The International Airline Program (IAP) is one of the lesser known perks of the Amex Platinum Card, and it offers discounts on international premium cabin airfares. In some cases the savings can be huge, and more than justify the annual fees on cards. In this post I wanted to cover everything you need to know about the program.
In this post:
What is the Amex International Airline Program?
With the Amex International Airline Program, you can get exclusive savings on select airlines when booking through American Express. There are some basic things to be aware of:
- The Amex IAP is available to those with The Platinum Card® from American Express (review) and The Business Platinum Card® from American Express (review)
- The Amex IAP is valid for international itineraries in first class, business class, and premium economy
- The Amex IAP can be used on both refundable and non-refundable tickets
- The Amex IAP can be used to purchase anywhere from one to eight tickets on the same flight
- The Amex IAP offers discounts for flights originating in the United States, or select Canadian gateways
Which airlines qualify for the Amex International Airline Program?
The Amex International Airline Program is valid for select itineraries on the following airlines:
- Aer Lingus
- Aeromexico
- Air China
- Air Europa
- Air France
- Air India
- Air New Zealand
- All Nippon Airways
- Asiana Airlines
- Austrian Airlines
- Brussels Airlines
- Cathay Pacific
- China Airlines
- Delta Air Lines
- Emirates Airline
- Etihad Airways
- Finnair
- Icelandair
- Japan Airlines
- KLM Royal Dutch
- LATAM
- Lufthansa
- Qantas
- Qatar Airways
- Royal Air Maroc
- Singapore Airlines
- SWISS
- Virgin Atlantic
How do you book Amex International Airline Program tickets?
There are two ways to book a ticket through the Amex International Airline Program — you can either call Amex, or book through the Amex Travel website.
If you want to book by phone, call Amex Travel at one of the following numbers (note that bookings by phone are subjected to a $39 per person ticketing fee):
- Call 1-800-525-3355 if you have the Amex Personal Platinum Card
- Call 1-800-553-9497 if you have the Amex Business Platinum Card
My preferred way to book is online, since it makes it easier to compare options, and it avoids having to pick up the phone. To look up Amex International Airline Program fares and book, simply go to amextravel.com, and then log into the account associated with your Amex Platinum. At that point search an eligible international itinerary.
After starting your search, you’ll notice that some results have “International Airline Program Platinum Card Benefit” written at the top, and those will be the options that are discounted. The original cost of the ticket will have a line through it, and then the “cheaper” price will display. For example, looking at a roundtrip nonstop Air France first class ticket between New York and Paris, the fare is discounted by nearly $1,000.
You’ll also see the option of redeeming Amex points for one cent each for these tickets, though we’ll talk a bit more about that below.
Of course it goes without saying that a roundtrip nonstop first class ticket for $10,000+ might not be the most affordable option available through the program. There are definitely better deals out there, though the savings won’t always be quite as big — generally the more expensive the ticket, the bigger the savings.
For example, on a more reasonable Air India business class ticket from Washington to Delhi, you’d ordinarily pay $3,640, while through the International Airline Program you’d pay $3,319, representing savings of over $300.
There are lots of options to sort results through Amex’s website, and you can narrow them down by the airline, travel time, number of stops, etc.
Combine Amex International Airline Program & Amex Pay with Points
As you can see above, you can use the Amex Pay With Points program to pay for an Amex IAP ticket either partly or entirely with points (you do need to redeem a minimum of 5,000 points, though).
On the surface, both the Amex Personal Platinum Card and Amex Business Platinum Card offer one cent of value toward the cost of a ticket. That means a $2,000 ticket would cost you 200,000 Membership Rewards points, which isn’t a very good deal.
Fortunately, the business version of the card has a 35% rebate on this feature, with some restrictions:
- It’s valid for first and business class flights on any airline, or for any flight with your designated qualifying airline
- You can get up to one million bonus points per calendar year using this method
- The 35% rebate is refunded after the fact, and will appear 6-10 weeks after the purchase appears on your billing statement
In other words, if you redeemed 200,000 Amex points for $2,000 worth of travel, you’d get 70,000 points back. So you’d essentially be paying 130,000 points for $2,000 worth of airfare, which is a value of ~1.54 cents per point.
Getting 1.54 cents of value per Amex point while also getting savings on your ticket is a pretty awesome combo.
Earn 5x points on Amex International Airline Program tickets
One of the other awesome things about booking through the Amex International Airline Program is that if you pay for your ticket with the Amex Personal Platinum Card or Amex Business Platinum Card, you’ll earn 5x Membership Rewards points. That’s because both cards offer 5x points on airfare booked through Amex Travel up to $500,000 on flight purchases per calendar year and then 1x. I value those points at 1.7 cents each, so to me, that equates to an 8.5% return on those purchases.
Do you earn miles for Amex International Airline Program tickets?
Tickets booked through the Amex International Airline Program are eligible for mileage accrual, regardless of whether you pay cash or redeem Amex points using the Pay With Points feature. That’s because this is a fully paid ticket, and will qualify as such.
You can expect that you’ll earn miles and receive any elite perks as you usually would if booking direct. The one consideration would be that if you’re flying an airline with a revenue based frequent flyer program, you might earn miles at a slightly different pace than usual.
For example, American Airlines has a special mileage earning chart for “special fares,” which often includes third party bookings. With this, you earn miles as a percentage of distance flown, based on your fare class. In some cases that could even be advantageous. 
What about Amex Insider Fares?
Since we’re talking about discounted Amex airfare, I think it’s also worth mentioning Amex Insider Fares, which are similar in some ways, but ultimately different. What are Amex Insider fares?
