The American Express Travel portal offers valuable benefits to American Express cardholders, including special prices. Depending on which card you hold, you may also be able to pay for travel with Membership Rewards® points and get access to perks such as discounted airfare and specialty benefits at luxury hotels. Let’s take a look at how the Amex Travel portal works, whether the benefits are worthwhile and who can access Amex Travel’s website.
Key points
- American Express Travel offers hotels, vacation rentals, flights, rental cars and cruises.
- Luxury hotel benefits and discounted airfare are two benefits of booking through Amex’s travel portal.
- American Express cardholders can access Amex Travel.
How to book travel through the Amex Travel portal
Booking travel through the Amex Travel portal requires you to have an online account associated with an Amex card. While you can complete a search on the Amex Travel website without logging in, you will need to do so in order to make a booking.
After you choose whether to book a flight, hotel, vacation rental, vacation package, rental car or cruise, you’ll need to enter your travel details.
For example, if you want to book a flight through Amex Travel, you’ll need to put in your departure airport and destination as well as your dates of travel. The site will then bring up a list of matching results.
You can filter based on when the flights take off as well as how many stops you’re willing to tolerate, among other options.
The Amex Travel site offers a wide variety of hotel stays and flights, but you’ll always want to double check elsewhere before booking since it doesn’t always feature every option.
Once you’ve selected a booking, you’ll be taken through the checkout process. This includes providing your personal information and can also include seat requests and adding in loyalty program numbers.
To pay for your booking, you can use your American Express Membership Rewards, if you have a card that earns them, or your American Express card or a combination of both.
After you’ve booked, you’ll receive a confirmation email containing your reservation information. You can also find your bookings under the My Trips section of Amex Travel.
Who can use the portal?
Any American Express cardholder can use the Amex Travel portal to book travel. But those whose cards don’t earn Amex Membership Rewards points will need to pay with their Amex card.
However, many American Express cards earn Membership Rewards points that can be redeemed for travel through the Amex Travel portal. These cards include (terms apply):
All information about American Express® Green Card, Amex EveryDay® Credit Card, The Business Platinum Card® from American Express and American Express® Business Gold Card has been collected independently by Blueprint.
Is the portal worth using?
The Amex Travel portal can be worth using in certain cases, though it won’t always make sense. For example, some flights aren’t bookable via Amex Travel, so if what you need isn’t available you’ll want to look elsewhere.
That being said, those with certain cards are entitled to exclusive benefits that can lower prices or allow them to redeem points for travel. There are also perks for booking luxury hotels within the portal. In these cases, Amex Travel is definitely worth investigating.
How to maximize your Amex Travel benefits through the portal
International Airline Program
Available to those who hold a high-end American Express card, including The Platinum Card from American Express, The Business Platinum Card from American Express and the American Express Centurion Black Card
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The information for the American Express Centurion Black Card has been collected independently by Blueprint. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.
, the International Airline Program (IAP) can save you money on certain international flights booked via the Amex Travel portal.
All information about American Express Centurion Black Card has been collected independently by Blueprint.
This benefit is only available on tickets booked in premium economy, business or first class, but the savings can be significant.
For example, we looked at a round-trip flight in premium economy from San Francisco (SFO) to Tokyo (NRT). Booking with Japan Airlines (JAL) directly resulted in a cost of $4,431.40, while the Amex Travel portal and the IAP charged just $3,797.40 for a savings of over $600.
Fine Hotels + Resorts® and The Hotel Collection
American Express also offers the Fine Hotels and Resorts and The Hotel Collection to eligible cardholders.
Fine Hotels and Resorts allows guests to book luxury hotels with special benefits. These include room upgrades, complimentary breakfast, an experience credit, late check-out, early check-in and more.
The Hotel Collection offers similar but less exorbitant benefits. It’s directed toward more midscale properties and includes an experience credit as well as a room upgrade.
35% rebate on redeemed points
Those who hold The Business Platinum Card from American Express are able to get a 35% rebate on points redeemed for eligible flights booked through the Amex Travel portal (up to 1,000,000 points per calendar year).
Eligible flights include all fare classes on an airline that you select each year. It also includes first and business class tickets on any airline.
Quick guide to Amex Membership Rewards
American Express Membership Rewards are the points you earn with eligible Amex cards. These highly flexible and valuable points can be redeemed in a number of ways, though they tend to be most valuable when transferred to Amex airline partners.
Other ways of redeeming Amex points include:
- Gift cards.
- Travel booked via Amex Travel.
- Online shopping.
- Gift cards.
- Statement credits.
- Cash.
While these are nice options to have, you’ll generally get much less value from your Membership Rewards points by redeeming them in these ways. Finally, although you can redeem your points in the Amex Travel portal, this isn’t necessarily a good idea if you aim to reap maximum value. Even if you’re taking advantage of the 35% rebate on redeemed points for flights, you’ll only ever receive a value of 1.54 cents per point. This is lower than you’d expect when transferring your Amex points to many airline and hotel partners.
Frequently asked questions (FAQs)
No, travel insurance is not automatically included when booking through the Amex portal. But many of the best credit cards feature complimentary travel insurance when using your card to pay, including those from American Express. Otherwise, you may be able to opt in to travel insurance during the booking process or via a third party provider.
Those with the The Platinum Card from American Express can earn 5 Membership Rewards® points per $1 for flights booked directly with airlines or with American Express Travel on up to $500,000 per calendar year, 5 points per $1 on prepaid hotels booked with American Express Travel and 1 point per $1 on other purchases. The card has an annual fee of $695 (rates & fees).
Those with the The Business Platinum Card® from American Express
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The information for the The Business Platinum Card® from American Express has been collected independently by Blueprint. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.
, meanwhile, earn 5 Membership Rewards points per $1 on flights and prepaid hotels through American Express Travel, 1.5 points per $1 at U.S. construction material & hardware suppliers, electronic goods retailers and software and cloud system providers, shipping providers, and purchases of $5,000 or more on up to $2 million per calendar year and 1 point per $1 on other eligible purchases. The card has a $695 annual fee.
All information about The Business Platinum Card® from American Express has been collected independently by Blueprint.
The phone number for American Express Travel is: 1-800-297-2977.
The number of Amex points that you’ll need to redeem for a flight will depend on the cash cost of your flight and whether you’re booking through Amex Travel or transferring your Membership Rewards points to an Amex airline partner. Amex Points are worth about one cent when booking flights through the portal, so a flight that costs $500 in cash would require about 50,000 Amex points. You’ll typically get a better deal with transfer partners than booking through the portal.
For rates and fees for The Platinum Card® from American Express please visit this page.
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