I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it sounds like D-Day has arrived for paying tax / utility bills on the Platinum charge card and Platinum Reserve credit card - they're getting similar "enhancements" to what was rolled out on the Platinum Edge credit card (and a few other lower cards) a couple of months ago.
Just got off the phone to my Amex account manager, and from 1 October 2012 the MR points earning on the two cards are changing as follows:
Restaurants in Australia: 1 point + 2 bonus points per $1 spent
Travel (including airlines and accommodation), and foreign currency transactions: 1 point + 1 bonus point per $1 spent
Everything else: 1 point per $1 spent
Utilities & ATO: 0.5 points per $1 spent
For the Platinum charge card the bonus points will be capped at 300,000 points per annum, and for the Platinum Reserve credit card the bonus points will be capped at 150,000 points per annum.
Affected cardholders are currently in the process of being notified - it sounds like account managers are doing the ring-around to their clients at the moment, and everyone will be getting a letter in the near future.
I guess the above changes could actually be positive for some cardholders depending on spend pattern (as opposed to the Edge changes, which could only have been universally negative), but it's definitely a huge negative for those of us paying large ATO bills via one of these cards. As one other small positive, my account manager did confirm that the point-earn for the Qantas and Velocity Ultimate cards is not changing - she made it sound like Amex can't change these even if they wanted to due to contractual requirements with Qantas & Virgin.
I was also advised of a couple of other (genuine) enhancements being introduced - not sure of the date of introduction nor whether they're just for Platinum charge cardholders or whether they apply to the Platinum Reserve credit card too:
1) Some sort of price-match service for Business and First class seats across a decent range of airlines - a bit "who cares" unless you really want to use Platinum Travel, as you mind as well just book via whatever source provided you with a cheaper price.
2) Virgin Australia lounge access - potentially a genuinely useful benefit.
So there you have it - I suspected this day was coming, but I was still holding out hope that Amex would leave their premium cards alone
Just got off the phone to my Amex account manager, and from 1 October 2012 the MR points earning on the two cards are changing as follows:
Restaurants in Australia: 1 point + 2 bonus points per $1 spent
Travel (including airlines and accommodation), and foreign currency transactions: 1 point + 1 bonus point per $1 spent
Everything else: 1 point per $1 spent
Utilities & ATO: 0.5 points per $1 spent
For the Platinum charge card the bonus points will be capped at 300,000 points per annum, and for the Platinum Reserve credit card the bonus points will be capped at 150,000 points per annum.
Affected cardholders are currently in the process of being notified - it sounds like account managers are doing the ring-around to their clients at the moment, and everyone will be getting a letter in the near future.
I guess the above changes could actually be positive for some cardholders depending on spend pattern (as opposed to the Edge changes, which could only have been universally negative), but it's definitely a huge negative for those of us paying large ATO bills via one of these cards. As one other small positive, my account manager did confirm that the point-earn for the Qantas and Velocity Ultimate cards is not changing - she made it sound like Amex can't change these even if they wanted to due to contractual requirements with Qantas & Virgin.
I was also advised of a couple of other (genuine) enhancements being introduced - not sure of the date of introduction nor whether they're just for Platinum charge cardholders or whether they apply to the Platinum Reserve credit card too:
1) Some sort of price-match service for Business and First class seats across a decent range of airlines - a bit "who cares" unless you really want to use Platinum Travel, as you mind as well just book via whatever source provided you with a cheaper price.
2) Virgin Australia lounge access - potentially a genuinely useful benefit.
So there you have it - I suspected this day was coming, but I was still holding out hope that Amex would leave their premium cards alone
), but in the same basket is all other government, utilities, telecommunications and insurance. I'm sure we all pay a mobile bill and some sort of insurance annually as a minimum, and that can be fair scratch.
