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Jumeirah One disappears as a redemption from Amex International Currency Cards

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American Express has, for many years, issued two cards for anyone globally who would prefer to bank in US$ or Euros rather than their home currency. This includes UK residents.

These cards are known as International Currency Cards, with the individual cards known as the International Dollar Card (IDC) and International Euro Card (IEC).  Each is available in Green, Gold and Platinum versions.  The cards are run from Brighton which is very convenient if you have any issues.

There was no sign-up bonus for the Gold or Green card.  However, the Platinum International Currency Card offered a sign-up bonus of 30,000 Membership Rewards points. This was very handy, because you could get this bonus irrespective of any other American Express cards you held. It would also not impact your future applications for UK cards.

Jumeirah One disappears from American Express International Currency Cards

The key upside was that the International Currency Cards have different Membership Rewards partners. These include Jumeirah One, Qatar Airways Privilege Club (less useful now that Qatar has adopted Avios) and Malaysia Airlines. They also retain a 1:1 conversion rate with Singapore Airlines which beats the 3:2 rate offered by the UK programme.

Unfortunately, Amex has recently taken the International Currency Cards off the market. If you don’t have one, you’re not getting one.

If you DO have one, one of the benefits seems to have gone. Jumeirah One has disappeared as a transfer partner.

10 years ago this was the greatest deal around. Jumeirah resorts in the Middle East are ludicrously expensive but you could pick them up with a points transfer. I was getting 3p-4p of value per Amex point.

Sadly Jumeirah One went revenue based. Each point is now worth around 1.5p, so the 4:1 transfer from American Express ICC Membership Rewards became pretty pathetic. Plenty of transfer partners offered far more value, especially Singapore Airlines with its 1:1 transfer rate.

I am tempted to shut down my ICC card entirely. Even retaining the ability to transfer to Singapore Airlines at 1:1 isn’t necessarily worth the annual fee.

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Comments (45)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • eligold says:
    17 Feb17 February 09:07

    What’s my best option to get my MR points out of my amex IDC. I I’d rather put them to Avios or Virgin but Hilton, Marriot or Etihad are also an option.
    The lower points redemption value compared to the £ card far exceeds the difference between the Dollar and the Pound.
    So how do I best minimize the loss compared to UK AMEX points?

    • Rob says:
      17 Feb17 February 09:34

      With the £/$ nearer parity than it was when the transfer rate were drawn up, I think the best option is actually a transfer back into a UK MR account.

      When I set mine up, I moved points across at $1.59, so 100k MR = 159k IDC MR. If I move them back now, at $1.20, 159k IDC MR would get me 133k MR, a tidy gain.

      Moving them to Singapore Airlines is the only option which is more attractive than this to me, and the 3-year hard expiry on SQ miles concerns me.

      • Jonathan says:
        17 Feb17 February 11:02

        It’s still a great option if you plan to redeem the KrisFlyer points straight away the transfer, or very shortly afterwards, but definitely not a good idea to simply put the points away for saving, especially if you’ve got no route in mind…

        That’s the main problems with programs with hard expiry policies, especially with a carrier that’s based so far away, okay they’ve got daily flights to their hub from major European cities, but there’s still things like the Q Suite to compete with, although that involves a connection, it’s still very competitive

        Any news on when some airlines might soften their hard expiry policy ?
        M&M already seems halfway there, by waiving it to those with a co-branded credit card, and high level status, Skywards & ANA Mileage Club only waives it to the highest level members
        As far as I’m aware KrisFlyer doesn’t much in the way of giving immunity to its expiry policy…

        Etihad Guest scrapped theirs with a thank you to Gavin

        I go for Aeroplan as (in my opinion) the best all-rounder program for Star Alliance flights (I don’t take many of them, even when I do so, it’s always a mix of the airlines), although other readers have mentioned their choice being Aegean Airlines Miles+Bonus
        No airline loyalty program is perfect for everyone, since it depends heavily on where in the world you regularly travel, and many other factors

      • CamFlyer says:
        17 Feb17 February 11:15

        I’m in this position with an IEC Platinum. I’m considering whether to change to UK Platinum instead. I think timing will depend on whether I end up using my accumulated MR points for a redemption through SQ (likely on TK metal) in the next few months, or want to hold them longer (or use on, eg, EK).

  • sam says:
    17 Feb17 February 11:56

    i am disappointed there are no Irish restauants again.

    • Andrew. says:
      17 Feb17 February 12:09

      Not true. There is one restaurant listed where you can enjoy Irish cuisine.

      Daffodil Mulligan, 70-74 City Rd, Old Street, EC1Y 2BJ

  • Charles says:
    17 Feb17 February 13:00

    Did anyone ever get the 1 month Paramount + offer which was meant to be coming to BA Executive club members? Haven’t seen anything about it since it was announced in December, but maybe I missed something….

    • Rob says:
      17 Feb17 February 13:05

      Got it, used it. You should have had an email.

      • DaveJ says:
        17 Feb17 February 13:33

        I didn’t get one.

        Then again BA didn’t even contact me to tell me my flight was cancelled this week (I was checking myself as I thought a cancellation was likely and they’ve definitely got my latest contact details. They also wanted to charge me £200 online to move to a flight that was actually running)

      • Eli says:
        18 Feb18 February 22:14

        Have I missed out if I only just became bronze?

    • Steve says:
      17 Feb17 February 14:17

      Like Rob, got it and used it. Managed to binge City on the Hill, Halo and both new Star Trek shows in the month. Plus the Ray Donovan movie which I didn’t even know existed!

      (Helped make January slightly more bearable…)

  • Ant says:
    17 Feb17 February 13:49

    Any suggestions for restaurants/bars in NY to use the £150 credit?

  • Maz says:
    17 Feb17 February 14:00

    Does anyone know how the AmEx credit works in Japan? It says you have to use Pocket Concierge and prepay, but doing a quick skim, I can’t see any prepaid restaurants.

    • Gavin says:
      18 Feb18 February 00:09

      I think all the restaurants on there are prepaid (although it’s not clear if they are all at the time of booking). The point of the service is that you pre pay, and then having nothing to pay at the restaurant unless you order additional drinks etc. I booked a restaurant in December for February and payment was taken immediately, refund from Amex received after about 1 week.

    • cin2 says:
      19 Feb19 February 00:23

      They are all prepaid. I got the full £300 on Michelin star restaurants in Dec and Jan.

  • ABS says:
    17 Feb17 February 14:31

    Anyone know how long the dining offers take to appear on the card. Just activated mine today and no option to add offers

    • James Baxter says:
      17 Feb17 February 18:26

      It varies, my new card has still only got 6 offers (about 10 days after activating). Others have 40+ offers – and indeed often more like 100.

      Most of them completely useless, of course.

      • ABS says:
        17 Feb17 February 21:53

        Was specifically thinking of the £150 uk dining credit and £150 overseas credit. They’re published benefits so surprised they weren’t loaded automatically.

  • James Baxter says:
    17 Feb17 February 18:28

    Tim – how much did you get for selling that site, then? 🙂

    I’m sure it’s a matter of public record.

    If only we knew where to look.

  • Seantex says:
    17 Feb17 February 20:48

    “Unfortunately, Amex has recently taken the International Currency Cards off the market. If you don’t have one, you’re not getting one.”
    It’s not quite true. New Amex ICC cards aren’t available directly through Amex website any longer but one can still apply through a bank, for example Barclays (just google international+barclays+amex). Off course one needs to be Barclays client first. There is number of banks that have this partnership with Amex.

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