The Business Platinum Card® From American Express Review

Who Is the Business Platinum Card From American Express Good For?

The American Express Business Platinum Card is part of the Membership Rewards program and the top premium business card offered by American Express. It carries a high annual fee, but the exclusive benefits are worth the high cost of admission.

Cardholders receive a sizable sign-up bonus, free access to airport lounges, an annual credit for airline incidentals, credit for Global Entry or TSA Pre-Check, gold statuses in hotel loyalty programs, and many other benefits.

However, you’d be hard pressed to call its earning scheme generous. The Business Gold Rewards card is much more generous for earning Membership Rewards points and its annual fee is roughly 2.5 times less.

Remember that the American Express Business Platinum Card is a charge card so you are expected to pay your balance in full every month.

Sign-Up Bonus:

The current sign-up bonus is 120,000 Membership Rewards points after charging $15,000 on eligible purchases with your card in the first three months. Eligible purchases can be made by the primary card member and any employee card members in a single card account. That means if you open employee cards, your employees will help you earn the welcome offer.

It’s important to note that eligible purchases do not include fees or interest charges, purchases of traveler’s checks, purchases or reloading of prepaid cards, purchases of gift cards, person-to-person payments, or purchases of other cash equivalents.

Points Earned:

• 5X points on flights and prepaid hotels booked on AmexTravel.com
• 1.5X points on eligible purchases in key business categories and on eligible purchases of $5K or more everywhere else. Cap applies
• 1 point per dollar on other eligible purchases.

What Do Your Points Get You?

The benefits of the Platinum card are diverse and plentiful, but most of them are centered around travel. Of course, you can use your Membership Reward points to buy gift cards, pay your credit card balance, shop, etc., but if you do use it for travel, you will see why it’s more than worth the annual fee.

First, Platinum card membership allows you to get 35 percent of your Membership Rewards points back if you book a business or first class fare on any carrier or any cabin with your designated airline if you pay with points through the American Express Travel website, up to 1,000,000 bonus points back per calendar year.

That already gives you a terrific value, but you might do much better if you transfer your points to a  participating partner airlines’ frequent flyer account. That can be especially lucrative if you redeem your points for expensive tickets, like premium cabin seats.

Usage Perks:

• 120,000-point sign-up bonus
• $200 airline fee credit per year for incidental airline fees
• $189 CLEAR® Plus credit
• $100 credit for TSA Pre-Check or Global Entry
• 35% rebate on eligible airfare purchased through the Amex travel website
• Free Access to Centurion Lounges, The Global Lounge Collection, Delta Sky Clubs, and Plaza Premium Lounges
• Priority Pass lounge membership
• Marriott Bonvoy™ Gold Elite Status
• Hilton HHonors Gold Status
• Occasional bonuses for airline transfers

Usage Quirks:

• High annual fee
• Free Priority Pass lounge access is limited to the cardholder
• $200 airline fee credit is for one designated airline only
• Some airline transfers are not instant

How Far Do Your Points Go?

When you use Pay With Points for booking your designated airline, you will receive a 35 percent rebate for a value of 1.5 cents per point. This is a great redemption, as the Platinum card is the only publicly available card in the Membership Rewards family that can get you more than 1x return without transferring to an airline program.

For example, if you spend 40,000 points to book a $400 ticket, you will get 14,000 points back that you can use at a later time. It’s like getting $140 back from a $400 purchase.

Of course, you can get a better return if you transfer your points to partner airlines and redeem them for award tickets on really expensive flights. For example, using the Membership Rewards points to redeem a premium class flight on Cathay Pacific between New York and Hong Kong in first class can yield up to 13 cents per point.

Additional Cardholder Benefits:

• Fine Hotels + Resorts® program and The Hotel Collection benefits
• Trip delay insurance
• No foreign transaction fees
• Trip cancellation and interruption insurance
• Premium car rental privileges
• Business Platinum travel service
• Shop Dell Technologies credits
• Adobe Creative solutions
• Wireless credit
• Preferred Access
• Car rental loss and damage insurance
• Global Dining Access by Resy
• Baggage insurance plan
• Premium Global Assist hotline
• Pay Over Time option
• No preset spending limit
• Employee cards
• Cell phone protection
• Extended warranty
• Purchase protection