lounge access
- Fee Credit for Global Entry or TSA Pre✓
- Hidden Benefits
- SPG gold status
- Hilton Honors Gold Status
- Card earns at the same rate as the primary cardholder:
- 5x points per $1 spent on purchases made with airlines or with American Express Travel
- 5x points per $1 spent on hotel bookings made directly from the American Express travel website
- 1x points on all other purchases
It might be worth it for some people to add authorized users if they have friends/family that want lounge access but don’t want to sign up for credit cards (getting them to give you $60 for the privilege means you break even/make a small profit. Good friends teach them the churning ways though). Keep in mind the authorized users don’t get their own $200 airline reimbursement (but any charges they make will qualify for the primary cardholders benefit) and you’re responsible for any purchases they make.
It seems like American Express are rolling out these offers on a lot of their cards, for example:
- [YMMV] Add An Authorized User To Premier Rewards Gold & Get 5,000 Membership Rewards (Up To 4 AUs/20,000 Points)
- AmEx Everyday Card: 1,500 points for up to 4 authorized users. Requires $150 spend
Probably worth calling to see if any other cards have similar offers. Feel free to share your datapoints in the comments here.
Hat tip to @Roar_Singh, @PuigFamilyBBQ, @_moarbetter, @VoyagingDoc, @Wizmanison
