UPDATE: This offer has expired.
Back in May the The Business Platinum® Card from American Express OPEN upped its publicly available offer where you could receive up to 100,000 points. This is a reminder that this offer ends in just one week on August 8, 2018. While this is a great offer, the minimum spend is ridiculously highly making it unobtainable for many folks. You’ll need to spend $25,000 on the card within the first 3 months to earn the full 100,000 bonus points! However, if you are able to generate this much spend on the card that is great and definitely an offer I suggest taking advantage of. This high of an offer doesn’t come around too often, so I am glad that it popped up again for a few months.
- The Business Platinum® Card from American Express OPEN – Limited Time Offer: Earn up to 100,000 Membership Rewards® Points. Earn 50,000 Membership Rewards® points after you spend $10,000 & an extra 50,000 points after you spend an additional $15,000 all on qualifying purchases within your first 3 months of Card Membership. Offer ends 8/8/18. *Terms Apply.
While this card does come with a $450 annual fee (yikes!), there are some great benefits to the card which can absolutely outweigh the fee, especially the first year you have the card. One other thing I want to point out is that this card does NOT count towards Chase’s “5/24” rule since it is an Amex business credit card.
Card Benefits
$200 Airline Credit Per Year, So Get $400 in Credits 1st Year!
While this card comes with a high $450 annual fee (not waived the first year), there are some perks that can help outweigh the cost. First off, you’ll receive up to $200 airline credit per calendar year for your selected airline. That means if you apply for the card now, you can receive a $200 statement credit between now and the end of the year and then again starting January 1, 2019. That means it is possible to receive up to a $400 credit in your first year of having the card. This can really help out weight the annual fee!
Lounge Access
This card also gives you complimentary access to select airport lounges. This includes participating Delta Sky Club lounges, Priority Pass lounges, Airspace lounges, and Centurion lounges. This is one of the better perks of the card for those that fly often and enjoy the access of lounges throughout the world. I personally am a huge fan of the Centurion Lounges, but unfortunately there are not too many of them throughout the United States.
Global Entry
With this card, you’ll receive free Global Entry. You will receive a statement credit for $100 after applying and paying the $100 application fee for the Global Entry program. This membership is valid for 5 years and allows you to quickly get through US customs. You can also instead decide to receive TSA PreCheck instead (which costs $85 and you’ll be reimbursed), but since Global Entry comes with TSA PreCheck, you might as well get both, assuming you’ll travel outside the country within the next 5 years. And if you already have Global Entry, you can use the statement credit on someone else’s Global Entry fee. Just pay their $100 application with your card and the statement credit will hit your account within a few days. The names do not need to match.
Starwood, Marriott, and Hilton Gold Status
This card will automatically give you Starwood and Hilton Gold status. And since you can match your Starwood and Marriott status, once you receive SPG Gold status you can leverage that to earn Marriott Gold status! Or you’ll automatically be upgraded when the loyalty programs combine on August 26th. You can learn more about this automatic status and what the status will get you here.
Earning Points
With this card you’ll also earn 1x point on all purchases, however, a new-ish bonus was added last year – for purchases over $5,000 you’ll earn 1.5x points on your purchase (up to 1 million bonus points per year). This is great for those that have high purchases, but probably not very common for the average person. You’ll also earn 5x points on flights and prepaid hotels booked on amextravel.com.
35% Airline Bonus
Another relatively new perk of the card is that when you use your Membership Rewards Pay with points for all or part of a flight, you’ll get 35% of your points back for both: 1) First and Business Class tickets with all airlines available with American Express Travel; and 2) Economy class tickets with your selected qualifying airline. You are able to select one airline of choice for the year and this is the airline you can receive both the $200 statement credit and 35% points back (for economy tickets) for the year. For example, if you book a flight that costs $500, that will require you to use 50,000 points. You’ll then receive 35% of the points used, thus 17,500 points, back to your account to use for a future flight.
Overall…
This is a great card for the welcome offer alone. I personally like to use my Membership Reward points to transfer to partner loyalty programs, although with the 35% point back benefit, that can actually be a great redemption option too. When transferring to partner loyalty programs, I value the 100,000 points to be worth at least $2,000 in travel. Although, for those that prefer to redeem their points for business or first class, you’ll most likely receive even more value from the points since those flights cost significantly more if you were to actually pay for them. Or, if you’d prefer to use them another way (i.e., redeeming for gift cards, etc.), the 100,000 points is worth at least $1,000 (not recommended, but still good for those that prefer an easy redemption).
Unfortunately, I’ve applied for this card in the past (also during a 100,000 point offer many years ago), so I am no longer eligible for this card. American Express now has a once in a lifetime rule for all cards.
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