American express business gold card foreign transaction fee

Besides knowing your rights as a credit card holder, understanding the American Express® Gold Card's perks, fees and interest rates can assist you in making an informed decision about if the card is right for you.

The table below can help you understand the fees, interest rates, rewards rates and more for the American Express® Gold Card.

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  The American Express® Gold Card comes with a high variable APR of between 15.99% and 22.99% and 25.24% for cash advances. These rates are subject to change based on the prime rate published in The Wall Street Journal.

• The card has an annual fee of $250, which is on the higher side. However, this can be justified if you make the best use of the card and earn dining and Uber cash credits.

• With no foreign transaction fee, you can easily use the card while on an international trip and earn points at the same time.

• Every dollar spent with the card earns you at least one reward point.

With the American Express® Business Gold Card you’ll earn one Amex rewards point per dollar spent. While that may be relatively unremarkable, what makes this card shine is the exceptional bonus rate of four points per dollar that you’ll earn in whichever two bonus categories where you spend the most.

These categories include airfare, advertising, computing, restaurants and shipping—among others where many businesses tend to spend heavily. And you don’t need to choose the two categories where you’ll earn extra points. The points—worth a penny each when redeemed for airfare through Amex—are automatically applied to your top two eligible spending categories   

Amex Business Gold does have some downsides: The card comes with a $295 annual fee. And the bonus rewards rate is capped at $150,000 in combined bonus category spending per year, although that should be attractive for all but the largest businesses. 

Still the card’s lucrative bonus rewards, along with a generous sign-up bonus of 70,000 points after spending $10,000 in the first three months, led us to name it Buy Side from WSJ’s Best Business Credit Card for 2022.

buy side top pick

American Express® Business Gold Card

• Base rewards: 1x
• Bonus rewards: 4x on up to $150,000 combined spending in the two categories where you spend most each month: airfare bought directly from the airlines; purchases for advertising; gas; purchases on computer hardware, software and cloud solutions; restaurants; shipping.
• Welcome bonus 70,000 points after spending $10,000 in the first three months.
• Book your flight with American Express Travel using Membership Rewards Pay with Points and get 25% of those points back.
• $295 annual fee
• No foreign transaction fee
• APR: 17.24% - 25.24%, variable
• Terms apply. See rates and fees.

Are the cash back rewards worth the fees?

To evaluate business credit cards, Buy Side from WSJ assumed a monthly spending budget of $10,000. (You can find more on that below.) Based on that budget and American Express Business Gold Card’s base one-point rewards rate, you would earn 190,000 points in the first year, when you collected the sign-up bonus, and 120,000 points in other years. 

Amex’s Membership Rewards Points are worth a penny each when redeemed for airfare with American Express Travel and up to a penny when redeemed for gift cards and at some online retailers. That means in a typical year your points would be worth $1,200 if redeemed for travel—easily enough to cover the $295 annual fee.  

But, again, where this card truly excels is its bonus categories, like travel and purchases for advertising, where a cardholder will receive four points per dollar spent in their top two spending categories, up to $150,000 in combined category spending. If you spent $10,000 a month on the card, and collected the bonus rewards rate on half your spending, you would earn 300,000 points a year, worth up to $3,000 depending on how you redeem them.

It’s possible to find business credit cards with a higher base rate, but for businesses that spend significantly in one of this card’s broadly defined bonus categories, Amex Business Gold is hard to beat.

Card details you might miss

While Buy Side from WSJ judges business credit cards primarily based on their rewards and usefulness to a business, it’s important to understand all the terms and conditions. Here are some other key points to keep in mind about the American Express Business Gold Card: 

• This American Express card is technically a charge card, in which you are expected to pay in full every month, but it has a “pay over time” option. Assuming you choose that feature, the APR is 17.24% – 25.24%, variable.
• There is no foreign transaction fee, making this a good card for international travel.
• You can participate in the program called “The Hotel Collection with American Express.” If you use your card with American Express Travel at eligible hotels, and you stay at least two consecutive nights, you’ll earn a $100 hotel credit and room upgrade upon arrival, if available.
• Car rental loss and damage insurance: If you rent a car with your card, and the vehicle is damaged or stolen, you’ll be covered. It’s secondary coverage, after you use your own car insurance policy, but it allows you to decline paying the rental company’s collision damage waiver. Some exclusions and restrictions apply.
• Baggage insurance plan: Coverage is provided for up to $1,250 for carry-on baggage and up to $500 for checked baggage, and it protects your baggage if it’s lost, damaged or stolen. You must purchase the ticket for the airline, bus, train and so on, with your American Express Business Gold Card. Some exclusions and restrictions apply.
• Trip delay insurance: If you buy a round trip with your American Express Business Gold Card, and your trip is delayed for more than 12 hours, as the card’s website puts it, “we may be able to help.” Terms, conditions and limitations apply.
• Extended warranty: After the original manufacturer’s warranty is over, you’ll get an additional year of coverage.
• Purchase protection. Coverage is offered up to $1,000 for items lost or stolen within 90 days of purchase.

Who benefits most from the American Express Business Gold Card?

For businesses that spend heavily in this card’s rewards categories—including advertising, computing and shipping—American Express Business Gold can be a great way to rack up extra rewards points. That the card automatically confers rewards in the two categories where you spend the most means earning these points should be relatively hassle-free.

That said, if your business doesn’t spend heavily in Amex Business Gold’s bonus categories, you may do better with a card that offers a higher across-the-board rewards rate than this card’s base rate of one point per dollar spent. 

The Capital One Spark Cash Plus Card offers 2% back on all your spending, the highest overall rate we found in the business card category. Like Amex Gold, this is a charge card. But it doesn’t offer the flexibility of Amex’s “pay over time feature.” If you don’t pay the balance in full every month you will be hit with a 2.99% late fee. Capital One Spark Cash Plus has a $150 annual fee.

If you are looking for a business credit card—as opposed to a charge card—with no annual fee and a generous rewards rate, consider the Chase Ink Business Unlimited® card, our pick for Best Business Credit Card for Simplicity. This card offers you 1.5% cash back across your spending.

Our Best Business Credit Card methodology

To pick Buy Side from WSJ’s Best Business Credit Card we looked for cards with the most generous cash back and points rewards, both overall and in popular business spending categories such as shipping, advertising and travel. We also looked for cards that were easy to use, without gimmicks or complicated rules to follow.

Our $10,000-a-month credit card budget was based on data from the credit bureau Experian which shows that for the second quarter of 2022, the average commercial credit card limit was $56,000. From there we assumed business owners would use about 20% of their available credit, roughly in-line with national averages. We then rounded down to keep things as simple as possible. 

To find out more about how we chose credit cards—and to meet our panel of experts—you can also check out Buy Side from WSJ’s full best credit cards methodology.Eligibility and Benefit level varies by Card. Terms, Conditions and Limitations Apply. Please visit Amex for more details. Underwritten by Amex Assurance Company.

The advice, recommendations or rankings expressed in this article are those of the Buy Side from WSJ editorial team, and have not been reviewed or endorsed by our commercial partners.

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