Marathon Man

are you certain about this with amex? You may be right. I do not know. It just stood to reason from my friend's perspective that if he did not meet the requirements, he could try again someday. I have no idea myself. And since my wife got her points and we really do not care to do MR business in the future, we do not really care about future apps for these useless and risky points. (risky in that amex can just make up reasons to take them away or delay them, as we have seen)

cwebjohn

I started a live chat session and asked them directly. Their standard response is that any points earned will adjust the points outstanding.

I suspect there is no value to the points, which is why they stopped allowing customers get point advances once that previous lawsuit about the value of points was closed.

Marathon Man

sounds right. But what if one never decides to get another mr product again?

cwebjohn

That really is the big unknown.

I like American Express, but I warned them today that I will be leaving as a customer and cancelling all my cards if this thing isn't resolved soon.

I already have received all the bonuses on 3 platinums (MB, Ameriprise and Regular), PRG, Ameriprise Gold, SPG biz and personal, 2 Hilton, Everyday and Everyday preferred, Blue cash everday , blue cash preferred, Green.

At this point there is nothing really keeping me...

Marathon Man

zactly.
For me, the fact that SPG currently works for Amex and one can still do some light MS with the cards, even at 1x, still has some value.

The eyes that see MS for MR are not yet focused on other currencies. IMO this has to do with the fact that MR are an AMEX based currency, that they have more control over and ownership of. The other products, like Hilton, Delta, SPG, etc are all transmitting data that turns into pointage on the other end, so with the respective programs, not within Amex and all its rules and terms. This could change but for now it is what it is, so for that reason alone, I would keep some of those cards. For now.

Sant

Those who have taken advantage of the Amex Sync offers would have had "returns" on their account every month.

forever1001

OK. I ended up with the dispute and I closed the plat card.

Anybody who wants to know the progress of the case can call 9545033000. The rep there has the authorization to see the detail of the case.

Yesterday I miss a call from this number. Today I call them and was told because of another reason - fraudulent purchase of MPX amazon gc with a $200 credit, they decided to clawback 100,000 points and the case now is closed. And there is no way to dispute this decision.

wwhh85

Oh my...I feel sorry for you, but what the hell is "fraudulent purchase of MPX amazon gc with a $200 credit"??

May I ask if you MSed to meet the spending? I didn't follow this whole thread so closely.

farnorthtrader

Okay, this is new information. I have looked back at your previous posts and you said that the only credit you had was for a purchase at Best Buy, but it appears that you also would have had a credit for this MPX purchase, which would trigger the $200 airline incidentals credit (shouldn't, but did). Did that credit take you under $3000 spend? Or was any of the rest of your spend for gift cards/other cash equivalents?

forever1001

I totally made about $3600 purchase including this MPX amazon gc. The NET spend is more than $3000, though about 90% of purchases are MS. The rep today also mentioned the $25 BestBuy credit as "return"... Even I didn't want to argue that rediculous reason. Anyway if they want to clawback the points, they would use any reason that you can't imagine.

By the way, I think MS is not the reason triggered the clawback. I purchase prepaid gc at Kroger, but I think Amex cannot get the L3 data from the grocery store. Think about the amount of the transactions everyday, there is no way for Amex to restore such huge data.

yuanzheng625

I called this number, having the exact response about the MPX 200 as fraudulent activity. However, I guess this explanation is only the mr representative's guess. I did argue with her this is unfair and she eventually said this is only what she could think of and all the notes from AMEX investigation she could see are noted as "ineligible returns".

So I guess the main explanation is still the obscure reason "ineligible returns" that AMEX doesn't want to elaborate.

wwhh85

I agree, by no means the MPX 200 can be considered as "fraudulent activity". Think about this: we bought 200 on MPX and the transaction itself is perfectly legal. If Amex doesn't like that as something that qualifies for the credit it can choose not to, and if Amex decides to give it to us (like it did), the credit would also have no bearing whatsoever on our total spend.

farnorthtrader

Yes, this is the typical front line AMEX rep "pull it out of your butt" reason when they have no idea. They pulled your points because of the GC purchases at Krogers. They can use the transaction number to pull full details of the purchase. I have been on the other end of this in my small business and from AMEX perspective when I was in banking and they can get any information that is on your receipt, right down to your signature. They can request either a paper copy or the electronic copy and it is just a matter of how much time it takes the merchant to get it to them, not whether they can get it.
No guarantee that they actually have done this, they may just be surmising from your transaction patterns, but if they haven't already pulled the information and are pushed, it appears that they certainly will go to whatever lengths they need to to make sure that the T and C were met to the letter.

cwebjohn

Every CSR I talk to has a different answer now days. Why is it so hard for management to be forthcoming?

reverted

Well it isn't looking good for me. I haven't heard back yet from CFPB and multiple reps are giving me different information regarding my case. One said the decision is from the corporate office and there is not much that they/I can do. Another said it was a system batch pull and that it could take 30-90 days for resolution.

This is getting ridiculous. No definitive answer from anyone on Amex's end. Will probably be cancelling the card tomorrow and recoup part of the annual fee. I'm assuming many folks may be doing the same?