Every so often, American Express targets existing cardholders with an offer to incentivize them into upgrading one or more of their cards. There’s a new opportunity right now for some Business Gold® and Business Green® cardholders to upgrade to a Business Platinum Card® and earn 120,000 bonus Membership Rewards points after spending $10,000 within three months.
(h/t: DOC)
The Deal
- Earn 120,000 bonus Membership Rewards points after $10,000 spend in three months after upgrading a targeted Business Gold or Business Green card to a Business Platinum.
Quick Thoughts
This is a decent offer if you’re targeted for an upgrade. The best publicly available offer on the Business Platinum right now is 200,000 bonus points after $20,000 spend in three months.
Although this upgrade offer awards 80,000 fewer bonus points, it also slashes the spend requirement in half. $20,000 spend in three months will be hard going for some people/businesses, but $10,000 – especially leading up to the holidays when businesses might anticipate spending more on all kinds of items – will be far more achievable.
This is also helpful if you have – or have had – a Business Platinum card and get a pop-up when applying for a new one advising that you’re not eligible for a new welcome bonus. These upgrade offers are a way around that restriction if you’re targeted.
Sadly, this is a targeted offer. My wife and I have a few potential cards that could be upgraded between us, but when logging in and trying to upgrade, we both got a message stating ‘We are sorry. This offer is no longer available.’ The offer is still available; that’s just the wording that Amex uses if you’re not targeted.
Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.
Ironically, I just took advantage of a similar targeted offer by Amex (but more lucrative) to upgrade my personal gold card to the personal platinum and receive a potential 125k bonus after spending just 6k within 6 months. Ironically, I only just cancelled my previous platinum roughly 15 months ago because I felt that the annual fee increase at that time negated the benefits. My bonus on that previous Platinum was 150k bonus. Essentially, in just a short few years my platinum generated me 275k in signup bonuses alone. A very rare occurrence, from what I’ve tried to research with other consumers experiences. And to boot, though the latest platinum annual fee is higher than ever, I feel the new annual credit incentives make this card a very easy YES to hold onto. Easier than ever to recoup much more than the $895 annual fee.
Just a thought – it’d be nice to have a 1st Yr Value estimate for these standard upgrade offers.
Applying the normal FM calculations, the goodies are valued the same, allegedly worth $717.50. The amex points @ 1.5cpp = $1800. The cost of spend is $150 (2% of 10k, the delta between 3% and 1.5%), the AF is 895. By my calculations, that yields a value of $1472.50. Hmm – I actually was targeted for it but I hadn’t worked through the details. That is tempting.
Fwiw I disagree w FM valuations a bit, Hilton credit is overvalued since gift cards no longer available, I’d say they’re worth 25%, like Dell, same for FHR. I’d say wireless credit is basically face value. So I calculate ~$1250… that’s awfully good for an upgrade.
I got targeted, included in a mailer, after opening Biz Gold in January. If it were Personal Platinum (streaming credits, Uber, Lululemon, $400 Resy, etc.) I would do it in a heartbeat, but I don’t think I’ll be able to get any value out of the Biz Platinum. Traveling with small kids, FHR isn’t very useful to me (too expensive to book suites and 1-night stays suck having to unpack/repack).
I got 80k after $8k spend to upgrade my personal gold to personal platinum
FYI – For those who prefer a thinner wallet, the personal Platinum Card is now available in plastic.
DP: Green card downgraded from Platinum 1 month ago – not targeted
When I was in my account, I saw my personal Gold card had an offer to upgrade to Platinum for 50K for $2K spend in 6 months. The post got me thinking it would be good to get a Platinum card now to pay the $695 AF and get the new benefits supposedly coming out tomorrow. So I jumped on the 50K offer.
I wonder what happens if you have accepted a retention offer on your current card. Amex rules typically prohibit making any changes to the card within 12 months of the retention offer acceptance, otherwise they reserve the right to claw back those points. I wonder if this applies to upgrades too?
I did this after 4 months from accepting a retention offer. I hope there is no issue.
The claw back applies to account closures and downgrades. Upgrades should not be affected.
Thanks for posting this. I’m eligible for this offer.
But my amex biz gold currently has employee cards with SUBs in progress.
Does anyone know if these employee cards would continue to be eligible for their SUBs while also being eligible for the new platinum SUB after upgrading?
My personal experience, as well as DPs I have read. Yes, you can double dip with an EC spending offer->Upgrade offer
There is an indirect indicator in the terms and conditions that suggests yes. That is, if you upgrade from Biz Gold to Biz Platinum, the “add employee” bonus on the Biz Gold will carry forward. To spare yourself annual fees, choose “employee” cards as opposed to “additional user” cards.
what does this mean?
“Our system is currently not responding. To upgrade your Card, please call the number on the back of your Card”
IT issues.
P2 Got targeted for this offer, but she has never had the Business Platinum. Think it makes sense to wait for new elevated offer when they launch refreshed cards?
If she’s not had the card before, it would definitely make sense to apply for it new before taking advantage of one of these upgrade offers provided she’d be able to meet the higher spend requirement a new card has.
struck out both P1&P2. have held gold for 3 yrs
I took this offer yesterday since I was targeted for it. Opened the business gold earlier this year for 200k for 10k spend.
This offer is no longer available.
As noted in the post, that means you’re not targeted rather than the offer not being available anymore.
If you previously downgraded from Amex Business Platinum to Business Gold 3 months ago, is this too soon to upgrade back to the Business Platinum? What are best practices? Does AMEX expect you to keep the account at a certain level for a year minimum?
If you’re targeted for this upgrade offer, it’s not too early – you can go ahead and accept the offer without needing to worry. Once you’ve upgraded you’ll want to ensure you keep the Platinum as-is for 12 months if you earn the bonus points to ensure they don’t get clawed back, but upgrading itself right now is perfectly fine.
Thank you for the wisdom.
does it matter if the 12 month requirement is not shown in the offer terms? Still keep as-is for 12 months?