As Amex double rewards offer is about to expire by 20th July 2020, American Express has come up with a new offer but limited to only utility spends. This offer however seems to be targeted only for very small set of customers.
The offer on Amex Platinum (charge card) is different from other Amex cards. Here’s everything you need to know about the offer:
Offer on Amex Platinum
Offer | Earn 5 Bonus Membership Rewards® Points on every Rs.100 spent on utilities. |
Max. Points | 5,000/month (15,000 during offer period) |
Min. Spend | Rs.50,000 |
Offer Period | 7th July – 30th September 2020 |
Eligible Spends | Electricity, water and gas bills |
Fulfilment | 90 days after the calendar month in which eligible spends under the offer have been made. |
Source | Terms & conditions |
Offer on other Amex Cards
Offer | Earn 5 Bonus Membership Rewards® Points on every Rs.100 spent on utilities. |
Max. Points | 1,000/month (3,000 during offer period) |
Min. Spend | Rs.7,000 |
Offer Period | 7th July – 30th September 2020 |
Eligible Spends | Electricity, water and gas bills |
Fulfilment | 90 days after the calendar month in which eligible spends under the offer have been made. |
Source | Terms & Conditions |
Things to Note
- Its a targeted offer. Only those who receive the communication are eligible.
- It is mandatory for the Cardmembers to enroll for the offer.
- Transactions going through an aggregator (like Paypal, Paytm, PayU, Amazon Pay, PhonePe etc.) may not trigger MR’s as they may not always report the transaction type properly all the time.
- No regular MR points on these utility spends, as per Amex usual T&C.
- Do refer to your offer email for all details for details like min. spend.
There is also another offer, even for non-plat’s without the min. monthly spends, without a need to enrol. I was said by support that I’m eligible for that offer, on Amex Reserve. This seems to go live from July 9th. (yeah, not 7th).
So it seems there are multiple variants of the offer. If you haven’t received the email, feel free to call customer care and ask them to check which one you’re eligible for, or simply wait for 2-3 days for them to automatically arrive.
Monthly spends required to max. out the benefit are Rs.1L (for Plat) & Rs.20,000 (for other cards)
Bottom line
Overall its a good offer for Amex Platinum cardholders but for other Amex cards, the max. cap is too low & also comes with a minimum spend criteria.
So the minimum value you get through bonus points on Amex Platinum is ~Rs.7500 while on other cards its ~Rs.1500.
Overall that’s a very good value from Amex which doesn’t usually give rewards on utilities. Yet, wish the spend types were broader.
It seems Amex is targeting the type of spends done during the pandemic. Means we can hope for some offers on dining, something like this Amex Zomato Offer, or hopefully better.
Have you received the offer? Feel free to share your thoughts on the offer in comments below.
How do we pay electricity bill if not done through an aggregator. TANGEDCO/TNEB doesn’t accept Amex via their site.
rent payment is treated as utility
I personally do not find the offer on the Plat Charge useful – primarily due to the abysmally high spend requirement on just utility. My utility expense is not that much (thank god!). My wife has received the Plat Travel offer and I may use that, or else I might just use Diners Black as it continues to give 3.3% back on utility expenses – or even using Citi Prestige via PayTM is also an option.
However the offer on Reserve is intriguing as it does not have a minimum spend requirement. Indeed a sweet spot.
Hi Sid,
Given the MR points will most probably hit after 90 days , the minimum value of MR will be lesser than 7500 as by then the double value offer(50p a mile) would have gone?
I always value it at min. 50ps irrespective of the double rewards offer.
Hi All,
Stumbled upon this amazing website while searching for my first ever CC, Kudos to Sid and team (Y).
Sorry for hijacking an unrelated post for my queries, but wanted a couple of suggestions from the best experts:
1. Is there any cons to paying a CC bill BEFORE the bill generation happens, in terms of credit score ? (I have read that a good utilization ratio should be amazon->reward CC and so on)
Once again, kudos to the amazing community 🙂
Hey Rohan,
There is no known cons of doing so. That being said, there is no advantage apart from when you wish to increase your available credit limit mid-cycle for making another purchase.
Happened with my first card, when my limit was only 40,000. I had to pay in between to make additional purchase because my spends were in the order of 50,000 per month.
Hope that helps.
Wondering which utilities accepts AMEX card payments
Does this mean I have to spend 50,000k/month on utilities? Or I need to spend a total of 50k/month total, and then whatever I spend on utilities, I’ll get bonus points for that?
