American Express trialling bonus points offers …. and a good Harrods cashback deal

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• Lak says:

  13 Apr13 April 07:06

  If this offer stacks wth the 6 avios/£1 you get for shopping with Apple through avios.com then that’s 10 avios/£1 if you spend over £500.

  • Nathan says:

    13 Apr13 April 08:50

    good idea :). if only you could split payments onto 2 cards online 🙁 (as looking to buy and imac)

    • NP says:

      13 Apr13 April 10:17

      Buy two apple gift vouchers @ £500+ each and then use to buy the iMac?

  • Nathan says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:29

    does anyone know if I buy 4x £500 gift card via 4 different gold cards (me,wife,mum,dad) will we all get the 200 MR bonus and then I can just use the vouchers all together? Hence total of 8000MR and 12000Avios.

    • Rob says:

      13 Apr13 April 09:42

      Harrods tills can take up to four gift cards per transaction so you’re fine. If you want to spend more than that, Customer Services can merge lots of small gift cards into one large one.

      • Nathan says:

        13 Apr13 April 09:43

        what about the apple store? as I am eligible for Higher Education Discount.

    • NP says:

      13 Apr13 April 09:59

      I’ve used multiple gift cards at the HE store before but unfortunately the gift cards themselves and purchases through the HE site don’t track through the shopping portals.

  • Arun T says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:52

    Can anyone confirm if this works, as this is exactly what I want to do (want to buy an iPad). Annoyingly this costs £479 so will need to buy a case too!

    • Brian says:

      13 Apr13 April 10:12

      So you’re going to pay an extra 21 pounds to get 2000 MR points?? Unless you actually need the case, I’d save the 21 pounds (if you can’t use a gift voucher).

      • Genghis says:

        13 Apr13 April 10:24

        Or as someone said the other day, if possible buy from Dixons Travel at LHR using Currys vouchers bought from tesco (7.2 avios / £) with HR points (1 avios / £) and could then hit a HR bonus?

        • Nathan says:

          13 Apr13 April 10:33

          this is a good option if you want an off the shelf mac but I want to increase the ram

        • Ryan says:

          13 Apr13 April 18:14

          It is possible to purchase goods at Dixons travel, bag the Heathrow rewards points and then return the goods to a Curry’s PC World. Leaves you with the points. Ethically questionable.

      • Nathan says:

        13 Apr13 April 10:37

        well that ruins my plan anyway, thanks for the heads up.

      • Arun T says:

        13 Apr13 April 12:02

        I see your point but I do need a case (and a few Mac accessories anyway) so extra spending is not JUST to get the 2000MR points.

• Jack says:

  13 Apr13 April 07:48

  Unfortunately the Harrods offer is not showing on my BAPP

• Andrew says:

  13 Apr13 April 07:52

  10% off at Harrods with their Rewards card weekend of 23/24 April. Not applicable at Apple and some other concessions such as Louis Vuitton.

• Matt says:

  13 Apr13 April 08:04

  I’m never convinced by this type of offer.

  Even discounts of 10-20% don’t seem significant compared to eg sales or buying carefully.

  Perhaps I need educating.

  • harry says:

    13 Apr13 April 08:16

    Harrods food hall prices (deli counters, eg sliced processed meats) reportedly compare well with the big supermarkets

    • Genghis says:

      13 Apr13 April 08:28

      £300’s worth is a lot of deli items 🙂

    • Matt says:

      13 Apr13 April 08:40

      How about with Aldi and LIDL, who have excellent quality on many lines?

  • Brian says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:31

    Surely the point is that you can still take advantage of sales with these offers…

• Matt says:

  13 Apr13 April 08:41

  One question which may make a difference: do Harrods do competitor or online price match?

  • Andrew says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:07

    No

  • Rob says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:45

    No. For electronics prices are the same as anywhere – I get all my Apple stuff there. Many other items where prices are not widely known tend to carry a Harrods premium of 10 per cent or so.

    • Joe says:

      14 Apr14 April 22:31

      + you get your reward points

• Jenny says:

  13 Apr13 April 08:50

  I might be going mad, but 2000 reward points are worth £100 and not £10, correct?

  • luke says:

    13 Apr13 April 08:55

    u are going mad….confirmed heehee

  • Brian says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:31

    Certified…

  • Peter K says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:32

    If worth a penny per point (let’s assume) then you need to divide by 100 to get the worth in pounds as 100p in a pound. 2000 divided by 100 is £20 or if valued at 0.5p per point then half that at £10.

