American Express Now Goes After Airline Incidental Credits
American Express is striking once again, and this time it is going after airline credits on credit cards that have this benefit. They sent out a mass email to those affected, to let them know that they have been charged for the credit they received from the merchant. And this is for credits that were issued in 2019.
The letter pictured below states (HT: DoC):
We discovered that, while we issued you a credit under out Airline Fee Credit program, you also received a credit from the merchant for the same charge(s). To correct this error, we have charged your account for the amount identified above to offset the credit(s).
People who have received this notice have likely charged some kind of fee on their Amex card and have ended up canceling the flight altogether. So that would result in a credit from Amex and the airline for the same charge. While it might have worked in the past, it clearly wasn’t meant to. You can read some more articles here about Amex clawing back credits.
Guru’s Wrap-up
Does this American Express customers who have cards like Amex Platinum or Hilton Aspire that offer these airline incidental credits? Yes, but these credit are still useful for frequent flyers, so there is value there. You just have to play by the rules with American Express and recalculate the value of each card that offers such credits and decide for yourself if it is worth keeping a card long terms.
Let me know if you received a notice or if this affects you in any way.
