American Express Credit Card Points

[Fast Black Trucks]

I use my American Express card to build up points and have found that getting Gift Cards is the best return for the number of points required. Home Depot is where I have been getting the gift cards too lately to buy tools and supplies for the garage.

Well through tomorrow, you get 20% off on those gift cards. Meaning you spend 20% less points for the same gift card. That allowed me to cash out my points and get an extra gift card too, bringing my total to $350!

I'm not the biggest fan of Husky tools but they aren't too bad when they're "free to me". And now that I'm in the market for a tool box the 36" Stainless tool chest doesn't look bad either. I'm just not a fan of pop rivets holding the drawers to the slides and a bunch of wide drawers.... decisions, decisions.

 

[Jack Olsen]

I built my shed with a $500 HD gift card I got from a a 'try it for one year' American Express deal.

 

[LWW]

I can't find any HD gift cards in the Amex Membership Rewards site?! I do see everything at 20% off though!

 

[66HertzClone]

I used mine to buy a 46" Panasonic plasma a year or so ago. Tried one to buy airline tickets, that was a mess, they select your flights instead of you. Next time I think I will buy some wine with the points, a good no out of pocket way to add to my cellar.

 

[battmain]

I've been trying to figure out how to calculate the points on mine. The headlines said spend $2500 and get a free $25 gift card. I've spent way more than that and no gift card yet. Doesn't matter. I'm using the Amex more than the Mastercard that I'm getting rid of. Mastercard seems to enjoy charging me fees for being 2 minutes late on a payment. It's not worth my while to deal with the customer service reps who treat me like a non-paying customer. Even if it cost me $200 in fees when it's all over with. It is much easier to take my business elsewhere.

 

[Stuey]

I've been trying to figure out how to calculate the points on mine. The headlines said spend $2500 and get a free $25 gift card. I've spent way more than that and no gift card yet. Doesn't matter. I'm using the Amex more than the Mastercard that I'm getting rid of. Mastercard seems to enjoy charging me fees for being 2 minutes late on a payment. It's not worth my while to deal with the customer service reps who treat me like a non-paying customer. Even if it cost me $200 in fees when it's all over with. It is much easier to take my business elsewhere.

As far as I'm aware, Mastercard doesn't offer their own cards. So your beef is with your bank/card issuing company, not MC.

Everyone will charge you fees for making late payments. As long as you don't make a habit of it, they should have waived it as part of a one time courtesy. But how do you rack up $200 in fees when you're "2 minutes late on a payment"?

In any case, darn, I wish I had an Amex card again! I dropped it because Citi dropped my Amex reward points from 5% on groceries and gas and 3% on everything else to 1% on everything. It just wasn't worth the $100 annual fee anymore.

 

[HomeBrewA4]

I think the issue is, at least with us, you have to make payments by 3pm eastern or its late. Yes we usually make it night before, but life doesnt always allow that. We would go automatic, but we did that at first with our Chase card. We were getting charged 2-3 times A MONTH for that months bill and would have to call and fight about it, only to get told "it will get charged back" and have to wait and wait and wait and wait, all while the bank account is sitting, missing 3-4 hundred dollars for weeks on end.

At that point we went to paying EVERYTHING manually.

I think if its due say Sept 20th, it should be able to be paid by Sept. 20th by 11:59pm. Not some stupid mid-day cut off time.

 

[ovilla]

That's how I got my 50" plasma and a PS3 last year. I walked into Best Buy with 2K in gift cards. I'll be doing the same to get a new computer in a couple of months.

For those of you wondering how this stuff works. You don't really need to buy anything special. We've been using our cards for mostly all household stuff, even utility bills.

 

[Stuey]

I think the issue is, at least with us, you have to make payments by 3pm eastern or its late. Yes we usually make it night before, but life doesnt always allow that. We would go automatic, but we did that at first with our Chase card. We were getting charged 2-3 times A MONTH for that months bill and would have to call and fight about it, only to get told "it will get charged back" and have to wait and wait and wait and wait, all while the bank account is sitting, missing 3-4 hundred dollars for weeks on end.

At that point we went to paying EVERYTHING manually.

I think if its due say Sept 20th, it should be able to be paid by Sept. 20th by 11:59pm. Not some stupid mid-day cut off time.

If you have problems making payment by a certain date (e.g. your payday is the night before payment is due), you should be able to call up and move your payment date around.

I'm the biggest procrastinator I know, and to my knowledge I have never made a late payment in the past 7 years or so since I've had my own credit cards. I now use electronic payments from my bank. I log in, write the amount, hit send. Payments post rather quickly. Some are electronic transfer, some are laser drafted checks.

