Amex Details Next Round of Business Platinum Card Improvements

March 06, 2017

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3 min read

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Update 4/4/17: Amex has confirmed that the Business Platinum card will be available in a metal version later this year.

Update 3/6/17 11:20am: We reached out to Amex for clarification on a few points below:

Metal card — there are no plans to issue The Enhanced Business Platinum Card from American Express OPEN in metal at this time.
5x on Pay with Points bookings — you won't earn points on flights booked as part of a Pay with Points redemption, so the 5x earning rate will not apply to these reservations.
Employee cards — Platinum, Gold and Green authorized user cards can earn 5x points on airfare and prepaid hotels booked through Amextravel.com as of March 30, 2017. Points will be deposited into the master account.
Priority Pass — the benefit of two additional guests will apply automatically for all lounge visits beginning March 30. There is no need to request this feature to be added to your account.

March 30 is a very big day for the Amex Platinum card — and now we know that this product's business counterpart will be getting some notable updates, too. On that date, the Business Platinum Card from American Express OPEN will add the following benefits, as Amex confirmed to TPG:

5 points per dollar on airfare and prepaid hotels booked at Amextravel.com — this almost matches the consumer card benefit, but note that unlike with that card, you won't earn 5x on airfare purchased directly through an airline.
Priority Pass Select improvements — enrolled cardmembers will now be permitted two guests.

So, great, that means the fee's going up, too, right? Fortunately not. The Business Platinum Card's fee will remain at $450.

These are the only confirmed changes at this time — while there's still a few weeks to add perks like the Uber credit and metal card before March 30, I wouldn't expect those features to make their way over to the biz product unless the fee gets bumped up to $550 (which we don't want to see, of course).

These two benefits join the card's other recent major addition: the ability to redeem points toward airfare at 2 cents apiece. With 5x points on airfare booked at Amextravel.com and the 50% rebate on revenue flight redemptions, this could easily become your go-to card for booking flights — whether you're paying cash for a business trip or redeeming points for leisure.