American Express has added a new benefit to their Business Platinum credit card, when you pay for flights with points you’ll receive a 30% rebate. Here is the official announcement:
We are pleased to announce that, beginning July 1, 2015, you can get 30% Membership Rewards®1 points back when you use the Pay with Points2 feature for all or part of a flight with the airline you select†. There are no blackout dates or seat restrictions, and you can still earn frequent flyer miles when using Membership Rewards points. To take advantage of this benefit, simply choose the airline that’s best for you from the eligible options and book your flight using the American Express Travel site or by calling Business Platinum Travel Service.
Look for more information on how to select an airline and full terms and conditions from American Express on July 1, 2015 when this benefit becomes available.
†The selected airline will be applied to both this new benefit and the $200 Airline Fee Credit3 benefit.
Basically you need to select an airline (and this is the same airline that you’ll receive the $200 incidental airline credit on) and when you use the pay with points feature you’ll receive 30% of the Membership Rewards back. This is a bit of a back flip, as earlier this year they said they would remove a 20% rebate. The big difference is that with the old rebate you received it for booking ANY airline, not just the single airline you specify.
Personally I preferred the old benefit as I have absolutely no loyalty to any airline and generally just choose the cheapest flight (within reason). When you redeem Membership Rewards points using pay with points, they are worth 1¢ each. Under this new benefit they would be worth up to 1.425¢ (remember that you can get a rebate on your rebate).
1.425¢ is a pretty good redemption value in my mind. The good thing about using pay with points is because they are considered a revenue ticket you’ll earn airline miles and status. If you don’t already have the American Express business platinum, remember it’s possible to get a 100,000 point sign up bonus simply by calling in.
What are your thoughts on this new benefit? Do you prefer it over the previous 20% bonus? Let us know in the comments.
I have an offer to upgrade my Amex BRG to Platinum for 30,000 additional points. I have not been inclined to do that, because I would lose thousands of points that I get from bonus categories. Now, I’m wondering if I should rack up a bunch of points, get my upgrade to Platinum, spend the points, then downgrade back to Gold. Of course, if I did that, I would waste my opportunity to get a 100K bonus for opening a Plat later on, so I’m probably not going to do it, but it’s at least worth thinking about.