American Express Platinum Benefit

we are on the shadow in sept and used our AEP card to pay, and got an obc AND a "bottle of DOM" . has anyone used this benefit before, and is there a chance to change to DOM to another kind of champagne or ...... caviar? :D

thanks,

anthony

We bring our Dom home with us. Although on two trips we did change it of for high end bottles of BV. Then on another voyage they said it keep it or leave it in the room. I did not push it because it's not AMX who is buying this for you. It's AMX forcing them to give it to you to keep their relationship. You can play it by ear when you get on board.

Yes, in the past decade (not for our current two booked SS cruises tho) for almost a dozen SS cruises we have used our AMX-Platinum card to receive the $300 SBC, bottle of Dom, and an invitation for a Galley tour. (we did this tour once on the Whisper). We enjoyed having our butler send the Dom down to Le Champagne and often shared the bottle with cruise friends or share the bottle of Dom when invited to a ship's officer's table.

Now, however we pay our Silversea cruise final payments with the Chase Saphhire Reserve card. For travel expenses you get 3 Chase Ultimate reward points for every dollar you spend. So, if you total cruise SS payment is (for example) $25K you will get 75K points (good to transfer to some airlines/hotels) or you can take $750 cash (compare with AMX-P; $300 SBC plus about $150 bottle of Dom). Also, annually this Chase card will give you a $300 Travel credit (so if you use your card to pay for excursions, you can get a $300 credit if you have not used your card for previous travel expenses within the year). Finally, you get up to 20K trip cancellation insurance when you make any payment of your SS cruise on this card.

Yes, in the past decade (not for our current two booked SS cruises tho) for almost a dozen SS cruises we have used our AMX-Platinum card to receive the $300 SBC, bottle of Dom, and an invitation for a Galley tour. (we did this tour once on the Whisper). We enjoyed having our butler send the Dom down to Le Champagne and often shared the bottle with cruise friends or share the bottle of Dom when invited to a ship's officer's table.

 

Now, however we pay our Silversea cruise final payments with the Chase Saphhire Reserve card. For travel expenses you get 3 Chase Ultimate reward points for every dollar you spend. So, if you total cruise SS payment is (for example) $25K you will get 75K points (good to transfer to some airlines/hotels) or you can take $750 cash (compare with AMX-P; $300 SBC plus about $150 bottle of Dom). Also, annually this Chase card will give you a $300 Travel credit (so if you use your card to pay for excursions, you can get a $300 credit if you have not used your card for previous travel expenses within the year). Finally, you get up to 20K trip cancellation insurance when you make any payment of your SS cruise on this card.

I'with you, Wes. I use the Chase Sapphire Reserve card exclusively now. The points and benefits received far outweigh the $300 OBC and champagne from the Amex Platinum card. IN fact, I have been an Amex Platinum cardholder since the 70s but will probably cancel this year because the higher annual fee is no longer worth it to me.

Henry, understand and agree; we are relative (compared to your AMX seniority) AMX-P virgins (have had this card since early 2000s). However, we already canx'd Ida's AMX-P since she has new AMX Blu + card to keep her Memberhip Reward points alive.

Kept my AMX-P as Schwab pays $200 of the $550 annual fee with a statement credit every year--use the $200 airline fee up too and since we now use UBER will get near the $200 credit per year with UBER. Thus, will make out just ahead of the AMX-P $550 annual fee (but it takes some work).

Yeah, I've only had the AMEX Platinum for a about 3 years...but it has paid for itself so far (Global Entry, Airline Reimbursement, Points, Rental & Hotel Status, Warranties, etc. Not a big fan of the increase, but have already used some Uber credits and curious to see how the 5x travel benefits pan out.

Never had Dom Perignon so trying it at least once will be interesting. Too bad it isn't the P2 version. ;)

I think much of these decisions are very personal, and value is based on priorities and circumstances. I never bothered with the card before 3 years ago because I was a frequent traveler using a corporate card. I was the highest status with most travel programs so the travel perks didn't provide any direct value. Now, 3-years later I am a nobody :D so some of these perks have proven beneficial.

In addition to the $300 SBC and DOM, I also use Amex Platinum for access to Delta SkyClub, $200 of Delta fee credits (usually checked bags when wife traveling on her own or to get her into SkyClub or food on plane or high end booze in Sky Club) and now can get up to $200 of Uber credits a year. I don't actually use Amex Plat to pay for the entire cruise, I use Delta Amex for that.

