DaveH

Exactly mia, and well said, thank you.

That's the behavior observed with other MR rebates in the past, as far as I've seen. Hopefully we'll see it here too.

lkar

Oh, that's interesting. I didn't realize that when you pay with points you're also charged on the card.

I guess I'll have a data point soon. I redeemed some points for a flight using pay with points yesterday, and indeed points were deducted from my account and the charge also shows up in my pending charges. I used the business plat as the selected card when I checked out on the amex cite so I won't get 5x, but at least I'll see whether I get the points back and get points on the purchase.

flyinghigh77

Amex clawing back 50% pay with points bonus

I booked a flight ticket using points with my chosen airline (Amex Plat Biz). 50% of points went back to account. A few days later, that 50% points credit disappeared from my account. Called Amex. I was told the points were awarded too quickly and therefor have been taken back. I should check again in 6 to 8 weeks as points are supposed to be in my account then. Anyone else in the same situation?

mia

The terms say:

...but it would have been better to apply the terms as written to future transactions, rather than try to undo recent credits.

flyinghigh77

agreed!

extremeromance

My 50 percent bonus posted a day after and has not been clawed back yet, perhaps this is just a tactic to wait a while before awarding the points so the MR balance won't stay high enough to do continuous transactions

lkar

Ok, here's my datapoint, such as it is. Redeemed points for a flight on my selected airline and chose the Amex business plat to pay. Points were deducted immediately. Pending charge was placed on the card. About 4 days later, the charge was credited back and the 50 percent points were posted back to my account. The statement closed the next day.

Looking at pending points in my MR account, it looks like I got zero points for the cost of the tickets.

lkar

What a ridiculous policy. "Sure, we can post them early but we're going to deliberately wait in order to make the benefit less useable."

This feature traditionally is described by blogs and others as effectively getting two cents per point, but that's a bit misleading. For those who have quickly replenishing MR accounts, that's true but if you're trying to book for two people, just as an example, you can have trouble unless you always have double the points.

Troopers

But don't you always need double the points if you're trying to book for two pax, regardless if it's 50% back or not? Not sure what the issue is.

mia

The delay also protects American Express against refunded tickets. In any event, at this point we have only a single report of a reversed transaction, and we have only a customer service agent's verbal explanation.

If you had confidence that the points would be refunded in a few days you could book two tickets with only a 50% cushion. Example:

1. 150,000 opening balance
2. 100,000 redeem for 1st $1,000 ticket
3. =50,000 balance
4. +50,000 1st 50% refund
5. 100,000 balance
6. 100,000 redeem for 2nd $1,000 ticket
7. -ZERO-- balance
8. +50,000 2nd 50% refund
9. 50,000 closing balance

Troopers

Agree with above.

But it seems to me that the previous poster was suggesting that it's a bad deal because one needs to have double the points to book tickets for two. What miles/points program allows tickets for two without double the points?

lkar

The point I was trying to make inartfully is that the claim that the points are worth 2 cents each is misleading to the extent it implies the points are as good as cash. They aren't, and if Amex is going to start taking longer than a few days to reimburse the 50 percent then the value proposition goes down even further.

If you have 200,000 points, they are not close to worth $4,000. Can you get $4,000 in value out of them by redeeming them for travel? Yes, if you use exactly the right combinations (although it will always be some number less than $4,000 because you'll always have a remainder unless you use more points).

For a guy with 200,000 points who wants to jump on a business fare deal to get two tickets for himself and his spouse for $1,100 each, he's out of luck. He can't even get $2,200 in value out of those points even if he were willing to use all of them for the two tickets. He could get one ticket for 55,000 points and use cash for the other, which would still be a great deal. Or he could simply wait for another opportunity to maximize his value.

But my point is that the lack of flexibility and the requirement that you always need double points makes the value proposition such that when trying to decide whether to get the Amex Business Plat or trying to decide whether to pay with points, you need to take that into account. Most of us, or at least many of us, when trying to decide what currency to use or whether to use a particular currency come up with general points per dollar values. So, for example, when I'm trying to decide whether to transfer MR to Avios or to SQ I have a general sense of how I value each MR point to decide whether to transfer it (the same with earning when I can choose between spending a dollar on Amex Everyday or Chase Freedom).

My general value of MR points is, personally, around 1.7 cents. That is the value at which I'd just as happily take the points as I would take the cash. In that respect, a 2 cent per point redemption option seemed like a game changer but in fact the way that you have to redeem points to get the 50 percent back drops the value to me to less than 2 cents per point. I would not be just as happy to have 200,000 points to use all for 50 percent back redemptions as I would be to have $4,000, because of the limits described above. If they are going to increase the redeposit time then the value drops even further below 2 cents per point.

Obviously, there's a micro and a macro issue here. Question one is the value of the points in the abstract and question two is the value of the points for any particular redemption. If you need a $200 ticket and have 200,000 points, then obviously you can get 2 cents per point for a particular redemption. But that doesn't mean the 200,000 in your account before you have a use for them should be viewed as worth $4,000. It's the same as thinking that because you used 100,000 points for an $18,000 singapore ticket last year that your 200,000 points are worth $36,000.

lkar

I meant you need twice as many points as the redemption cost in order to book the ticket. If you want an award ticket on an airline that costs 12,500 points, you only need 25,000 points to book it for two. If you want to pay with Amex points to get a $250 ticket, it costs you 12,500 Amex points but you need quadruple that amount of points to book it for two people, or 50,000 points. Yes, you get 25,000 back eventually, but that doesn't help you if you don't have 50,000 points.

Suppose American Airlines said, from now on, to book a business class ticket to Europe, it is going to be 115,000 miles instead of 57,500 miles, but we'll give you back 57,500 miles a week after you ticket. I would presume most would view this as a significant devaluation and that's the only point I was trying to make to temper some of the enthusiasm about MR now being worth "2 cents per point."

Troopers

Emphasis added.

Maybe I'm all confused since I haven't used it yet but I'm think you're incorrect.

If you want to pay with Amex points to get a $250 ticket, it costs you 25,000 MR points (with a 12,500 MR credit after so net 12,500 MR). If you want 2x $250 ticket, it costs you 50,000 MR points (with a 25,000 credit after so net 25,000 MR). It does not cost you quadruple, it costs you double for 2 tickets.

mia

This isn't complicated. To book a $1,000 ticket you must have 100,000 points, but the net redemption will be only 50,000 points. This means you must have twice as many points at time of redemption versus the amount implied by the $0.02 valuation, which is based on the net amount. This is an excellent marketing choice by American Express because it rewards engaged spenders more than one-off churners.