Tag Archives: American Express

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US Bank FlexPerks Visa and AMEX $49 Annual Fees Just Posted – Next Steps?

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Good morning everyone, I hope your weekend is going well.  It is supposed to rain on and off all weekend in San Francisco, so I hope the weather is better wherever you are.  Yesterday was not a very good day for most Bluebird and AMEX Serve Card holders (Round 2 of AMEX Serve Card Account Closures (March 4, 2016)), but the second round of shutdowns ironically occurred at a great time for this post.

When I logged into my US Bank online account this morning, I saw a $49 annual fee post on both of my US Bank FlexPerks Credit Cards (Visa Signature and American Express).  I was exclusively using my US Bank FlexPerks AMEX Credit Card for AMEX Serve Card online reloads, but since that avenue is no longer available, I really have no other use for the US Bank FlexPerks AMEX Credit Card.  I originally got both US Bank FlexPerks Credit Cards when they were offering large sign up bonuses (Winter Olympics in 2014 for the US Bank FlexPerks Visa Signature Credit Card and the standard 20,000 FlexPoints for the US Bank FlexPerks AMEX Credit Card).

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Round 2 of AMEX Serve Card Account Closures (March 4, 2016)

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Good morning everyone, I wish I had better news to share, but it looks like American Express is up to no good today.  Myself and at least 1 other person I know, received the following email that says that their AMEX Serve Card was flagged for “unusual usage patterns.”  This follows on the heels of AMEX Serve Card Mass Account Closures Effective Immediately (1/8/2016, Section 15.d).  Based on these 2 data points, AMEX sends account closure emails around the first week of the month, possibly every other month.  Did anyone receive an email between January 8 and today (March 4)?  The title of the email says: Termination Of Funds Loading Capabilities on Your Serve® Account.

New Serve Account Shutdown Email

As of today, all my AMEX Serve Cards are closed and I have no more prepaid cards with American Express.  It has been a good run, but now it is time to shred my final AMEX Serve Card.  Did anyone else get hit with an account shutdown email today?  I hope the rest of the weekend goes better :)

If you want to read more AMEX Serve Card shutdown stories, head over to:

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New AMEX Offers: Staples, TurboTax, & Cruise Lines; US Bank FlexPerks & Club Carlson Targeted Spending Offers

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Good afternoon everyone.  American Express added a few new AMEX Offers over the last few days.  The offers include Staples, TurboTax, Norwegian Cruise Line, Carnival Cruise Line, and Porsche Design.  Receive a 5% statement credit at Staples or staples.com after spending $100 or more.  This is not any better than the Chase Ink Bold/Plus Business Credit Cards, but I suppose if you have already maxed out the $50,000 yearly cap on your Chase Ink card, you may be interested in this AMEX Offer.

Staples AMEX Offer

After you enroll all your eligible AMEX cards, you will receive a bunch of enrollment emails from American Express explaining how to shop at Staples and earn cash back via a statement credit.  Too much hand holding from Staples and AMEX for me.

Staples AMEX Offer Enrollment Email

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AMEX for Target Discontinuing Program & AMEX Serve $25 Sign Up Bonus

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Good evening everyone, I hope your weekend is going well.  I wanted to give a quick shout out to all of you who joined me at In-N-Out Burger this afternoon for my OC miles and points meetup.  I had a great time meeting and speaking with all of you.  I will organize another OC meetup in a few months.

Anyway, a long, long time ago, the American Express Prepaid Card for Target (aka AMEX for Target) was one of the few/best MS techniques available at the time.  Back in the day, you could load up to $1,000 with credit/debit/gift cards for a $3 fee and unload the card via cheap ATM withdrawals.  You could have 2 cards in your name and load up to $5,000 combined per month.  It was far from a perfect MS technique, but it was the best we had at the time.

TargetAmex

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New AMEX Offers: KLM $200 Off $1,000, Hilton Garden Inn $40 Off $200, a Few Others

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Good morning everyone.  It’s been a while since I last reported on AMEX Offers.  The offers have just been so bad for the last few weeks that it wasn’t even worth mentioning.  The streak has been broken with 2 pretty good travel offers.  The first is from KLM, where you can get a $200 statement credit for spending $1,000 or more on KLM flights.  The only cash back portal that has KLM is Ebates (they are offering 1% cash back for KLM flights).  The second offer is from Hilton Garden Inn, where you can get a $40 statement credit after spending $200 or more.  iConsumer is offering 3.2% cash back for Hilton Garden Inn.  This offer is not valid at any other Hilton properties and the total stay charge must be higher than $200 to trigger the statement credit.

KLM AMEX Offer Hilton Garden Inn AMEX Offer

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