American Express has posted an announcement that there will be a major refresh coming to the Amex Platinum and Business Platinum cards. There is not much detail in the announcement about what to expect, but it sounds like we should expect extensive updates and changes based on the announcement.
The press release notes that “the company is making its largest investment ever in a Card refresh”, signaling that we should probably expect significant changes.
Howard Grosfield, Group President, U.S. Consumer Services, is quoted as saying, “Platinum Card benefits and services resonate across generations, particularly with Millennial and Gen Z who accounted for 35% of total U.S. Consumer spending last quarter. We’re going to take these Cards to a new level, not only in what they offer in travel, dining and lifestyle benefits, but also in how they look and feel, to meet the evolving needs of our customers.”
Personally, I’m hoping that they don’t spend too much money on how the cards look or feel and rather that they focus on useful benefits. The release goes on to note that there will be new Centurion Lounge openings coming in Newark, Salt Lake City, and Tokyo, Japan this year. It further sounds like Amex intends to maintain a focus on experiences, specifically noting that “American Express partners with leading brands on the Platinum Card and plans to announce more as part of the Card refresh”.
My read of the release is that we’ll likely see an expansion of coupon partnerships and I wouldn’t be surprised if we see the launch of some sort of curated experiences platform, particularly given the mention of Millennial and Gen Z customers accounting for a significant (and likely growing) segment of spend on the cards. I sincerely hope that Amex also considers how they can reward spending for those customers and adds some useful bonus categories. As things stand, Platinum cards are useful for their benefits, but at a very high price point already, I have to wonder how much they could possibly increase the fee without adding some more useful everyday spending categories to the card.
We’ll keep our eyes on the cards and ear to the ground for further details, though I would expect that we won’t know more for quite a while.
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The AmEx Plat is already the most questionable card in my wallet. I can’t get the credits to cover the annual fee, but I’ve rationalized keeping it the last couple years mostly because I fly enough that it ends up coming out to ~$8 per Centurion lounge visit. But these days I am more often finding myself skipping the Centurion to go to other lounges that are better options. Any increased annual fee or degradation of the benefits for this card and I will be canceling it pretty quickly.
What a crazy coincidence that I was targeted for the 250k MR for $20k spend offer today (despite having the same card already) after sitting on the sidelines for almost 2 years. I jumped on it with both hands… cherry on top was the $500 stmt credit for $2500 airfare spend… will find a good use for that in the next 3 months.
COUPONS, COUPONS, COUPONS FOR EVERYONE.
I’ve got an upgrade offer to the Platinum card on my Gold that I think I’m going to bite on and try to stack with AU and retention bonuses. I’m close enough to under 5/24 I don’t want the hit on opening a Platinum directly but I want to get a round of points and double dip benefits before the fee shoots up even higher and the credits become even less useful to me.
never upgrade a card, you lose out on bonus points. always get the best offer to apply out here. downgrade the gold of you don’t want it anymore. 150k in some places for platinum. Gold and Plat are so different and cover different types of spend. Much less points with the Plat.
I predict annual fee of $995 and $250 fee per AU. Chase, Capital 1 and AMEX, cancelling all cards upon renewal and if I don’t find good points redemption, I will just cash them.
Another blogger characterized the Amex announcement, in light of the timing, as “me too” if not an act of desperation. Certainly, Amex was caught flat-footed.
Now, think about how the Business Platinum statement credits played out over the past several months.
What about a Green Card refresh? What about an EDP refresh? It’s as if someone in management has dropped the ball.
Agreed, both AMEX Green cards are particularly in need of a revamp. The Business Green has no value proposition at all and the personal only has a smidge as the earning categories and no FT fee make it AMEX’s true travel card. But they did nothing at all to make up for the loss of LoungeBuddy and I don’t think most people care about CLEAR, which means you are paying more than CSP, Strata Premier, or a Venture card while having similar earning rates and no really useful credits to speak of.
As I have watched the Amex “Offers” over the years and how pitiful they hace become I have now not even looked at an “offer” in over a year. A few years ago I could count on using many of these offers. Sure, there are 100 at least on each card but not for anything I want.
Considering many don’t want the coupons . . . let’s see . . . a card that gets the *same* 5x on its issuer’s travel portal, 3x on dining, 2x on other travel. Chase Sapphire PREFERRED. Sadly, that’s the comparison for points earning.
It’s hard to justify putting meaningful spend on the Amex Platinum (as well as a number of other Amex cards). As a consumer, Amex has become uncompetitive. Amex seems to be behind the power curve.
I would hope a pivot toward Gen Z and millennials means less crap like Wall Street Journal subscriptions. But I’d be interested to see how this differs from Bilt, who are going after that cohort with benefits that are much more relevant to their lives. Either way, I should probably get a platinum before they (clearly) up the annual fee.
Presumably they’ll raise the annual fee again, so we’ll see what happens with the benefits and whether I can justify keeping the card, or if I cancel it and decide to put that AF line in the budget onto another card (or cards).
C’mon Nick, there is zero chance they increase the multipliers on this card.
I do wonder with this rollout if they will finally beat the Shop Small + Restaurants 15X Resy SUB from the last refresh. That was an absolute bonanza.
Please increase the annual fee by a lot so people will just cancel. That would really help with the overcrowding thanks!
No doubt all changes will be “Due to customer demand”.
I hope they don’t lose sight of the older segment out here. You need to be retired in order to maximize all of the tedious coupon benefits amongst several Plat and Gold cards. It’s a full-time job. If you don’t live in a city, that adds another layer of effort to run around picking up food orders, $7 Dunkin coffee drink, Visa GC at office depot, cobbling together Uber Eats and multiple Grubhub orders for each $10-$20 coupon. Then there is the illustrious Saks $50, which has devolved into no longer having the Bombas socks I like. We don’t travel to resorts, we stay in apartments, so no use of hotel credits. The silver lining is the large signup bonus.
And since Amex will want a return on said investment, they will be raising the AF to $895
I honestly wouldn’t be surprised to see a bunch of new use it or lose it credits added (more than the rumored CSR) and have them go all the way to $995.