Checking in Episode 9: Amex Additional Employee offers w/JG and CF Frost

Community member JG and I discuss a lucrative Amex additional employee offer that’s set to expire at the end of the year, then CF Frost joins us with some additional datapoints.

0:30 Quick Overview of the Opportunity

• For Amex Business cards only (not Personal, there are different opportunities for Personal)
• Add up to 5 employees per card
• Get 20,000 MR for each employee you add who spends $4,000 in 6 months
• So a total opportunity an additional 100,000 MRs for $20,000 in spend (on top of other earning)
• Stacks with other opportunities like +4x referrals, base, and bonus categories
• I see that as a lower friction way to test the waters vs a similar 99 employee offer some are targeted with if calling in, especially nice with P2 Business card
• JG, how are you playing it?

5:45 Links

• You might see this pop up at the top of the page or in your Amex Offers for each card but it seems like even if not targeted you can qualify for this offer. So is it targeted or isn’t it? Definitely some risk here.
• https://www.americanexpress.com/en-us/business/campaigns/employee-cards/business-green/index.html
• https://www.americanexpress.com/en-us/business/campaigns/employee-cards/business-gold/index.html
• https://www.americanexpress.com/en-us/business/campaigns/employee-cards/business-platinum/index.html
• When clicking through any of these links you’re typically presented with all the Business cards associated with your login so in a sense it doesn’t really matter which link you use to get to the enrollment page
• JG you had a good datapoint: Can you confirm that you got this on a Blue Business Plus (a MR-earning card) even though you never saw a targeted link for that, and you navigated from one of these links to add additional employees?
  A: Not working on Blue Business Plus, only working on Business Green, Gold, and Platinum. Listen through to the end for clarity on this.

11:00 Nuances

• Only need first and last name to add a business AU
• Cards arrive activated
• Amex will send you an email reminder each time you use the card suggesting you add SSN and birthdate but word is they won’t cancel them even if you refrain from confirming these additional details
• I hear employees need to be 18 years old if you do decide to confirm the cards
• Bonus should appear 2-3 days after hitting $4,000 in spend
• Should be able to do them all at once, or go back and add more employees later (up to 5)
• You need to add employees by 12/31/2021
• Do you need to keep primary card open a year after adding employees? Do you need to keep the employees on a year after adding them?

17:50 What We’ve Been Up To

• Which cards have you added employees on?
• How are you spending on these?

24:45 Follow Up

• Seems like Blue Business Plus is not working which is surprising
• Can’t think of any other MR-earning card that Amex issues, but I think the guidance here is:
• This works on Business Green, Business Gold, and Business Platinum
• This can be done on multiple cards (say you have 2 or more Greens, you can add 5 employees to each green and spend on $4,000 on each of those cards for 20,000 x 5 = 100,000
• It doesn’t much matter which link you go through to add the employees, though the Business Gold only comes up as an option when using the Gold link
• It doesn’t seem to matter whether you were targeted, but again - there’s risk here
• You can add the same names of 5 people to be added to business cards and you don’t necessarily need to space them out over time
• So this is a 100,000 x however many Business Green/Gold/Platinum cards you have if you can add 5 employees to each and spend $4,000 on each of those cards

Terms & Conditions

1 Employee Card

Employee Card Spending Limits may be set up online or by calling the number on the back of your Card. The Spending Limit is not a guarantee that the Employee Card Member will be able to make purchases up to that limit. There are certain purchases where the limit does not apply, such as, for example, restaurant tips and hotel stays extended beyond their original reservation period, and the overall Account capacity is taken into consideration. You agree to pay all Charges without regard to whether any Charges exceed a limit, and you agree that we are not liable to you or any other person when a limit is not applied to any Charges and/or when Charges are incurred and billed that exceed a limit. For more information on the application of the limit, please refer to the Employee Card Spending Limits Terms and Conditions at www.americanexpress.com/spendlimits/terms, which will also be provided when you enroll Employee Card(s) in this feature.

2 Offer

Offer is nontransferable. Add new Employee Card Members to your Basic Card Member account here and earn 20,000 Membership Rewards® points after each new Employee Card Member spends $4,000 in eligible purchases on the new Card in their first 6 months of Card Membership. The maximum bonus points you can earn through this offer is 100,000 Membership Rewards points. Your

request to add Employee Cards must be processed and approved by 12/31/2021 11:59PM ET to be eligible for this offer.  The 6 month period for each new Employee Card Member to spend $4,000 starts on the date that the respective Employee Card Member is added. Purchases made by other Employee Card Members on your Account, including Employee Cards that you do not add here, will not count toward the $4,000 spend requirement. Your purchases as the Basic Card Member will not count toward the $4,000 spend requirement.

The 20,000 Membership Rewards points will be applied to the Basic Card Member's American Express account within 8-12 weeks after the Employee Card Member has met the purchase requirement. If we in your sole discretion determine that you or your Employee Card Members have engaged in abuse, misuse, or gaming in connection with this offer in any way or intend to do so (for example, if you added one or more Employee Cards to obtain a bonus offer(s) that we did not intend for you; or if you or your Employee Card Members cancel or return purchases made to meet the Threshold Amount), we may not credit Membership Rewards points to, we may freeze Membership Rewards credited to, or we may take away Membership Rewards points from your account. We may also

cancel this Card account and other Card accounts you and your Employee Card Members may have with us.

Eligible purchases do NOT include fees or interest charges, purchases of travelers checks, purchases or reloading of prepaid cards, purchases of gift cards, person-to-person payments, or purchases of other cash equivalents. In rare instances, the period for the new Employee Card Members to spend $4,000 may be shorter than 6 months if there is a delay in receiving their Employee Cards. Also, purchases may fall outside of the 6 month period in some cases, such as delay in merchants submitting transactions to us or if the purchase date differs from the date they made the transaction. (For example, if they buy goods online, the purchase date may be the date the goods are shipped). To be eligible to receive the bonus Membership Rewards points, your Card account must not be past due, canceled, or have a returned payment outstanding at the time of offer fulfillment.