jerryhung

Agreed
Mods can easily find a few reading this thread starting with last page and back

Hoping everything becomes clean and good old FlyerTalk again

mikeycanuk

Boy it sure is quiet here....

alc

Ok.. so let me post a question then.

Anyone applied the AMEX AeroplanPlus Gold after April 1 got the Welcome Bonus counted for "d" status?

One of my co-worker is thinking about apply the card and this will be one of the key reason for it.

Cana2013

My friend applied in the second week of April, received the card but the bonus miles are not posted yet. I will ask him to check if the bonus miles are Distinction eligible.

cwhitt

So the "hidden" SPG link is now broken, but for those who applied while the link existed, but after the public SPG offer went to 10k: good news.

I just called Amex to get my SPG number (never had SPG before the Amex card and I couldn't find the number with the info I got with the card). The rep told me that I had 20k+ SPG sitting with Amex to transfer after my next statement.

So it looks like they honored the hidden link. I didn't call or contact them in any way before today except to activate the card.

Cheers,
Christopher

1Newflyer

You must be a confused moralist. You just like to spend but can not afford or choose not to have a fee credit card. Nothing wrong with that. You however want "free" annual holidays for your family on points with a minimum cost. You earn these by manipulating applications to get bonuses. But these bonuses cost someone and you are taking advantage of it. Yet you seem to be OK with it and you deem it to be within your ethical threshold.

FREE TRIPS DO NOT EXIST. Its only a distribution of cost that happens with bonuses.

mikeycanuk

The whole credit card points game is simply paid for by those who are irresponsible spenders who see points, points and more points but yet carry a balance and pay usurious interest rates. We are constantly abusing those fellow card members, especially Capital One. Those 2% returns of ours just cover the merchant fees. And those fees don't go directly to Capital One. They first go to payment processors who must charge a decent %.

markandrew

Biz card costs $250 but gives 25,000 points. If you want to keep your MR balance alive you can very simply get the card and redeem the points for $250 credit, then it cost nothing but comes with no bonus.

Lacking any other choice, and if the MR balance justifies, I would consider this option.

We technically are not abusing those cardholders, the banks are. The banks offers incentives to sign up to hook enough clients in to get some of those interest payers. I don't think interest rates would fall if incentives were taken away. Amex also shows that you do not need to be reliant on interest to offer meaningful rewards, though their vertical integration assists greatly in this respect. I doubt they make extensive profits from interest on charge cards as I know from first hand experience from processing error that when you are a few days late on the 30 day grace period, they cut your charge cards off.

Lazarev

First of all, credit cards earn PER transaction, so diverting all my spending through credit card is exactly what earns them money. 2.5% transaction fee for any transaction, including the coffee at local coffee shop is hardly "FREE". I pay my due, and I understand it. Besides, we can always argue that the bill for all our points (of any kind) is footed by those who pay cash since they are paying credit card inflated prices due to clause each merchant has to sign to not have differing prices for CC vs. cash. Credit cards earn revenue based on card use, and their 2.5% earn rate on each transaction is hardly covered by measly 1% they offer in points (that are not as liquid as cash we fork out to cover those bills).

If you are so morally pure, then maybe you should consider lobbying for transparent credit card pricing that shows credit card imposed fees separate on your bill. Then people would understand that your points and my points and any other credit card "perks" have already been paid for by ourselves.

I'm not confused, as obtaining the card and using it for 70.000 yearly spend and referring my husband to the same is exactly what is desired by Amex and what is supported by their rules - I'm merely following, not manipulating. Canceling a year later is hardly a manipulation, as I have forked out $1750 in hidden credit card "price". The "bonus" 20.000 points is worth (at best) $400.
Where manipulation begins is when I start representing myself as "business" (which I don't have) and cancel shortly after receiving benefit (3 months later). First of all, I'm clearly breaking the "business" rule and I'm canceling before "earning" the benefit - so, yes, this is beyond my ethical threshold.

