Originally Posted by
RewardsNetwork
I may have misunderstood--as a general rule, your best bet is to consult the credit cards accepted list on the merchant's details page. This is the best way of ensuring that the card you are using is eligible for benefits.
If a card such as AMEX is not listed on the merchant's details page, it's possible that all AMEX transactions go on a different credit card processor. So while the restaurant will accept AMEX, benefits may not be issued for AMEX cards. Such a case is unlikely, but it is possible, and this may be what you experienced.
I'd never realised this was possible, until just recently. I already knew the restaurant and knew that it accepted Amex. As it was over the Xmas/New Year period, I checked the search listing to see that it was earning on the day I went, but I didn't even look at the detail page.
I had always thought that all necessary information was on the search result page, including "Rewards Today". If a restaurant accepts some types of cards for RN and some types of cards which don't credit RN, it would be useful to have a marker for that on the search results page. (There are plenty of times I use that as a list and don't even check the detail page. It's never mattered before, and the reviews on tripadvisor are far more useful.) Alternatively, how about mandating an all-or-nothing approach? Either in or out, not "partly in, depending on which card you use".
I sometimes check the accepted cards list, but not often. If a card type was missing on the RN listing and accepted by the restaurant, I would have assumed (as Kathy suggested) that the list was just information from the restaurant, like the menu, which could be out of date.