AMEX Massively Devalues The Business Centurion Black Card

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The AMEX Centurion card, colloquially known as the Black card, is the most feature-laden card out there.

But it’s a shadow of what it used to be.

The card’s annual fee started off at $1,000 before climbing to $1,500, $2,500, and currently a whopping $5,000 per year. The additional user annual fee is also $5,000 per year.

The initiation fee for new Centurion cardholders is currently $10,000.

The benefits though have crumbled. The card used to offer top-tier status on Continental, USAirways, Virgin Atlantic, Hyatt, and Starwood. Those days are long gone. The card does still offer Delta Platinum, Hilton Diamond, and Hertz Platinum status.

Other benefits like airline fee credits, unlimited inflight WiFi passes, and free premium roadside assistance also fell by the wayside.

But the Business Centurion card does have one killer app. Cardholders got a 50% points rebate on all airfare redemptions, making AMEX points extremely valuable!

It’s a more premium version of the 35% points rebate offered by the AMEX Business Platinum Card. The Business Platinum card also used to offer a 50% rebate, but that was devalued after just 8 months. Currently, it offers a 35% rebate on all airlines in premium cabins and on the airline of your choice in economy, but the offer is capped at 1,000,000 points rebated per year.

Sadly, several readers share that the Business Centurion’s key benefit is being devalued. Effective 2/1/25, you will only be able to receive a rebate of up to 3,000,000 points per calendar year. While that may sound like a lot, you need to spend some seriously major bucks just to qualify for a Business Centurion card, so cardholders earn and burn millions of points annually from spending. With the benefit now capped at 6,000,000 redeemed points, for a rebate of 3,000,000 points per year, you’ll get the rebate on only $60,000 in annual airfare redemptions.

I know some Business Centurion cardholders that redeem tens of millions of points annually, so this will put a serious dent in the card’s value for big spenders.

 

 

Are you affected by this change? Will you still keep your Business Centurion card after this change?

HT: dandu16 and wakimike, via DDF

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21 Comments On "AMEX Massively Devalues The Business Centurion Black Card"

All opinions expressed below are user generated and the opinions aren’t provided, reviewed or endorsed by any advertiser or DansDeals.

Shalom

Seen this, this morning, really bad news.

Dave

“Seen this” ugh nails on a chalkboard

BLK

The benefits are still worth it, will keep it.
Once you hit 6 mm in spend for travel you can use a plat and get 35%.

yelped

Can you please elaborate on how you get $5,000 a year in value?

If you purchased a lot of tickets until now, that could have made sense. How does it still make sense for you?

AE

If he is cashing out 6M points per year, he is getting 3M points extra, worth $30K+. Still more than covers the $5K cost. Even if you just figure the 900K extra points over a Plat (50%-35%) – if you could redeem that many – it would still be worth the cost.

Keep in mind, you are not talking about the average Joe redeeming a few hundred K points per year, or even a Dan, redeeming a M or 2, you are talking about a whale redeeming 5M+ points every year.

For the spend side – no, it absolutely sucks, not worth it in any way, shape or form. Same goes for most of the benefits – not really any different or better than a Plat (unless you have very niche spending habits).

Parvez

On Platinum card did the maximum of 1 million points that you will get using 35%, so that’s not much bargain

Martin

Rich man’s problems

Steven

And they also removed the ability to purchase MR points on Centurion.
Not that it was great value (at 2.5c, up to 250k annually) but at least the option existed, if you wanted to top-up for a big redemption or transfer to an MR loyalty program partner.

EZ

Do you think a petition from Black Cardholders fighting this would sway the AMEX opinion on whether to do this or not?

Parvez

We should try to petition that

Alexander

Personal black card has less benefits for air rebate!

JC

Still worth it
Status symbol plus lots of “extras” received via special invites

Ariel

Sounds like a good problem to have.

Parvez

This is terrible. I hope a lot of people quit using centurion card and paying $5,000 per year and then American Express being the benefit back. They have gotten rid of so many benefits already

Malibumiler

AXP has a market cap of 192 Billion and is up 76% in the last 12 months. Hope they add new benefits in 2025 as they are as $ strong as ever.

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