sdix

Agree, figuring out which card to use for what has become tiresome.

blaz

Citi's products are doomed from the get go. Before they can actually offer a viable premium product, they need to get their act together. My experience with them is that they are a very disorganized company (opened a checking account with them that ended up in a CFPB dispute that I won ... long story).

Chase has the scale. They are the 800lb gorilla in the credit card business. They are indeed loosing money on the CSR right now, but they can afford it, while Amex hardly can.

Also, even if the CSR turns out to be not viable for Chase and they have to downgrade some (or all) of the benefits, the CSP is still a good fallback card. The entire product portfolio (Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, CSP, CSR, Ink, etc.) is just a better all-around product than anything Amex has to offer.

jamesinclair

The improvements on their own are great.

But they are not so great when combined with a price increase.

Especially because the Uber thing is broken up into $15 per month. Thats ridiculous.

I have PRG and this makes me less likely to get Platinum, even though every month they send me an annoying invite.

opus17

Wow. I've never used Uber (should now be called eew-Ber) and I'm certainly not going to start patronizing a social pariah company because of a few dollars credit.

Oformula

Speaking as another member of that generation, I disagree. Perhaps part of this comes from living in the city, versus other millennials who may live in the suburbs. Whether it's at home or at a destination, I can't remember a month where I didn't spend at least $15 in ridesharing. Especially since I've been using Lyft lately, this is a big push to incentivize uber use.

Between the airline credit and Uber credit, the out of pocket ends up at $150 a month. Throw in the FHR benefits, lounge access (especially for my partner with the new PP benefits), and the free global entry credit every 5 years, and I feel like I'm easily getting my money's worth.

For what it's worth, I only use the card for items I want the Platinum Purchase protection on, and charges that are credited. This isn't a daily driver, it's a cache of benefits that happens to be in the form of a credit card.

trouble747

I take it the uber credits do not accumulate? Not a good deal for us (we have many ridesharing options but uber isn't one of them).

mia

I think that's common, and it isn't clear if American Express sees it as a problem. Once upon a time all American Express (USA) cards earned a bonus for "everyday" spending, but after they rolled that back (simultaneously with their competitors) they never did anything with Platinum to encourage routine spending.

julianm

The timing of this announcement makes me question how much American Express is paying attention to anything. To me it just reads like Uber begging people to reverse on #deleteuber.

My wife and I work in the tech industry. We used to use Uber a lot. But we both care very much about inclusion and diversity in our industry. My wife especially has met quite a few challenges in her career.

We knew of Travis "Boober" Kalanick's general outlook on life had and suspected the culture in his company was pretty poor, but the past few weeks of revelations (from weird involvement with the US administration, to employees claiming sexual harassment is rampant, to the SVP of Engineering resigning for sexual harassment allegations from prior company, to Travis blowing up at a driver) were just too much for us. And to top it off American Express makes Uber the benefit that would've made the price increase worthwhile for us. But it no longer is.

csyoung49

I think it varies with your use cases as I'm a millennial business traveler but don't use ride sharing that often due to always having a rental car on my travels and a car at home. Rarely do I use Uber unless it's an airport ride home.

I have the CSR and the Citi Prestige as well, so a lot of the benefits "overlap" and thus I don't count on them to reduce my annual fee. I look at points earned, credits, and status/program benefits...so these changes negatively affect the Platinum card for me.

factory81

Ouch. In the war of $400+ non-airline cards to keep you in your pocket, this puts the Amex Plat card in a tough spot compared to Citi Prestige Card/Chase Sapphire Reserve.

Pro's and con's. Your card fee prepaid for a lot of expenses. GoGo Passes, $200 airline, TSA Credit, delta lounge access, and even the occasional Centurion lounge. Now we have to justify a $100 increase to more or less prepay for $200 in Uber rides.

If you love throwing cash at these cards, it might be a good "all in" card - with the variety of other benefits. But I am really not sure I want to go along with this. What's next, $100 higher annual fee and you get free parking at disney, and a $5 monthly credit to Netflix?

Amex is smart in the sense that they are shaping (or chipping away) the consumer that wants these cards. They are encouraging people to consume more, and more on brands that they affiliate with. The amex cashback stuff is a more boring way Amex does this. I also find the CB program to be disappointing as well (I very rarely have needs to purchase from the brands).

You either use uber or you don't, right? You either like their lounges or you don't, and even if you do like their lounges, do you really like them? As in, when you want to use them, are they usable, or overflowing and even at capacity? Not every lounge is Las Vegas or Dallas - where the warm buffet concept is used, and well - there you have it.

Can Amex build up enough amenities to save the attrition of people from the Amex card? I think it is going to take some bold lounge rollouts. As in, full buffet lounges at Chicago/Denver. They are about the biggest places beside Atlanta that is missing one , and it would connect a lot more people with the brand, who otherwise don't see their lounges as much.

acarney

Ya, I'm super surprised this didn't launch as a "ride share credit" where Uber and Lyft and anyone others in the future were eligible for using the credit. Uber has just had horrible press lately and for Amex to charge move and try to justify that by backing that company with a new benefit... well it seems poorly timed. I just get the feeling there has got to be some back and forth with Amex and Uber on this deal, not just Amex handing out a flat $15 each month....


Edit from above... At least a $5 Netflix credit would be a little easier to use. Those are usually services that are a routine monthly thing, unlike Uber which is more of a need based use. Sure, I guess there are those people that use Uber every week or something, but I suspect a lot more of them have at least a couple months where they don't use Uber at all, but one month they may use it twice as often as normal. To not be able to roll over those credits or start up front with the full value SCREAMS that they're trying to play the numbers game and not have to pay them out. I suspect they know statistically exactly how much of that Uber credit they'll actually have to pay out, and I bet it's drastically lower then the airline credit usage....

eccentricfusion

Citi can't even get merging of online accounts correct - back when I had both a Prestige and Citi Hilton, I couldn't even see the accounts using a single sign on. Customer service and user experience were definitely all over the place with them.

I'm also curious about whether the CSR will be viable long term for Chase. It attracted tons of churners with the 100k bonus, but I'm sure a lot of those accounts will close before the annual fee hits. It's still a great product, but I wonder how many people will keep it and continue paying the annual fee?

acarney

Ya, but I'm not a business and I really have zero that I could try to group together to even pretend I'm a business. I know a lot of people just use their SS# and call themselves a business because they do a few hundred bucks a year worth of work in something, but I'm literally at zero, unless I start invoicing family for favors I do for them....

I figure if I start something on eBay or Amazon I'll end up spending more in fees and selling items at a loss just to make it look like I'm actively moving product that it will outweigh any points I redeem for the extra amount... again maybe some people are fine with having an online "storefront" on one of those sites open and never selling a single item... but I would feel like to keep the "game" running I needed to at least be able to product some records for transactions incase anyone double checked at some point...

Madone59

I too am meh' on the Uber credit because it does not roll over. I really do wish it was set up like the airline credit where we could pick Uber or Lyft and use it all year.

I am not going to completely give up in the hope that the 5X on hotel spend goes from pre-paid through AMEX to at least booked with Amex or booked directly through the hotel (like 5X airline is).

navatwal

Are there any new decent offers on Personal Plat?

You would have thought that they would have come up with a large bonus to promote new benefits and get new members