Thanks in advance.
Anyone who has been holding AMEX platinum card in Switzerland? Appreciate your sharing the experience and whether worth for the annual fee (1st year CHF 425 and subsequent year CHF 850). The benefit associated with the card seems generous, would like to understand real experience enjoy the benefit.
Depends on your use, really. I have one and like it. Some of the reasons are tangible and you can put a monetary value on it and some you cannot.
It saves me a ton of money on rental car insurance(I rent may be 4-5 times a month at about 40 CHF per rental). I also like the travel insurance that comes with it, which saves me from buying a separate policy(about 100 CHF). Then again, there must be credit cards out there with cheaper fees which can give you the same perks.
The biggest perk, which makes me love the card, is the concierge service. I have managed to get some hard to get event tickets and last minute reservations at top restaurants. Last year, due to a snow storm, I was going to be stuck for 2 days in Colorado but the concierge found me a way out and also managed to get my hotel in Houston to amend a prepaid reservation with no additional charges. Again,this is subjective and if you are someone who plans ahead of time or have an assistant then might not be of much value.
The lounge access is nice but most of the time I use the airline lounges except in the US where the Amex centurion lounges are far nicer.
There is also a travel service which is nice but again if you are reasonably adept at online booking you can do it yourself. You also get a bunch of elite statuses with hotel chains and rental car companies which are nice but nothing special.
Oh, also, you do get 1 point per chf spent which you can then convert to award miles on most airlines which is nice. It gets me a return economy ticket on an intercontinental flight once a year.
As a counterpoint, as someone who didn't use the benefits, the Amex Platinum was a huge waste of money for me. I "downgraded" to the Amex/Air France card which allows me to continue to accrue points/miles. I have airline lounge access via my UBS Visa card and airline cards. I have travel insurance via my bank. And I never used the concierge service in ten years, so that benefit was wasted on me.
Basically, you need to work out if you'll actually use the services on offer or not, and make the value determination accordingly.
Bumping this thread - I'm considering an Amex card and would like to hear from people who use amex.
I really only want the card to start accruing points for frequent flying with Emirates, as I need to book several flights with them over the next year and I've never bothered trying to take advantage of points before. I note that this is only available on their charge cards, rather than credit cards, which was a surprise.
I know years ago in Australia, nobody (vendors) would accept Amex, I guess because their fees were really high. Is this still the case? Do you get restaurants / bars / etc. that will say 'we accept all cards except amex'?
Thanks all.
I've been using a cashback Amex for the past 3 years now. Looking at my monthly statements, it's extremely rare that I use my Mastercard.
Coop, Shell, Galaxus, mobile provider, Denner, parkings, restaurants, Uber, IKEA, gym membership, ski resorts, airlines etc
It's only the odd restaurant/bar that won't accept it. I've heard that Lidl doesn't accept it too, but I haven't verified.
They are getting more and more widely accepted to the point that they are not much behind Visa/Mastercard.
I haven ́t had that, it seems to work everywhere I go in Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands and the US.
I have one, and beyond the airmiles, rarely use any of the perks.
Given that now I'm using a new financial tracking app that relies on openbanking, I think I may need to move back to UBS's cards as swisscard do not support openbanking...
It depends if you're speaking about the Platinum card issued by Amex, or the Miles and More Platinum card issued by Credit Suisse.
In my case it's the M&M Platinum card and the fee is well worthwhile. CDW insurance on rental cars is a boon. I calculated to have saved at least CHF 2,000 with this. Curiously, they will not pay the first CHF 400 of any damage, but if the bill is CHF 401 they will cover it all!
Travel Insurance is a good one, but you must have paid all or part with the Amex card.
The miles are a nice bonus, and you can exchange some for Status miles if you need those few extra miles to re-qualify for a particular status. I don't need this anymore as I have the status for life but I did use it once. And the miles don't expire.
Concerning the miles, I usually have enough each year from my (and family) spending for a business class return to South Africa. This is anything from a CHF 3,000 - CHF 5,000 value.
I know there are many other benefits, but those are the ones I use the most. So for me it gives great value.
This is all good to know, thanks LuganoPirate.
I'm definitely referring only to the Amex one, because I only fly with Emirates.
I had one for years while the wife worked at a bank where we got it basically for free... I'd never be able to justify the price tag at all. All credit cards in CH are super expensive when it comes to using them abroad... which is the exact use case I need a credit card for. Amex was by far the most expensive one to use. I rent cars a lot but the free insurance is in my opinion not worth it - I usually rent with some price comparison portal that gets me full cover for basically no extra cost... so no point in that. Only thing we used was the airport lounge pass... but you can get that with any platinum visa or master for a fraction of the price.
The new Cumulus card has no fees for using abroad.
I actually already get the Priority Pass membership with my UBS card so this is wasted on me
Really? That ́s included? Never knew that.
(No real need though as I have a Swiss frequent flyer card).
Get it with business tixs too
Ahhh, those days. Now I can only fly business class when it is a long haul flight.
A month ago I was boarding a flight to London City. Literally half the plane was on priority boarding, and we all got economy tickets. Everybody has the miles and the status, but companies don't do business for every flight any more
AMEX availability is getting better and better, very few places don't get them so not a major issue. Forex is a pain, but many times I send money to Revolut through my M&M Visa, so I get most of the miles when I transfer the cash into Revolut and then get to use Revolut for foreign transactions.
Perks as everybody mentioned, you need to value for yourself. Miles are not that great, I'm racking them up, only used them once for a return flight to Greece. Collecting to do a family trip or something later since they don't expire. If you have lounges through airline status, insurance through other stuff (I got European through TCS because I needed the breakdown coverage and it's cheaper than getting it through the car insurance when it's a few cars), etc, then quickly the value you'll get diminishes.
With where I am right now, I only use Swisscard because their balance calculation makes sense, and the UBS one is just infuriating. I'm also can't be bothered to increase the limit with UBS which is at a quite inconvenient level as it's stuck from my student/early professional days. The 300 CHF per year subscription to Swisscard I don't feel like is really worth it, but I'm sticking with it mostly due to inertia...
That only works as long as you fly with Swiss or a star alliance partner...
Mind telling us which airline this is? M&M takes forever....
M&M is (I think) being over 60 and having had your status for 10 years?
Maybe in the past. Now you need the status for almost 30 years to qualify for lifetime status.