No, there is no FREE lunch, but I somehow think that my lunch should not be skimmed so deeply by credit card companies. Yes, I'm willing to pay a fee to have something as seamless as credit card purchase, but at the same time, I want that fee to be as low as financial company could bear. Which is exactly why they are offering points, and why I plan to use them in most effective, non-manipulative way.

Sorry for off-topic rant.

markandrew

This is inaccurate. Although 2% of your purchase may have made its way to the bank, it does not mean that your purchase would have been 2% less but for that fee. Firstly, the merchant fees are spread across all purchases by all purchasers, including the lowest transaction costs system - Interac. If credit cards were not here, prices would probably be higher because of all of the transactional risks involving cash purchases - forged bills, higher insurance, theft, time spent balancing and attending the bank.

Moreover you cannot expect the whole convenience of the credit cards system which makes significant transactional savings for you, especially in terms of time (finding an ATM or branch every time you needed cash, going to a branch to pay bills etc.) to come without a cost, there are huge technological, infrastructure and human resources invested into the network. You get a lot for the $1,750 which was largely subsidized by the less savvy population.

mikeycanuk

Remember Amex charges merchant fee's up to 4%. Visa/MC range between 1.75%-2%. Amex also holds the merchants money until the end of the month. For small biz, anyway. I can imagine big entities get better terms. I wonder what Costco got?

As for prices higher if we all used cash? Are you kidding me? I did a quick off the cuff calculation of my wife's store. She pays $22,000 a year in merchant fees, probably higher as I didn't take Amex into account. How on earth do you think that handling cash would cost more?

Forged bills- maybe once in 5years
Theft- once in 20 years
Insurance- it never goes down.
Time spent balancing -ok a little but retail salary/hr x 20mins =not much. I can counter with credit card machine rental, tape and if there is a mistake somewhere it takes time to track it down too!
Bank charges-sure but she takes her cash, puts it in her PCFinancial account and writes a cheque to her biz. Makes a little interest and saves $250-300/yr. Loblaws is across the street from the bank.

Lazarev

There are no transactional risks involving credit cards???

2.5% less is exactly what market determined in any place that is not under strong grip of credit card validations. Apparently, in terms of merchant cost, that is how much overhead they have purely due to credit cards - even interac is pitiful, as it charges $0.40 flat fee for any transaction amount larger than $35. If I spend $400 dollars and pay with credit card, %2.5 ($10) of that goes to credit card issuer, while paying with interac, only 40 cents will go to the bank. In terms of clearinghouse requirements and software needed for electronic transactions to go through - it is roughly the same, yet, cc collects 25 times more.

Cash to credit card comparisons in terms of savings becomes obsolete with other electronic forms of payment that apparently can function without huge hidden transaction fees. "Convenience" of not finding ATM and bank etc, is not coming from credit cards, but from electronic payments. Providing electronic payments to general public for low or no fees is exactly how banks save operational costs on their side - so it is only fair to share the burden of putting this all new (or not so new by now) system in place - I pay tiny transaction cost, banks get rid of army of bank tellers and money counters. My convenience is banks' savings, so it is win-win. Overhead of 2.5% transaction fee can be much, much lower. Only way I can get my "value" out of unavoidable 2.5% surcharge that is applied to every price (regardless of method of payment) is to collect the points.

microcosm

I know self referral works from amex MR gold-plat, but not sure if i want plat just yet, in meantime i want aeroplan gold + plat airmiles. these 2 are outside of the MR rewards program, will i still get referral bonus (10k) if i was to self refer from gold?

Actually, for Amex Air miles Plat i dont think id be able to get +500 referral airmile points so maybe i should use someone's referral or go with GCR rebate?

crimsona

I know of a Plat holder that tried to do a cross family referral (Aeroplan Gold, other user). 16 weeks later, still trying to get it from Amex, but at least one rep has refused to do so stating that it's from a different family

microcosm

do you think id still get the min 30k say on aerogold plus (compared to reg 25k) right? I mean if i lose out on trying to convince them to give me additional 10k on amex MR gold, well i guess its just life