I need to admit this…I like perks and I like free things. Only one of those things comes with the American Express Platinum card, sort of, this card has TONS of perks, but it has a $695 annual fee which has always stopped me in my tracks.
Why did I jump into the deep end with this credit card? Several things happened all at once, I started listening to a new podcast called All The Hacks by Chris Hutchins which he interviewed several points and miles gurus. One of the guests mentioned the Amex Platinum perks are amazing, call me intrigued by the word “perks”. Amex happened to be doing a very big sign-up bonus of 125,000 American Express points at the time of my sign up. Lastly, American Express does have a great group of transfer partners and they offer bonuses from time to time on those transfers. Assuming I can take advantage of them, that would be a bonus win.
However, I had this deep seeded idea the only people that owned those cards were a different type of elite class of people. After shaking off the simulated “Amex” prestige, I decided to take the plunge and try it for year. I started tracking perks and bennies from the card against the annual fee. Cause if I’m not tracking this and I can’t do my own ROI on it. Yep, I just dropped ROI in this post.
Here is my first year (more accurately first 3 months) of American Express Platinum Annual Fees vs. Credits to Offset the Fee
American Express Annual Fee $695
Annual Expenses:
Clear (Airport Access) -$189
Walmart + (monthly fee credit 13.73 x 12) -$165
Peacock Streaming Service (10.95 x 12) -$131
Subtotal Remaining $210
One off Expenses
TSA Precheck (only need every 5 years so this is one off for this year only) -$78.
Airline fee credit -$91. This is up to $200 in credit a year, I can still maximize this credit.
Subtotal Remaining $41
Discretionary Amex Offers
Tax Act (30% back) – well I had to do my taxes so that was an easy one -$19
Flowers for Mom & Auntie – Mother’s Day gift (check!) -$30
Uber credit -$15
Officially I’m at $23 and counting in the positive for on things I purchased through my card for the year. Admittedly, I was not a Clear member prior to getting this card but I since it was free, I decided to join it. I kind of feel like that is cheating but I’m leveraging it and it saved me a bunch of time for one of my recent trips, so it’s a win in a my book.
There has been more discretionary Amex offers that I’ve used! I found several more that I have taken advantage in addition to the ones listed above. I’m going to continue to track them throughout the year to see what my final total is going to be. So far…I’m thinking I might be able to make this work from year to year.
This credit card gives you access to a bunch of airport lounges which is difficult to quantify as a value of savings, but I used one lounge so far with free snacks and drinks which was an enjoyable experience. Kind of makes we wish I got to the airport earlier so I could have ordered a meal in the lounge…hello free food at the airport! Where have you been hiding?! Oh yeah, behind the perks of that shiny Platinum Amex card that I was always running away from before. I would be remiss to not to mention the bathrooms are for lounge patrons only, need I say more?
There is a lot more to come on that little gem of a perk, I have a few more trips planned this year so I plan on definitely leveraging that puppy some more. I didn’t even touch a few of other standard perks that come with the card so I think I’ll leave that for the next post.
