Some premium American Express cards are known for the credits that they offer with select partners, which makes up a large part of the value proposition of these cards. Along those lines, some changes have just been revealed regarding the credits on The Business Platinum Card® from American Express, and for most people, the updates will be bad news.
In this post:
Amex Business Platinum Card credit changes
The American Express Business Platinum Card in the United States offers credits with Adobe and Dell (among others, but those two are the ones that are changing, so it’s what I’m focusing on).
We’ve had reason to believe that these credits might change, since the terms have stated that they’re valid through June 30, 2025. We now have the details of what’s changing.
When it comes to the Adobe credits:
- As of July 1, 2025, enrolled cardmembers can get a $250 statement credit after they spend $600 or more on US purchases made directly with Adobe from July 1 through December 31, 2025 (and for each calendar year thereafter)
- As a point of comparison, through June 30, 2025, the card offers up to $150 in statement credits on select Adobe purchases annually
- The benefit of the change is that you can receive statement credits for all US purchases made directly with Adobe, expanded from spending being limited to select products, but obviously there’s a much bigger spending requirement
When it comes to the Dell credits:
- As of July 1, 2025, enrolled cardmembers can receive up to $150 in statement credits on US purchases made directly with Dell, and an additional $1,000 statement credit after spending $5,000 or more on those purchases from July 1 through December 31, 2025 (and for each calendar year thereafter)
- As a point of comparison, through June 30, 2025, the card offers up to $200 in statement credits semi-annually on purchases made with the card, for up to $400 in credits per year
- The benefit of the change is that you can receive up to $1,150 in statement credits per year, but that requires a huge amount of spending, compared to up to $400 in credits per year with the current system, with no spending requirement beyond that
These changes are negative (for most), not surprising
For a vast majority of people, these changes to benefits will be negative. For example, up until now you could get up to $400 in Dell credits with $400 in Dell spending, while in the future, you can only get a $150 credit per year, unless you spend at least $5,000 with Dell.
Ultimately it should be no surprise that these benefits evolve over time. Most of these credits with a lot of restrictions are viewed as a win-win for the card issuer and the partner.
The card issuer can offer cardmembers more perks that justify paying a higher annual fee, while the partner gets access to a generally affluent customer base, and it’s a way to encourage them to try the product. Of course over time, that becomes less valuable:
- If the partner actually gets a cardmember as a happy client, then they don’t have to keep offering incentives to get them to make purchases with them
- If cardmembers are simply maximizing the benefits and nothing more, then it’s unlikely to be very profitable for the partner
You should always crunch the numbers on card annual fees, and make sure you’re getting your money’s worth.
Bottom line
As of July 1, 2025, changes are coming to the Adobe and Dell credits on the Amex Business Platinum. For a vast majority of cardmembers, the changes will be negative, given that the credits are either decreasing in size, or a lot more spending is required to maximize them.
What do you make of the Amex Business Platinum credit changes?
Agree with others. This will make cancelling the card an easy decision. I'm not setting up a web domain so I can get a Hilton Biz account so I can get a quarterly credit. So lounge access, which I rarely need given other cards and the airline credit are the only real benefits for $695
Was going to cancel because the FedEx shipping offer no longer applied to FedEx invoiced charges. We would max it out and got the full $1k which justified this card between that being gone and now dell having min spend requirements don't see the point of keeping this card around. All of the benefits I will still have with my personal platinum.
so if I've already received $200 from Dell this year, am I done for the year, or do I get $150 more?
Try it and report back.
The Dell Credits were basically unusable for most cardholders. Removing Microsoft Products / Giftcards, Turbotax Products as well as frequently terminating orders made these Dell"credits" a sham. The new Amex Hilton $200 Credits, are following down the same sham path.
Cardholders are tired of these Fake Benefits, and unless Amex starts proving something of value for their $695 Annual Fee, they're likely to see a lot of cancellations.
I called and canceled my Platinum card. Without the Dell credits it no longer makes any sense to keep paying for the card.
Currently what Adobe charges qualify?
I hate the coupon book aspect of these cards. I live in a small town and take advantage of almost none of the "coupons".
So for Dell this means that this year I can get the $200 credit until June and then another $150 for july through December, a total of $350 instead $400?
Really gross behavior by Amex, but I was planning to cancel the card due to the prior devaluation where Dell removed the only interesting products - Bose headphones - from their offerings.
They've removed most good things. Including Turbotax products.