- Amex Insider Fares offer discounts when redeeming points for a ticket through the Pay With Points feature on Amex Travel
- Amex Insider Fares are available to all cards earning Amex Membership Rewards points, and not just the Amex Platinum; fares will automatically show up when logged in on the Amex Travel website and doing a flight search
- This is sometimes even available on domestic itineraries, unlike the Amex International Airline Program
- Amex Insider Fares can be stacked with the up to 35% Pay With Points discount, but can’t be stacked directly with the Amex International Airline Program
This is worth being aware of, because when you do searches on Amex’s website, you may see some show up as Insider Fares, and some show up as being part of the International Airline Program.
My strategy with the Amex International Airline Program
What’s my strategy for using the Amex International Airline Program? In many cases airlines are pricing international premium cabins more reasonably than ever before, as they go after leisure travelers. So even though I have a lot of miles to redeem, I’m often browsing Google Flights looking for good paid first & business class fares.
Whenever I find a fare that I might be interested in booking, I always go to Amex Travel and see if there are any discounts available through the International Airline Program, and often there are. In that case it’s a no brainer to book through the program, so I can also earn 5x points on the purchase, and even get great travel coverage.
For those with the Amex Business Platinum Card, I think it could also make sense to use the Pay With Points feature, because in the end each point could get you 1.54 cents toward the cost of a premium cabin airfare purchase, which is solid.
Bottom line
The Amex International Airline Program is one of my favorite perks of both the Amex Personal Platinum Card and Amex Business Platinum Card. If you fly international premium cabins with any frequency, the savings afforded by the program can be huge, and pay for your annual fee over and over.
When you’re getting ready to book an international premium cabin ticket (even if it’s premium economy), I always recommend taking a look at Amex Travel to see what kind of a fare is being offered.
What has your experience been with the Amex International Airline Program? Have you ever used it?
Why is AA mentioned in the mileage earnings? It’s not an IAP airline.
When I sought two R/T business class tickets Bangkok to Rome last June, I looked hard at the Amex program and discovered that I could book only the lowest business fares that way. Instead, I went directly to Qatar and reserved two seats in comfort class, which was important to me because of its benefits.
WE used the Amex Program to go to Japan. We connected via LAX and while waiting on our flight a Typhoon went thru Taiwan our stop before Japan.. All flights were cancelled. I called Amex to see what they could do==== Nothing. We were told to buy new tickets at twice the price to get there. We were on our own..???customer No Service.
Ben, can you do a post about which markets offer good premium priced tickets from? I remember Cairo and Colombo used to have cheap tickets in the past. Thanks
The AMEX IAP and Insider Fares is really hit and miss, but after 4 years of having the Platinum card FINALLY got a great deal from the IAP.
Scored two business class tickets on JAL (JFK-HND-HKG) for $2,300 each , when the ticket was going for $3043 before the discount.
Even without the IAP discount that is an amazing fare!!
I couldn't believe the fare when I stumbled across it!! Definitely one of those cases where it made sense to pay cash than the points redemption route. The alternative for me at the time was either transfer 110k points to EVA (JFK-TPE-HKG) in biz , or 75k points to Cathay Pacific (JFK-HKG) in premium economy.
I do love this program, but I've had some issues in the past (specifically with Air France LP actually!):
-In some cases, I have to click through to the final selection screen to see an IAP fare/reduction. When selecting the individual flights, they will not show as qualifying for IAP, but in the end when I go to pay they do.
-It's really hard on the platform to correctly filter. If I search...
I do love this program, but I've had some issues in the past (specifically with Air France LP actually!):
-In some cases, I have to click through to the final selection screen to see an IAP fare/reduction. When selecting the individual flights, they will not show as qualifying for IAP, but in the end when I go to pay they do.
-It's really hard on the platform to correctly filter. If I search for JFK-CDG in First Class, the Air France options will show, but any ticket with a domestic connection in First will also show (so you could see JFK-IAD in Delta First, but then IAD-CDG in Air France Business as an option). You really have to sift through the results to find what you're looking for sometimes. I've even had scenarios where I don't even see AF options appear! There used to be a way to select preferred airlines as part of your search, but that feature appears to have gone away and now you can only filter by airline among what is present in the search results. If Air France is not in your search results, then you cannot filter by Air France.
-I've also found the platform difficult to use when trying to by mixed fare class tickets (ie, JFK-CDG in Business, but then CDG-JFK in First). I almost always have to call or chat to get those.
-Not all fares that show on Google Flights or even the airlines' websites will show in your Amex search results. Again, if you don't see what you want, you have to call or chat.
-The biggest mistake I ever made and will never do again was booking a Delta codeshare on an AF flight in LP. When there was a schedule change, I almost lost my LP seat and only P fare classes were available on the other options, and spent hours on the phone with Amex, who had to call Delta, who had to call AF to get the issue resolved.
So, is all of this worth a savings of hundreds or even thousands of dollars? For me, yes. But just be warned you sometimes have to really work hard to take advantage of these fares, especially when you live in a place like Raleigh where most international flights require a connection.
The IAP is only available for tickets that start ex-USA, is that correct?
Never mind.
"The Amex IAP offers discounts for flights originating in the United States, or select Canadian gateways" - Thanks Ben!
no, the IAP is also available from Europe, but it seems the list of airlines is more limited. On amex.at (Austria) it says the airlines are SINGAPORE AIRLINES | QATAR | AUSTRIAN AIRLINES, LUFTHANSA, SWISS | EMIRATES ETIHAD AIRWAYS
One wonders if one has to be a resident of Austria and book on the Austrian site (e.g., amex.at), AND if fares are only available ex-Austria as well. Same with other countries.
Prior to flying exclusively on points, the pricing had always been hit or miss and I lost interest in the platform. Others might have better luck.