State of the Union: Just a quick update on the Sam’s Club Amex Offer of $20 off $20. We reported that the charges were showing initially as “Sams Club Photo” which had many worried that it wouldn’t work to trigger the  Offer credit since Photo is an excluded category. All purchases were initially showing as Photo and then switching over to ordinary “Sams Club” purchases.
Today, we are seeing numerous reports that the Offer credit is posting automatically (1, 2, 3). Gift Card purchases are also working to trigger the offer credit (1, 2). The charge switches over to “sams club” and gets the statement credit. There’s no indication in the Terms that the offer is not valid on gift cards so we really should be okay here. Even if it doesn’t post automatically for some reason, we should be able to get it manually applied, being that the charges are switching over to ordinary Sams Club charges and not Photo charges.
No one is getting the Congrats emails initially. I suspect this is because it’s coded initially as Photo which isn’t eligible. In any case, the credits are coming; no need to sweat the missing email.
Now, I have to go ahead and figure out the best way to maximize this offer. The Groupon deal on Sams Club membership is still around until around midnight tonight 5/4/15. (HT: Grant)
How do I know that the Sam’s Club deal is an issue vital to the State of the Union?Â
Well, Sams Club moved up to the #1 most searched item on Cashbackmonitor for a day or two (wish I had a screenshot), until it was unseated by Staples due to the recent Staples gift card deals. Amazing how you could track deals based on Cashbackmonitor.
Okay, so does the portal actually work for gift card purchases?
According to FM Laboratory it does not work, unfortunately.
Does the groupon deal get charged by groupon.com or by samsclub.com? (be gentle with the newbie 🙂
That’s charged by Groupon. You won’t get the Amex Offer credit for that (no reason to use an Amex on that purchase).
Once you have the membership, you can then go online at samsclub.com and buy stuff in $20 increments on each of your registered amex cards.
I recommend buying in $40 increments and splitting equally between 2 Amex’s. That way you have fewer GC’s of a higher denomination to use.
Excuse me if I need the spelled out. what is the benefit of having/buying the membership? I see there is some churning/cash-back oppurtunity there but face front I only see that you can get the membership for $45, $25 after the $20 you receive back. Newbie but it seems like a lot of work, or no?
The way I can see it being churnable is you buy gift cards using your Discover card at 5%. You get $10 for every $500 spent and $25 for the 5%. What do you go with the gift cards after then?
The advantage of buying membership is so that you can take advantage of this Amex Offer without having to pay the 10% surcharge which is charged to non-members.
If I’m misunderstanding your question, please clarify.
Yeah, that answers my question.
I’m your opinion, is the groupon worth it?
If you have lots of Amex cards it could be worth buying membership. (The Groupon deal expired already.) Otherwise, you can just pay the 10% surcharge.