Yes, the price is inflated above the regular menu but you still save $$ by doing pickup over delivery so it does give you more bang for your buck.

I meant to do pickup if it's somewhere that you'd be passing by anyway either on foot or by car on your way to or from someplace else. I doubt people are staying home all day every day, so once a month when you're out anyway just pick up something to eat from a local eatery.

For pickup, yes, unless you are going to be losing a monthly credit soon and need to use it before you lose it. Otherwise, for the places that do it (most will), you can do it the old fashioned way and call in for pickup. You'll save on the menu prices, but again, might as well use the credit while you have it.

If you want delivery, it is what it is, and yes, that would even be more to tip the driver.

I do Uber Eats pick ups on my way home from work, usually from places that I pass by anyway. It's literally a 5 minute stop for me.

The coffee house I go to most mornings is on UberEats so I just go there a few times when I'm not going to do rideshare that month. It's 75 cents more than if I were to just order at the register but I figure it's free money using the credit and the drink is ready to pick up as soon as I get there so no waiting in line

Thanks for that. I was concerned it was a year or two like FFCs or ETCs. Though I often prefer to fly UA, I'm a free agent when it comes to leisure travel and can't readily predict when I will use them, esp. as we try to use miles when possible. But 5+ years should be more than sufficient (To put in perspective I still have some AA GCs that were purchased and rebated by my CNB Crystal Card in 2019. Thankfully no expiration, and we finally had occasion to use a couple this year.)

I just used $200 of Delta gift cards today that Amex bought me in 2020

I hadn’t paid much attention to this change, but it is actually significant. Now it should be much easier to take advantage of the equinox credit if you have multiple Amex platinum cards. You can run one month’s charge through one card, then switch cards to the other Amex Platinum. Then you can probably switch to a card that earns better. Increases the value of the credit on the second card.

Many people do not live in an area where UE is even available.

Yep. We don’t. We have a little bit of DoorDash but that’s it. Still, I have the app on my phone and my card loaded, so when we travel to areas where it is available (we are usually in the Portland area every month or two), we can order some takeout and use the $15 credit that month. Of course, some months it will go unused, but we valued it at $0 when deciding whether to get this card, so any use we get out of it when traveling is a bonus. Honestly many of the credits aren’t aimed at rural and small town dwellers.

That's why they offer Wal-Mart and XM radio, LOL.

Seriously nothing would please Amex more than to have spoilage on the credits. They are out to maximize revenue, and do so by collecting $695 up front. Moreover I would be Amex collects a fee from the merchant on these promo credits, especially the ones that are limited to a specific merchant like Equinox.

I disagree. American Express wants the merchants who pay for these programs to consider them successful and continue to market through American Express. None of these arrangements are permanent, but a five year run is more profitable for American Express than a company that backs away after a year or two.

Amex, in its earnings call today, kept talking about “engagement” from millennials and Gen Z customers attracting more partners and merchants. And how they would keep refreshing cards if necessary. So I agree with Mia, they want Uber / equinox / etc to be happy

Yeah, those are credits almost anyone can use. We fully value the entertainment credit as it fully covers spending we were already doing, and I put a small but nonzero on the WM+ credit (mostly for Paramount+ streaming since we don't generally shop at WM). I think we can mostly use the hotel and airline incidental credit in most years, and with Schwab we get an annual bonus that offsets the fee some. At the end of one year, we'll see how much value we got out of it overall. For the first year, it's an easy winner with the 100,000 point bonus through the Schwab card. But we can re-evaluate about 10 months in to see if this makes sense to keep. I think there may be enough other benefits to keep it even if we can't recoup the entire $695 with credits and Schwab bonus, but we'll see.

I'd also add that the goal of a business is not to maximize revenue, but to maximize *profit*. Sure, sometimes you make a business decision to sell at a loss in the short term if it increases revenues, market share and customer base in the short term that should increase profits in the long term. But no sound business believes in the idea that "we lose money on every sale, but we make up for it in volume". Not in a long-term strategy, anyway.

But I digress, and back to the thread topic, either the $695 is worth it or it's not. With a new Schwab Plat and its 100,000 point SUB, that's worth at least $1,100 and maybe more if it can be transferred to airline and hotel partners for even more, so Year 1 is a no-brainer and lets us see if there should be a Year 2. Ain't life grand?

Because it was literally my point that it is not $240 in value. Just because you got a $240 credit, does not necessarily mean you saved $240.

UA wouldn't let me use Travelbank on my most recent flight because it was too cheap. If I paid for the more expensive fare, I could have used the funds. Again, a similar theme to all of this.

Maybe it's possible that the card just isn't for some people if they live in remote areas, don't travel or even leave the house, and have no expenses?

Seriously, if you're not getting value from the card, just cancel it?