Amex Business Platinum Upgrade Employee Cards
Last week I wrote about a very good offer some Amex Business cardholders have received for upgrading to the Business Platinum card. I personally took them up on the offer and I know many of you did as well. You can find the full details in my original post, but it basically entails receiving 50K points after spending $10K plus you get all of the Platinum benefits including the airline incidental credit and more.
One of the tricky things when it comes to the Business Platinum card is employee cards. Unlike the personal Platinum where there is only one type of authorized user card, the Business Platinum has three. If you are upgrading another card to the Business Platinum you need to look at this, because it can cost you.
Let’s look at the upgrade offer and how it explains these employee cards and their fees:
Employee Cards Upgraded
Since I was upgrading a Business Green card, I had assumed that my employee cards would remain Green while the main card would be upgraded to a Platinum. In fact, that is exactly what the offer says, “Any existing Employee Card(s) will not be upgraded…” Unfortunately what happened is quite different.
Last night when looking at my statement, I found the following:
Interesting enough, my main card was charged 1/4 of the normal annual fee ($112.50) and then adjusted since I have less than 3 months left until my cardmember year is over. You can also see each of my two employee cards were charged 1/4 of the $300 annual fee for Employee Business Platinum cards. Of course, I don’t want those to be Platinum.
Getting It Fixed
Thankfully, I was able to quickly hop on chat with American Express and explain that I wanted my employee cards to remain Green, while my primary card becomes a Platinum. The agent asked if I upgraded online and explained that the online upgrade was probably the issue. He was quickly able to reverse the charges and fix everything in the system. My employees are Green once again.
Conclusion
If you have already upgraded your current business card to a Platinum under this offer, check your account to make sure you aren’t being charged for employee cards. If you haven’t upgraded, you may want to consider doing it over the phone or at the very least staying on top of things to make sure you aren’t hit with extra fees.
Did you participate in this offer? Have you had similar issues or did it go smoothly?
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last month I got the 10K bonus miles for signing up for the extended pay option. Now I am offered the upgrade to Plat and have two questions. 1. Will I lose the 10K bonus miles I got last month? 2. I already have a Plat biz card, will they give me a second one? I assume they know I already have one that is why I was surprised by the upgrade offer.
1. No you won’t lose the 10K.
2. They should give it to you if they allow the upgrade.