American Express has announced some disappointing news today, advising that Priority Pass memberships obtained as a benefit from Amex cards will lose access to Priority Pass restaurants from August 1, 2019.
These restaurant options have been a welcome addition to Priority Pass for several reasons. They’re the only option at some airports with no other Priority Pass lounges, they offer more filling meal options than most lounges and can be in more convenient locations at airports with multiple terminals. I’ve used this benefit numerous times, most recently at Jerry Remy’s Sports Bar & Grill at Boston Airport to order some tasty tuna burger sliders topped with seaweed salad and sriracha aioli.
It’ll be interesting to see if Chase follows American Express in removing access to Priority Pass restaurants or if they’ll keep it as a benefit for customers in order to differentiate themselves. The pessimist in me assumes that they’ll also remove restaurant access at some point in the coming months, but I’d love for them to prove me wrong. The Priority Pass membership that comes with the Chase Sapphire Reserve card offers unlimited guesting privileges, so Priority Pass could be incurring large costs by allowing unlimited guests for restaurants. If they try passing those costs on to Chase (which might be what’s led to this Amex change), I can’t imagine Chase will want to subsidize that for much longer.
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[…] devalued their Platinum cards (and other cards that offer Priority Pass) when they dropped Priority Pass restaurants. On the other hand, the same cards increased in value with the addition of travel protections: […]
[…] Airport Lounge Access – Priority Pass Select Lounges: Priority Pass Select member plus two guests are allowed free entrance. Unfortunately, beginning Aug 1 2019 this membership will not include Priority Pass restaurants. […]
It’s Amex that is doing the devaluation. And this is after I just paid $595 for the business Platinum
Anyone know how to figure out which priority pass is with which card? I have so many I can’t tell anymore
“Priority Pass cards with 16 digits on the front are issued by Chase, while cards with 11 digits on the front are issued by other banks, including American Express and Citi.” Quoted from One Mile At A Time, which credited DoC.
The one from chase should start with 735, while the ones from American Express and Citi should all start with 142 and end with 1. To further differentiate, you have to call the number on the back of your priority pass card to inquire.
Remember:
1) they fed you on the plane
2) it’s all junk anyway
3) you’re already too fat!
According to Doctor of Credit, this is only for Amex cards issued in Hong Kong.
That was the case initially, but Gary at VFTW has confirmed today that US cards will also be affected from August 1.
Damn!
So in this arrangement, the restaurants would bill back Priority Pass the $28 credits/charges…and then didn’t Priority Pass ever charge/bill AMEX (perhaps like they would like for lounge visits??) or was Priority Pass always covering/eating that cost? Did they recently begin passing that charge onto the AMEX? Just trying to understand who was on the hook for all these increased $$ coming through. Thanks for the info.
I’m not too sure exactly how this worked. My guess would be that Amex paid Priority Pass x amount for every customer who got a Priority Pass membership. It might be that Priority Pass is now trying to charge more to offset their increased costs due to restaurants, but that’s just speculation on my end.
Thanks. The reason why I asked i because I’m trying to decide/determine who’s fault this is/who to blame. As an Aspire cardholder, one benefit I received was the PP membership….and one of the benefits of said membership (of having the card) was the restaurant credit, which they added to their portfolio. That is certainly something that AMEX doesn’t control. But if PP made the change to now exclude AMEX cardholders to the restaurants, then there is something going on where AMEX was involved financially or PP just doesn’t want to deal with all the influx of AMEX cardholders coming in. So by excluding them, we get screwed over from the overall benefits that should be extended. If it’s the latter, then while it may not be AMEXs fault, what are they doing to appease their members who were expecting this benefit?
It is AMEX denies the benefit. PP has nothing to do with it.
Priority pass is basically worthless any more save for the restaurants. Without that it is of very little value to me. The signs at most of my visited lounges are permanently out that say no priority pass so restaurants are my only use.
Agreed. The CLT lounge is a “minute suites” which is limited to 1 hour and no snacks. Great for business travelers who need a spot to take a call or do work in quiet, but otherwise pretty much useless for me on personal travel. Huge reason I’m already considering ditching Priority Pass (or at least trimming to one card only between myself and wife) and signing up for Amex for their lounge access when they open next year. As they continue to cut back in other airports their value to me continues to shrink.
That was one of the things that made Platinum card worth holding and more of a break even – Makes CSR so much more attractive as well as other premium cards.
I’d give Chase about 2 weeks before they follow Amex in removing restaurants. Of course I’m a hard-core pessimist so hopefully I’m wrong! But the CC and loyalty program world is a fickle one of race-to-the-bottom mindsets!
The Reserve no longer offers unlimited guests. That is long gone.
That’s a good point – I don’t know why I still had in my mind that they still offered unlimited visits.