Yesterday Amex announced a killer new promotion which will get people putting Amex cards at the front of their wallets. Amex is offering double base points for purchases at eligible small businesses through the end of the year. This applies across most of their personal and small business cards, and will certainly cause me to shift some spend to my Amex cards.
While my favorite Amex bonus category at the moment is the 5x points offered on airfare with The Platinum Card® from American Express, that’s not exactly useful for your small business spend. 😉
The best Amex cards for small business spend
Ordinarily, my favorite cards for small business spend are The Amex EveryDay® Preferred Credit Card from American Express and the Blue Business Plus Credit Card:
- The Amex EveryDay Preferred Card offers 3x points for purchases at U.S. supermarkets, 2x points at U.S. gas stations, and 1x points on everything else; you earn a 50% points bonus when you make 30 transactions per billing cycle
- The Blue Business Plus Credit Card offers 2x Membership Rewards points per dollar spent on the first $50,000 in purchases each year (after that 1x)
So ordinarily when I’m deciding which card to put non-bonused spend on, the math is as follows:
- The Amex EveryDay Preferred Card offers a return of ~2.55% (I value Membership Rewards points at ~1.7 cents each, and you can earn 1.5x points)
- The Blue Business Plus Credit Card offers a return of ~3.4% (2x Membership Rewards)
As you can see, the Blue Business Plus ordinarily has the edge, up until that $50,000 purchase limit.
The information and associated card details on this page for the Amex EveryDay Preferred Credit Card has been collected independently by OMAAT and has not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.
Um... NONE of them? Traditionally Amex's transaction fees are higher than Visa/MC/Discover, so most small business owners would prefer you use one of those instead. Chase Freedom Unlimited + CSR will give you 2.25% back & keep the shopkeeper happy as well.
The way I'm reading it (now) is that you'll get the extra point regardless of category, and the disclaimer quoted above is just making clear that it won't ALSO double your category bonus points.
So what's the verdict on already-bonused categories? It sounds like Pam/KCM are right: based on the landing page, bonus categories appear to be disqualified from this promotion. But perhaps there's a different way to read that text? Seems open to interpretation, the way it's worded...
I was pretty excited to read about this promo, already signed up all my cards and then started analyzing how much of my spend is actually at small businesses in a 5-10 mile radius. Turns out, not much. I realized I spend mostly at big box retailers, Amazon, large grocery shops, and warehouse clubs, all of which leaves very little spend for small businesses. Naturally, YMMV, but after conducting this analysis this offer won't ultimately...
I was pretty excited to read about this promo, already signed up all my cards and then started analyzing how much of my spend is actually at small businesses in a 5-10 mile radius. Turns out, not much. I realized I spend mostly at big box retailers, Amazon, large grocery shops, and warehouse clubs, all of which leaves very little spend for small businesses. Naturally, YMMV, but after conducting this analysis this offer won't ultimately change what cards I place at the front of my wallet. Sure, I'll probably spend a couple of hundred dollars between now and years end at restaurants, but that's not a lot of extra points.... I'd like to hear how people will be maximizing this offer. In my case, spend at small businesses is just not going to happen.
@KMC Sorry, meant already bonuses categories!
On the signup landing page: "You will not earn 2X rewards on any bonus you already enjoy with your Card, such as when you spend on certain types of purchases or at certain merchants. Rewards Caps apply."
@KMC I too read yesterday that non-bonused categories didn't get the extra point. Hmmmm.....
except if you have a threshold bonus to meet i.e. AmEx Delta Platinum 70K bonus, which is what I registered.
I could swear I read it differently yesterday (that any already-bonused categories did not get the additional point) but taking another look today, it looks like you guys are right and I was wrong.
No you get 3 points per dollar on PRG for restaurants. one bonus base point on top of the two you already get. Read the Amex website.
Check your math. 2.2 x 2 = 4.4, not 4.2. SPG now comes out ahead for non-bonus.
@ tda -- Fixed, thanks!
This promotion absolutely does change the math for EDP vs PRG.
During this promotion, Everyday Preferred is superior to PRG if you are eating at local restaurants, since you will end up with 2.5 points/$. With PRG you will still get only 2 points, since bonused categories don't get the additional point.
@ KCM -- Hmmmm, might be missing something, but where did you see that?
Thanks guys, figured it out. It didn't let me enroll at the same time as the MR-earning cards. I had to go through a separate link on the SPG Amex page to enroll
One other small point is you don't need to worry about the 30 transactions if you use the spg card.
@AVS
Is it the business SPG card? Did you go through the OPEN Business link?
That's odd. I was able to enroll my SPG Amex without issue. Even had the dedicated SPG link in which to do it. I did get an error when I tried to enroll an additional holder card but if I read the terms right, any spend on additional holder cards counts for double points as well, so long as the primary card is enrolled.
Hey Ben, so when I logged into my Amex account to enroll my cards today, I was only offered my Amex Plat and Everyday cards as eligible for double points, not my SPG Amex. Do you know why that is?