How are Membership Awards points calculated for Amex Plat Credit Card?

Mal · #1 (**permalink**) 3rd July 2006, 06:47 PM

Maybe I'm not aware of some kind of bonus offer or something, but I can never correlate the number of Amex Rewards points awarded to me with the amount I spend on the card.

I understand that the Amex Plat Credit Card has 1.5 reward points / $ spent. Great. Makes sense to me. I see that Amex award the "1" point as Points earned and ".5" reward points as "Bonus" points. Still making sense.

But I can't work out the following:

The amount of base points awarded never matches my monthly spend. It's sometimes higher or lower depending on the month.

The amount of bonus points doesn't always match 50% of the base points. It also can be higher depending on the month.

This is logical if Amex are having Bonus offers at the moment for spends at certain locations, however the only listing I know of is here:

http://www.americanexpress.com/austr..._en_nu=leftnav

,and apart from not spending any money at those organisation, nothing is displayed on my statement showing that I'm earning extra from any spend.

So what am I missing?

kyle · #2 (**permalink**) 3rd July 2006, 09:08 PM

Not sure about everyone else's card, but the online rewards table shows the points earned from 25 or 26 of a month to 25 or 26 of the following month, whereas the cutoff for my card is around the 2nd of each month.

I've tried adding up the spend from 25/26 of the month to the next. It actually matched the table (plus or minus one or two points for rounding).

NM · #3 (**permalink**) 3rd July 2006, 09:19 PM

My Amex Membership Rewards monthly cycle is not based on calendar month. Mine runs 14th of one month to the 13th of the next month. This is even different to my billing cycle which is 19th of each month. If you MR and billing cycles are similarly misaligned, perhaps that explains the difference.

Mal · #4 (**permalink**) 3rd July 2006, 09:30 PM

Aaah,

That does make a bit of sense.

I had another look at my account.

My Awards account has a cycle that ends 6 days before my credit card cycle!

Makes sense to me now, although does raise the question why Amex has to be so off tangent!

Anyways, thanks for the help. Although I havn't tallied up my various statements, it does look about right.

serfty · #5 (**permalink**) 3rd July 2006, 11:01 PM

If you are looking on-line and click the "Membership Rewards" you get two figures, one is "Closing Balance", a figure in line with the monthly cycle as described previously, the other figure is positioned above that, titled "Total Points" and is what you actually 'have'.

oz_mark · #6 (**permalink**) 3rd July 2006, 11:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by serfty

If you are looking on-line and click the "Membership Rewards" you get two figures, one is "Closing Balance", a figure in line with the monthly cycle as described previously, the other figure is positioned above that, titled "Total Points" and is what you actually 'have'.

Not for me! After I upgraded to the Platinum Credit Card the Membership rewards page has been pretty much non functional!

serfty · #7 (**permalink**) 4th July 2006, 08:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oz_mark

Not for me! After I upgraded to the Platinum Credit Card the Membership rewards page has been pretty much non functional!

What browser are you using? I had real problems with IE5.5/IE6, now use firefox with no problems.

AnonymousCoward · #8 (**permalink**) 6th July 2006, 04:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by serfty

What browser are you using? I had real problems with IE5.5/IE6, now use firefox with no problems.

Well, I have two membership rewards accounts. One linked to my corporate card, and one linked to my personal card.

For some reason, whilst both accounts appear in the drop-down list, selecting the second account (linked to my Plat card) merely reloads the corporate Spirit account.

I've looked around for some way to contact their web team, but Amex appears to have no contact details available :-(

oz_mark · #9 (**permalink**) 6th July 2006, 05:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AnonymousCoward

Well, I have two membership rewards accounts. One linked to my corporate card, and one linked to my personal card.

For some reason, whilst both accounts appear in the drop-down list, selecting the second account (linked to my Plat card) merely reloads the corporate Spirit account.

I've looked around for some way to contact their web team, but Amex appears to have no contact details available :-(

Indeed, I have this problem as well. I can only get to the first one, and likewise, I have not been able to contact anyone that I have been able to explain the problem to.

mileagemax · #10 (**permalink**) 6th July 2006, 08:59 PM

I have similar problems with their website. Support seems to be out of India and they are clueless.

I think I know their website and products better than they do

I just wish I had the access to fix it straight away!