 

[HomeBrewA4]

Chase will work with you, for a 35 dollar service fee. Once the card is paid off, its going in the trash. We will be fine on any other card we have, Chase was just our first and our favorite, till the last year when they became all but unbearable to deal with. So we will make the payment weeks early, so we know for sure, its done on time.

Cap 1, will move it a day or 2 and not charge anything. Even if we forget (we are humans), the late fee is like 5 bucks for 1 months. Chase doubles your payment for 2-3 months and then brings it back down.

Bank of America is our favorite card. There is a secondary website that you can make payments after 4pm, till 11:59pm and not be considered late. IDK why the actual BOA site wont, but the secondary site does.. i think its called "myeasypayment.com"..

 

[Tom2]

I have a BofA rewards card. The best deal seems to be cash back. I think it's something like 2500 points = $25 -- But if you want a $25 gift card to a resturant, it takes 3500 points. Why anyone would do anything other than the cash back is pretty confusing.. If anything it should be the other way around..

I think if you make 1 late payment a year, they will remove the fee if you ask. Has happened to me once or twice in the past. (both times were 1 day late).

 

[Steevo]

I buy 3 or four HD gift cards a year with my Amex points.

 

[kornjulio]

Costco rewards for me.

 

[mrb]

on a side note, i discovered something interesting the other day. I was studying the rates and terms for a merchant account. They charge an additonal 1.5% for 'non qualified transactions' which included purchases made with rewards cards. So not all of the rewards are coming from the bank, a good portion if not all is coming from the places you use the card. Kind of shady, but so goes the credit card industry...

 

[Andy Griffith]

I have to figure this stuff out soon. We have a costco amex that we use for just about every purchase/expense imaginable save for property taxes.

 

[Andy Griffith]

Guess my card doesn't get any points.

We have the True Earnings Bidness Card which has cash back - 1% everything else, 3% restaurants, 2% travel, 4% gasoline, but no points apparently.

Oh well.

 

[terabyte]

anybody figure out how to pay your mortgage with an Amex?

 

[Munich77]

I use the AmEX blue cash back and put just about everything on it. Nice to get a couple of hundred dollars credited to your account.

 

[battmain]

As far as I'm aware, Mastercard doesn't offer their own cards. So your beef is with your bank/card issuing company, not MC.

Everyone will charge you fees for making late payments. As long as you don't make a habit of it, they should have waived it as part of a one time courtesy. But how do you rack up $200 in fees when you're "2 minutes late on a payment"?

It's actually more than $200. The last statement shows $248.52 including interest charges. That is fees and interest charges only. Sure they'll gladly refund the fees, plus that months interest, but not the next months interest. Mind you, I pay off the balance every month and even pay ahead occasionally, but if one were to sit down calculate how they do things, it is quite intriguing. Never mind the changing due date.

As I said, it's not worth my time. I'll just move the business elsewhere. I'm just one customer in their monthly bucket of billions of dollars. The amounts I charge on a monthly basis is tiny compared to the billions they move hourly. While 248.52 is a lot of money to me, my sanity is worth more. Dealing with reps who treat you like an imbecile annoys the **** out of me, even when I'm being polite.

The two minutes late were because I was out of the country, and had to get rid of the stupid annoying e-bill request when I logged on to pay the bill. While I was waiting on the slow connection to clear the page, it went over the time limit. I also refuse to do auto payments. It's my money and I've heard and read enough horror stories to not chance it. To solve the issue, I tried to connect with customer service multiple times via ip phone, but kept getting cut off due to the bad connection. Sure it's my fault, but other companies seem to get by fine without getting their ******* in a wad if I pay the next day. I have no debt except for my mortgage, and if it weren't for my aunt (tax advisor) telling me not pay off the house, I'd have no debt.

The mastercard will provide me with some free Klipsch speakers for a surround system, so I'll get those ordered before I cut up the card.

 

[southernfriedcj]

Me and my business partner were racking up millions of AMEX Rewards points a year when building and development was in full swing.
Never paid for a vacation. We would get rental cars (50,000 points = a $500 Hertz card), hotels (a $600 per night room = 12,000 points, that is a bargin with the Starwood card) and we purchased plane tickets with the card.
Those were good times. Too bad they came to an end.

 

[Stuey]

The two minutes late were because I was out of the country, and had to get rid of the stupid annoying e-bill request when I logged on to pay the bill. While I was waiting on the slow connection to clear the page, it went over the time limit.

That's a pretty darned good excuse!

I would be super pissed off in your situation. If you charge as much as I think you do to develop $200+ in late fees and interest, Amex's customer retention dept. should/could have waived your fees if you threatened to walk.

 

[froggert]

thanks to the OP for the heads up. i just ordered a bunch of home depot gift cards.