Marc

I use my Amex P card Rewards Points for gift cards at Home Depot. They are especially valuable when the HD cards go on sale for 20% off.

Henry, understand and agree; we are relative (compared to your AMX seniority) AMX-P virgins (have had this card since early 2000s). However, we already canx'd Ida's AMX-P since she has new AMX Blu + card to keep her Memberhip Reward points alive.

 

Kept my AMX-P as Schwab pays $200 of the $550 annual fee with a statement credit every year--use the $200 airline fee up too and since we now use UBER will get near the $200 credit per year with UBER. Thus, will make out just ahead of the AMX-P $550 annual fee (but it takes some work).

Since I don't use Uber at all and I get Priority Pass Lounge entry from CSR plus a $300 travel credit annually I made the decision to "Amexit." Hope it will be less complicated than what Britain is in for.

Since I don't use Uber at all and I get Priority Pass Lounge entry from CSR plus a $300 travel credit annually I made the decision to "Amexit." Hope it will be less complicated than what Britain is in for.

I was considering an "AMEXit" as well (nice pun BTW) but have decided not to for the moment. Reason 1 (small reason) is that Uber is finally in Upstate NY and I may actually use it.

Reason 2 is that they have redone their International Airline benefit. Their old program was fairly useless - a "2-for-1" fare on International business class seats that was never useful to me. I could always find two discounted seats for less than the (full-fare) single ticket that they wanted to sell. Plus, the person traveling on the free ticket didn't earn miles for the flight.

Now, however, the program offers discounted tickets at a (sometimes) substantial discount. The tickets earn miles but in my one experience with the program, the savings are substantial compared to what I can find on my own. Details:

Flying to Australia next March. Wanted to go Albany-LAX (requires one stop) then Sydney, and come home from Melbourne to LAX-Albany. Tickets ranged from $6800-10K every time I looked. Not happening. So I thought of buying just the LAX-AUS legs from Virgin Australia, and flying ALB-LAX on miles. That was more reasonable but still almost 6K per person. Plus it's two separate itineraries so if one of the ALB-LAX legs is delayed and I miss the Virgin flight from LAX it's all over.

So I decided to try their program out and they got me single-itinerary tickets from ALB-SYD and MEL-ALB, domestic F and International Biz, for less than the cost of buying the Transpacific flights from Virgin. So the membership fee was paid back about 5x with that transaction. I'll keep them for now.

JP, one of our fav miles/points blogger's agrees, he estimates using the AMX-P card to pay for air, gives you an 8.5% return easily making the $550 fee back. Pls see the link below for a good summary of the AMX-P bennies:

http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.com/2017/03/03/amex-platinum-card-still-worth-it/

When we take Uber next Thursday (flying to London to catch the Silver Wind for Norway) we will enjoy the $15 monthly credit that the my Schwab AMX-P card provides. On our return home at the end of the month by using the code AMEXUBER we will get another $30 credit (different from AMX-P monthly credit)

Amex platinum in the UK brings you zero benefits with Silversea - lucky you people in USA! Booking with a credit card costs extra in UK.

:eek:

Amex platinum in the UK brings you zero benefits with Silversea - lucky you people in USA! Booking with a credit card costs extra in UK.

Amex platinum in the UK brings you zero benefits with Silversea - lucky you people in USA! Booking with a credit card costs extra in UK.

You can still get the $300 OBC and a bottle of DP by using the Amex Plat in the UK but in order to do so, you have to book through Amex travel and you cannot use any other agent or even Silversea directly. I tried to do so recently but Amex travel out-source their cruise bookings and , frankly, they were so clueless about cruises at this level and so hard to deal with that I gave up and went elsewhere.

Rp

I love my Chase Sapphire Reserve - got TSA Pre Check reimbursed and other travel costs, etc as well as a generous mileage bonus - if this new airline purchase program pans out it may be worth taking another look at AMEX Platinum the old 2 for 1 was not worth it when I looked at it for Tahiti last year.

