Amex Business Platinum Airfare Rebate Gutted
In response to the release of the Chase Sapphire Reserve card last year, American Express announced some feature changes to their Platinum lineup. Among the changes was the addition of a 50% rebate on some airfare points redemptions for Business Platinum cardholders. Specifically you get 50% back in points on economy tickets booked on your preferred airline and 50% back in points on business/first class tickets on any airline.
This new awesome points rebate feature essentially doubled the value of points to 2 cents each. Better yet, the rebate usually posted within 24 hours so you could have almost immediate access to the points. Unfortunately that will no longer be the case. As of now Amex has changed their policies and rebates will take 6-10 weeks from the time of the redemption.
But wait, there’s more.
The Points Guy is reporting that Amex is already gutting this benefit even further. In addition to the lengthier rebate times, the rebate amount is being cut from 50% to 35% on June 1, 2017. (Thus cutting the value from 2 cents to 1.54 cents each.) Also, there will be a cap of 500,000 rebated points per year.
To recap:
- It now takes 6-10 weeks to get your rebate instead of around 24 hours.
- The rebate is dropping from 50% to 35% on June 1, 2017.
- A 500,000 point per calendar year cap is being implemented.
In other words this benefit got a lot less valuable. What are your thoughts? Will this make you move your spend away from the Amex Business Platinum card?
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That’s tough for frequent travelers but for a guy like me that travels 3 or 4 times a year it isn’t too bad
I only going to be using the CSR 1.5 cpp (and transfer partners of course) over Amex. No hoops and no cap.
Sub
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Now you know why. This management team couldn’t manage their way out of a paper bag.
Well, that was STUPID AMEX.
It took 3 whole months to gut this benefit. Nice. Who’s running this company? Charge $450 for benefits, reduce almost immediately