Issues With American Express Bonuses Posting & A Warning About Double Bonuses

Update: Looks like this is affecting more than just SPG cards and it’s also affecting cardholders who didn’t contact American Express about missing bonuses.

There has been lots of reports from readers about the sign up bonus on their SPG cards not posting. This was covered by Travel Codex (originally here and the resolution here), we also suggested using Twitter when we linked to this TravelinPoints post in one of our recaps. What I want to talk about today is the fact that some readers have reported something unusual. The timeline seems to be like this:

  • They have contacted Twitter, this seems to have caused a manual adjustment of the points owed
  • After some time the bonus posts again. Presumably this is the bonus posting naturally
  • American Express eventually realizes their mistake and then debits one of the sign up bonuses

The problem is that in some cases people have already spent the second bonus and they end up with a negative balance. I’m not sure how American Express plan to handle this long term, but my suggestion is that if you receive a second balance that you contact American Express to notify them of the issue (and in the mean time don’t spend the points). I know it’s tempting to just use the points, but I don’t see that being a good play long term (and ethically not the right thing to do either).

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Mark
Mark (@guest_569755)
March 13, 2018 20:01

Realize this is late, but here’s my data point:

Signed up for BCE with $250 statement credit offer. Terms and conditions said bonus would post 6-8 weeks after hitting minimum spend. After the 8 weeks, did the chat multiple times and made no progress, just heard they were investigating. Once I hit ~16 weeks, I filed a CFPB complaint, but that didn’t do anything. Finally, I called and got a good CSR and he posted a statement credit for $350 (extra $100 for the hassle).

Since then, AMEX has posted two additional statement credits (the second accompanied by an email) for slightly greater than $250.

Moral of the story, they seem to be having some serious IT challenges…

Sarah
Sarah (@guest_493786)
October 14, 2017 09:02

I commented on the last SPG thread about not receiving my 25k bonus. It finally posted last week (while we were away on the vacation we’d hoped to use it on), after four phone calls and five months after meeting the spend.

Just a Note
Just a Note (@guest_493762)
October 14, 2017 08:08

Not a signup bonus, but registered AUs for both PRG and Everyday cards (4 of each), and met the minimum spend on all cards. First bonus posted (5000 for PRG, 1500 for Everyday), but thus far that is it.

I have actually contacted Amex, and they just say to “wait 8-12 weeks”. The next PRG bonus hits the 8 week mark on Monday, will see what happens. Others happen shortly after.

One note: The PRG cards were activated via phone, with social security (mine). The Everday cards were not activated, online, by phone, or anywhere, they just worked.

Naturally hesitant to contact them again, as the AUs are not questionable (they are simply variants of my name), but don’t want to call too much attention, what with new Amex terns and conditions.

However, curious if anyone else has received multiple AU bonuses, or they always just post one, then the others post later?

Rigo Leto
Rigo Leto (@guest_494940)
October 16, 2017 13:26

This is a well known AMEX bug by now that’s been confirmed through several DPs. If you signed up 4 AUs all at the same time, you will only receive the first 5k, for the AU that was first on your list.

If you registered the 4 AUs separately, you will receive all 4 right away.

Who knows if/how AMEX will fix this. Everyone who’s contacted them has been told to wait the full 8-12 weeks, but AMEX seems oblivious to the fact the 4 bonuses are posting immediately for those who registered their AUs one by one, so it’s not a matter of waiting, but a matter of them fixing their bug for people who registered 4 in one go.

Just a Note
Just a Note (@guest_504237)
October 31, 2017 10:54

Sounds like they are using the Citi IT staff on this one – especially since the offer says you must sign up all AUs at once! Naturally had not (yet) tried to add individually, so the AUs were added all at once. Next time I get the chance, will try and add them individually.

In the meantime, will see if I can wrangle the others out of them when the 12 week mark hit, as it’s not come through after 8. Thanks for the info.

Sue
Sue (@guest_493262)
October 13, 2017 10:01

Got the Surpass in mid August. Met the spend and the points posted after the first statement closed in September. This was probably right before they announced points would take longer to post.

Tad
Tad (@guest_492946)
October 12, 2017 15:40

I had SPG points post erroneously and then get debited back without any interaction on my part at all.

Charlie
Charlie (@guest_492819)
October 12, 2017 11:43

If Amex is going to continue with this policy of posting signup bonuses late so they can review the spending to see if it qualifies, then they should simply make a firm and public policy that bonuses will post x number of statements after the spending is complete, and they should annotate the cardholder’s online account to give the date that the bonus will post. Instead they keep their review process secret, and many new cardholders panic because they think that the bonus has been overlooked. The customer service reps get confused and issue a manual bonus before the review process finishes.

ff_lover
ff_lover (@guest_492455)
October 11, 2017 22:03

DP:
1. AMEX Blue for Business 2x bonus points not posting at all. Chatted with Delhi, India customer service. Incompetent people there. Kept just asking and repeating same questions/answers w/o looking at and “calculating” the points from the Monthly statments for 2 consecutive months. Will send a letter to AMEX MR office with screenshots.

2. AMEX Hipton Surpass 100K points not posting. Had to create a case to get them to post.

3. AMEX Delta Platinum Business 70K bonus hasn’t posted even after 3 months of meeting the minimum spend. Again created a case. No Delta bonus miles yet!

Totally getting fed up with AMEX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Every other Bank (Chase, Bank of America, US Bank, Barclays etc. etc.) points post like clockwork.
AMEX totally lost my business!

Gibunono
Gibunono (@guest_492485)
October 11, 2017 22:48

Do you have positive experience with amex during the past few months? Any card you opened and did get the bonus from amex?

Thanks.

Vee
Vee (@guest_492354)
October 11, 2017 19:21

Actually, this happened to me. The issue was that Amex created an SPG account for me even though I linked my own SPG to it. Then they merged the accounts after talking to reps. However, the bonus was never attached to the accounts so after my spending I never recieved the bonus. 6 Months later and my bonus arrived after a supervisor found the issue. Surprisingly, another bonus posted but 1 week later I recieved a Letter from Amex saying the extra bonus points was a courtesy to make up for their mistake. Keep an eye out for a letter before chatting with Amex.

TheMonkeyTech
TheMonkeyTech (@guest_492071)
October 11, 2017 15:29

Either they are really busy or they don’t much care to respond on Twitter any more. Its been hours since i tweeted them and they havent replied back at all.

sunny
sunny (@guest_492086)
October 11, 2017 15:51

talk to them on live chat on amex in your account. thats what i did and got the answer right away

TheMonkeyTech
TheMonkeyTech (@guest_492254)
October 11, 2017 17:36

Thanks for the tip Sunny. I just finished talking to them over chat, they said they would open an investigation and that was it…. Well i guess we’ll see….

sunny
sunny (@guest_492049)
October 11, 2017 14:26

just talk to amex rep and he told me they will give me the bonus offer every points from the purchase made in last month statement they will give it in second statement