We liked the Amex Platinum 2 for one for two reasons: the tickets were refundable and we didn't have to buy trip insurance for any refundable portion of the trip. While that is not a big deal on short flights, we are saving a lot on our upcoming flights to Sydney and home from Singapore on Qatar.

We liked the Amex Platinum 2 for one for two reasons: the tickets were refundable and we didn't have to buy trip insurance for any refundable portion of the trip. While that is not a big deal on short flights, we are saving a lot on our upcoming flights to Sydney and home from Singapore on Qatar.

Good point and one I hadn't considered (I refuse to think about the possibility of not going on a trip). For me, since I always shop for air tix well in advance and check a ton of different sites, permutations, etc, I have always been able to beat the 2-for-1 price. Since that is based on one full-price fare, I can find a nonrefundable fare that's less than 50% of the full-price fare, so even doubling those fares is cheaper.

So the 2-for-1 option has never been the cheapest option - for me. I suspect it might be good if Chris and I "need" to go somewhere last-minute, when there might be no discount fares to be found.

For how I usually shop, this new setup is way better. I got about $2500 off the absolute lowest price that I could find for two tickets on this upcoming Australia itinerary. And this was after searching for several months, using all the tricks I know of. That makes AMEX worth the fee for me, this year. And I already have to renew GE next year so that's another plus.

Some years, we use the heck out of the Hotels program with AMEX and other years we don't. Sometimes the rates are pretty good and sometimes not. I usually compare their prices with the best price I can get booking directly. At times, the deals are quite good. For instance, I booked Four Seasons Budapest for our pre-cruise stay last year. The rate AMEX offered was the same as the direct booking rate on the Four Seasons' website for a basic room. But AMEX added breakfast for two ($80 per day), plus $100 F&B credit (paid for most of dinner the first night), plus a two-category upgrade to a Danube View Room (at least $100 rate difference per night). So the hotel turned out to be much cheaper when booked through AMEX.

Careful, though, this is not always the case and AMEX rates at times can be much higher than you can get independently. The main point is to take advantage of these benefits when it's advantageous - for you. I've found that their added value varies greatly and you have to pay attention. This year, I haven't used their hotel program at all.

Now, whether I'd actually spend that much money on those perks if I were buying them outright, as compared to "getting them back" from money already spent, is another question entirely, though. Many of them are useful but few other than GE are truly something I'd pay full price for. If I hadn't had the free breakfast at Four Seasons, I would not have paid their full price for it, for example...even if it was quite good. So far, I've been able to conjure up enough perks from AMEX to cover their fee every year.

Nonetheless, looks like Chase offers a great product as well. I'm not really familiar with it as I've used AMEX for a while. Great to have these choices! Hope they keep competing and raising the bar. :D

JP- which Australia trip are you planning? Cruise?

Michelle

JP- which Australia trip are you planning? Cruise?

Michelle

2 weeks on land in the south (Barossa, Adelaide, Kangaroo Island, Great Ocean Road, Melbourne, Tasmania). No cruise this time. Even though we limited this trip to a relatively small area, it will be ridiculously busy.

So I needed an open-jaw itinerary starting and ending in a tiny airport where it took two legs to get to LAX for the Transpacific flight. Complicated itinerary, and I was pretty impressed that they saved me so much $$.

Too bad it isn't the P2 version. ;)

JP - Consider a wine tasting at Penfolds when you are in Adelaide. We did it this year and were very impressed. It was well worth the cost.

Sounds like a great trip.

If you like P2, you should really treat yourself to their P3. Heaven!.

what is P2/P3?

Second and third plenitude. It's Dom that has aged on the lees much longer (10-20 years longer) than regular Dom, so it's supposed to taste even better. Now I have to find some!

PS. I had to look this up so don't feel bad for not knowing. ;)

More: https://www.creatingdomperignon.com/a-sense-of-plenitude

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JP - Consider a wine tasting at Penfolds when you are in Adelaide. We did it this year and were very impressed. It was well worth the cost.

 

Sounds like a great trip.

Thanks! Will put it on the ever-expanding to-do list!

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JP - Thanks for the heads up on the Amex Platinum air policy changes. We just booked Delta first(domestic) and business (international) for the 1811 voyage from Dublin to London next may on the Cloud. There was a $900 savings over booking on the Delta site itself. We could have used points to further reduce the cost, but opted to save them for a later date.

Thanks!!