American Express offers a program that is not very well promoted: Fine Hotels & Resorts (or “Fine Hotels & Resorts Program” in French). It is available only to holders of the Platinum Card® from American Express and the Business Platinum Card® from American Express.
The American Express Fine Hotels & Resorts program offers benefits at high-end hotels around the world.
When you book with your Platinum Card® from American Express through American Express Travel and Fine Hotels & Resorts, you are assured of benefits such as:
In addition, for some hotels, additional promotions may take place, such as free accommodation for the third or fourth night.
No need to hold any hotel status that would have ensured you breakfast or late check-out. Here you will have access to a full range of benefits!
Reservations for hotels in the Fine Hotels & Resorts program can only be made with:
The easiest way to do your research is to visit the American Express Travel website.
Note that American Express has also launched a website dedicated to Fine Hotels & Resorts that you will find here (but at this time, only the hotels Fine Hotels & Resorts will be displayed, whereas on the American Express Travel website (option “Book a trip” in the screen below), they will be displayed first, before other hotels:
Once you have selected your hotel, you will proceed to checkout with the Platinum Card® from American Express or the Business Platinum Card® from American Express.
Some notes:
When I’m not using points to book hotels and I’m not staying at a hotel where I have status (e.g. Marriott / Hilton), I look at what Fine Hotels & Resorts offers.
We are obviously talking about high-end hotels where the nightly rate will rarely go below 200 CA$. In the past, I have used the program to get a stay at the Four Seasons Whistler for example.
So I recently repeated the experience in Las Vegas. I was looking for a hotel that could suit my family trip (with 2 young children) and one hotel particularly caught my attention: the Four Seasons Hotel Las Vegas.
Las Vegas is a particularly well-served destination for Fine Hotels & Resort, with 9 hotels in the program. And since it is often expensive to have breakfast or get a nice room in this casino town, it can be interesting to go through this program.
During the Easter weekend, this hotel was offered through the Fine Hotels & Resorts program at less than $300 CAD per night including taxes.
The hotel website offered the same room… at a slightly higher rate (excluding taxes!).
Not to mention the whole range of benefits that Fine Hotels & Resorts had to offer:
We were able to take advantage of all these benefits:
The Fine Hotels & Resorts program is available to holders of one of the two Platinum cards:
If you have a multi-night stay, and you have both cards (or your spouse also has a Platinum card), you can bypass the rule described above:
Consecutive stays at the same Fine Hotels & Resorts participating property within a 24-hour period are considered one stay
Being each a holder of each version of the card (yes… we like Platinum cards…!), this is what we did in Las Vegas. We divided our stay into 2 nights + 1 night and were able to take advantage of the 100 US$ credit in the Spa twice (1 hour manicure + 1 hour pedicure). We could have done 1 night + 1 night + 1 night…!
Note that this can be advantageous in hotels offering US$100 for meals and drinks in the hotel in addition to free breakfast!
You will just have to be careful to see if the hotel doesn’t offer a promotion like “third/fourth night free” which will then be much more interesting!
You can find a complete directory of American Express Fine Hotels & Resorts on this site.
In Canada, Fine Hotels & Resorts has about 20 properties. In Montreal, for example, 3 hotels are part of the Fine Hotels & Resorts program: Hotel Le St-James, Loews Hotel Vogue, Ritz-Carlton Montreal.
Of course, it is an expensive and high-end hotel. But it’s worth keeping this option in the back of your mind or for special occasions!
Savings are here:
