American Express originally filed a patent with the USPTO on August 13, 2014 for a ‘Third Party Digital Wallet Pay With Points’, but it was only published by the USPTO on February 18, 2016. The following summary describes what they are patenting:
A system, method and computer program product for redemptions of reward points to purchase goods and services offered by a third-party digital wallet or merchant aggregator. A single integration with a merchant aggregator enables cross-merchant functionality. This system, method and computer program may allow certain transaction account holders to directly pay with their loyalty points (“points”) in any third party digital wallet. Utilizing the system, transaction account holders may earn one or more point for virtually every dollar charged on eligible, enrolled transaction account and then redeem their points for a wide array of rewards, including retail merchandise or travel.
I think this system basically just describes their Plenti points program, which is a cross merchant loyalty program that allows users to redeem points with any of those merchants.