Though good offer but practically useless as direct Amex payment is not accepted by many water, gas or electricity utilities.
As you said, utility service providers don’t accept, but alternate options such as Billdesk, Mobikwik or Amazon can be initiated for utility payments to redeem reward point. Mobikwik post these transaction as utility to avail the benefits of amex accelerated rewards.
This is an excerpt from the T&Cs for the offer on Plat Charge.
The Offer is as below: Cardmember to enroll the eligible Card for which the communication has been sent and spend Rs.50,000 or more on utilities in a calendar month and get 5 Membership Rewards® Points for every Rs.100 spent on utilities transactions on their enrolled American Express® Card (including the transactions on linked Supplementary Card(s)).
Hi Sid, unrelated to the topic of this post, but can you do something so that we can view all the posts, Even after refreshing most o the new posts can’t be seen
Done some changes to improve this. Thanks.
Sid – have you closed your MRCC card?
I never had MRCC Manoj.
my bad. your articles are so comprehensive and that your comments on MRCC made me think you’re an owner of MRCC too lol
🙂
Hi Sid,
This offer will work with Cred rental pay right ?
Eligible Spends: Electricity, water and gas bills
Anyway I’m sure Cred payments still get points. So, no!
Does lic payment count in this?
Nope, LIC is not counted in this one.
Amex is very particular on this part “water, gas or electricity utilities”. That too they don’t want to take risk with Paytm or Phonepe, as no one is sure… how PayTM and PhonePe might submit the biller details…
Hi Siddarth,
I too got the above offer for my platinum travel and I compared the t&c with the one you posted. I don’t seem to notice minimum limit of Rs 7000 required to qualify for the offer. The very first line of the t&c omits Rs 7000 mentioned in your t&c.
Has anyone else noticed this. Do i need to confirm this from the customer care
You’ve skipped some lines in the article.
Yeah I saw that. Sorry for the omission. I was so busy staring at the t&c of both that I forgot to read the article in its entirety
Got the same on my Travel Card As Well. Though no mention of minimum spend !
Paying off your utility expenses on water, electricity, and gas
with your American Express® Card can bring you more rewards.
Earn 5 Membership Rewards® points
on every ₹100 you spend on utilities*.
You can enjoy up to 3,000 points with your Card.
Maximum 1,000 points in a calendar month.
The offer is valid from 9 July 2020 to 30 September 2020.
TNEB doesn’t accept amex, indane doesn’t amex as well. So what are the options available for users to utilise this offer?
You may use Paytm to pay TNEB via Amex. This ideally works as per Amex rep. but it will be messed up if you use wallet load or partial wallet money. Hence they discourage wallets.
I got a different offer:
1. Mine is applicable from 9th of July, not 7th.
2. There is no 50K spend requirement.
3. No need to enroll the card.
Rest it looks the same — 15K max, 5K per month, 5X points on utilities.
Awesome, I got the same offer as well. Seems targeted offer is different. Pretty neat for sure.
Although I wished they included Apartment maintenance as as one of the category. My water bill is included in it.
On a different note, you still holding US cards? Some of them got good Covid offers as well.
I’m still holding the Chase Reserve but did downgrade the Citi Prestige to Citi rewards+.
I do however have to upgrade my Citi Premiermiles to Prestige here…
Can we make payment using AMEX card thro payzapp. I have made payments in the past using HDFC credit card / payzapp and it appears as INSTA PAY BBPS PAY NOW. Will this description qualify for AMEX utility offer. Again, wonderful articles and excellent reviews with nice photos / videos.. Keep up the good work.
Is this offer better than using my HDFC Infinia? I somehow dont understand the conversion points on my Amex Platinum Travel. Please advise. Thank you.
Hi people,
Any offer running on payment of insurance premium currently?
Plz help. Thankyoi
I Paid Rs 6930 yesterday to Torrent Power. The Bill was Rs 6860. I paid approx 70 Rs extra. Now I saw that minimum spend is Rs 7K. Also I didn’t enroll, did transaction based on the email received. What should I expect?
Hi,
I am trying to make my electricity charges for past few days…no luck. None of the sites (Tamil Nadu Electricity Board, Amex Bill Desk etc) accept Amex cards. Any one successful…pls let me know. I’ve even raised a complaint with Amex customer support team. Thanks.