A New Way To Find American Express Pre-Approved & Higher Than Normal Sign Up Bonuses + Churning Opportunity

Update: Julian was able to get the 75,000 points successfully, you can read more about that here.

American Express let’s you check for pre-approved offers on both their personal and business credit cards, when doing so you’ll often find that the sign up bonus is higher than the public sign up bonus. Today I received an e-mail from Julian (of Bet You Didn’t Know & Devil’s Advocate fame) in which he told me about a new way he received one of these offers.

[Read: Pre-approval links for each credit card issuer]

A New Way To View Offers

When checking his Amex sync offers Julian was presented with this:

amex_offers_plat1

If you’re a regular reader, you’ll know that almost anybody can get 100,000 points on this card simply by calling in (and it’s possible for everybody to get the 75,000 offer a well) on the American Express Business Platinum card. The upside of the offer that Julian received is that the minimum spend requirement is only $5,000 (rather than $10,000 or $15,000).

amex_offers_plat2

What Makes This Even More Interesting

A lower minimum spend requirement is great, but since most people will be able to get the 100,000 point offer this still isn’t much to write home about. The real kicker comes in the fine print. Usually American Express business cards will state the following under “Offer Terms”/”Welcome Offer”:

Welcome bonus offer not available to applicants who have or have had this product within the last 12 months

If we look at that section on Julian’s offer, that fine print is nowhere to be seen!

amex_offers_plat3

This means that even though Julian received the sign up bonus on this card recently, he should be able to get it again. Obviously American Express might decide to enforce the 12 month rule even though it’s not listed, but I think you’d have a pretty valid complaint if they did this.

Final Thoughts

It makes sense for American Express to list targeted offers in their Amex Offers section, it saves them on marketing costs associated with direct mail outs. I think the reason the 12 month language is missing is because they’d assumed that their system wouldn’t offer a targeted sign up bonus to somebody who’d applied for the card recently, there is usually a significant lag time in these offers going out though which is why this might have happened.

In all likelihood American Express will add this language, but at the moment it’s not there. This is even bigger if personal cards are offered as it’s only possible to get those bonuses once per lifetime. You can view all the bonus rules & how many times you can get the bonus for each card issuer here.

Thanks again to Julian for the heads up. If you haven’t read any of his work before, I can strongly recommend reading Devil’s Advocate on Travel Codex & Bet You Didn’t Know on Frequent Miler. By far the funniest blogger in this space and always has a unique voice.

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Devil's Advocate
Devil's Advocate (@guest_150387)
July 25, 2015 19:34

Just to post the final updated data point, I did in fact receive the 75,000 bonus points from this offer without any issues immediately after the spend was completed. I also wrote about a similar Amex Business Gold offer for my “Bet You Didn’t Know” series at Frequent Miler. Thanks again, Will, for doing this post!

pier11
pier11 (@guest_117878)
May 11, 2015 11:02

Even though I’ve upgraded recently regular Hilton to Surpass, I still see offer for the upgrade with bonus. Tried this – no go.

Amanda
Amanda (@guest_117325)
May 10, 2015 12:27

For data point – my 75k biz gold offer is in my PRG card, personal version.

Amanda
Amanda (@guest_117324)
May 10, 2015 12:22

Sorry. What I meant was people with targeted offer where there is no mention of 12 month rule. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/american-express-membership-rewards/1626531-amex-business-gold-rewards-75k-50k-links-18.html

Devil's Advocate
Devil's Advocate (@guest_115931)
May 7, 2015 11:52

Just to pass along an updated data point, I just applied using this offer as I found it in my Amex Offers and received an automatic approval. We’ll see if I have to fight for the bonus, but I took screenshots of every T&C I could find and there was absolutely no exclusion language, so I’m feeling good about getting it.

Amanda
Amanda (@guest_117105)
May 10, 2015 00:19

I looked thru flyertalk, and have not seen any confirmation about people getting the bonus within 12 months of canceling the previous card. I did see a few people applied saying they confirmed with CSR that offer was tied to their account. But so far I have not seen any positive data point.

J T
J T (@guest_115357)
May 6, 2015 14:44

Not seeing any signup bonus listed in the offers section, but did see one yesterday for the first time on my account. Banner and app link at the top of my acct home page, beneath the drop down menus: Simplycash business, $300 credit/$1000 spend/3 months.

Glenn
Glenn (@guest_115339)
May 6, 2015 14:13

I’m confused by the graphic you show for Amex Sync offers. Where does it look like this? Doesn’t look like that on the iPhone app, or the online view in Firefox at online.americanexpress.com. I don’t get it. My presentation is a vertical list in grey text with alternating white and grey backgrounds like a financial spreadsheet or whatever, little plus signs to the left of each to expand the T&C’s, etc.

Paul
Paul (@guest_115481)
May 6, 2015 18:19

You still have the old version. My account is updated, like the one pictured, and my wife’s is still the old version you are describing. It does not matter which browser you use.

I have seen these offers on my Amex Hilton card for the newer Amex Hilton Reserve.

Amanda
Amanda (@guest_115149)
May 6, 2015 09:08

My offer is for 75k Business gold. Wierd thing is I just canceled that card on 2/28.

Devil's Advocate
Devil's Advocate (@guest_115901)
May 7, 2015 10:46

That’s exactly what happened to me. I just cancelled my Amex Business Platinum about two weeks ago, and then this offer showed up without exclusion language. Pretty sweet.

Adam
Adam (@guest_115065)
May 6, 2015 06:01

just curious under what current AMEX CC did Julian see this offer listed under?

same Q for JGM as well.

JGM
JGM (@guest_114863)
May 5, 2015 23:32

Saw that offer too, but for a 75k biz gold card.