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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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.
I am hoping that we will not see an elite credit card war escalating between Chase and Amex with fees spiralling out of control and “couponization” of credits becoming unwieldy to the typical consumer. Makes me wonder where all this will end.
The title should be Major Annual Fee Increase coming to Amex Platinum Cards, just a joke.
We all know that the platinum will cost around a $1,000 ($995 just to avoid the 4 digits figures)
They may add new harder coupons, making its harder to compensate the annual fee.
Maybe it’s should be Annual Major Fee increase
All I want is the Citi Prestige replacement.
Interesting timing… they clearly wanted to ruin the big Chase Sapphire announcement…
Chase has already done that. Own goal.
For starters , they can make the gold cards of real gold. Same with platinum.
$3 off any Dominos pizza, good once per day between the hours of 1am and 5am. That’s a value of $1,095 per year ($1,098 in leap years), largely offsetting the annual fee of $1,495.
Ultimate couponing! Exactly what the high net worth individuals they target are looking for!
Hourly $1 Walmart credit will be also great
fee will go up. more couponing and checkboxes to fill to justify the increase in annual fee. we’ll get write-up of how it is still a good value despite having to spend $500+ on stuff we wouldn’t ordinarily spend $ on (see: Saph Reserve last week)
You mean the post where they repeatedly said most people would be hurt by the changes? That it would require a lot of work to break even?
Will EVERY OTHER blog and websites write glowing reviews telling you to sign up through their affiliate link right now? Yes. But be fair to FM. That article stressed multiple times the changes were bad AND most people wouldn’t profit from the card.