    • Jenny says:

      13 Apr13 April 12:58

      Ah well, my maths never was that great first thing in the morning- thanks all.

• Leonid says:

  13 Apr13 April 09:15

  Slightly off topic but I wonder what might be the best way to buy Samsung Galaxy S7 pocketing as many points as possible? I have BA Amex and AMEX Gold but the Harrods offer is not showing up. Any other deals/offers anyone is aware of?

  • The Urbanite says:

    13 Apr13 April 16:41

    I bought mine from Argos. I had £325 of £25 Argos vouchers. Tesco give 150 Clubcard points per £50 of gift cards purchased. Mine were left over from Christmas, where this stacked with the 100 points per £20 GC offer.

    Do you have access to a workplace discount scheme? Perhaps discounted reloadable Argos and Tesco cards could help bring the cost down.

    If you’ve a week or so to spare and sufficient spend to put through, there’s also the Nectar Amex – £100 of Nectar points for £2k spend within 3 months. These can be spent in store at Argos.

  • Frenske says:

    13 Apr13 April 18:33

    If you get money off vouchers from Tesco use them to buy £50 Argos vouchers paying with Amex (last month I had a couple of £8 off when spend £80). So this gives you 11x150x2.6=4290 Avios through Tesco Clubcard and 550 Avios with Amex plus some considerable money saved using Tesco vouchers.

    • Genghis says:

      13 Apr13 April 19:32

      Good method – but generally x 2.4 cc>avios (not at bonus time), unless on grandfathered rate

      • Frenske says:

        14 Apr14 April 09:08

        I stand corrected.

        I have not use the Tesco clubcard points for Avios recently. I have been using them to pay for ferries/eurotunnel which gives better value than Avios.

• VP says:

  13 Apr13 April 09:39

  OTP: I took up the upgrade Amex Gold to Plat for 20K offer and now wanted to refer my wife for Amex Gold and close down my Plat once the 20K points post but when I go online to Refer Friends, apparently I can only refer to Amex Plat !!! Not able to see any referral option for Amex Gold. Is this a new change? any workarounds? This will put a big hole in our Amex MR collection !!

  • Rob says:

    13 Apr13 April 09:41

    The link is for Platinum. However, at the bottom of the application page is a picture of a Gold card and the message ‘Want a differenr card?’. Click, sorted.

    • VP says:

      13 Apr13 April 10:01

      First of all thanks for your prompt reply. So if I understand correctly I should send the referral link for Platinum and the person being referred can change from Plat to Gold during application and still receive the extra 2K bonus and I would receive the Gold referral bonus?

      • Genghis says:

        13 Apr13 April 10:05

        Send a gold referral

      • Rob says:

        13 Apr13 April 13:34

        Correct

    • Genghis says:

      13 Apr13 April 10:04

      If churning though, Amex plat might work out better:

      1) Refer to Amex plat: 18k + 35k = 53k MR points (on £2k spend)
      2) Refer to Amex gold: 9k + 22k = 33k MR points (on £2k spend)
      3) Refer to Amex gold then upgrade: 9k + 22k + 20k = 51k MR points (on £3k spend).

      It depends how highly you value your extra £1k spend on option 3 and how quickly you can spend the target on Platinum to minimise the fee.

      • nick says:

        13 Apr13 April 12:13

        I have an Amex gold my wife is a supplementary card holder. Can I refer her for her own gold card on the Amex site so I can cancel mine?

        • xcalx says:

          13 Apr13 April 12:34

          Yes, no problem.

        • luke says:

          13 Apr13 April 14:28

          go for option 1 for sure…

          good tactic here is what I do I think – lets say you do your shopping at Tesco and Sainsbury….

          get platinum card, immediately buy a 1000 pound Sainsbury voucher and 1000 pounds Tesco voucher, close the card the next week. you will get about 440 of the 450 pound fee back…just make sure you get all your hotel status confirmed immediately, may take some calling around, but worth the effort…

      • roberto says:

        13 Apr13 April 14:19

        Re amex earning options.. Can a gold card holder refer someone to a platinum card and pocket the 18k referral bonus?

        My wife and I are serial referers but her single salary won’t get her platinum.. Normally she refers gold to gold and I upgrade to plat as the year ends referring her & trousering the bonuses before cancelling. Rinse and repeat..

        Referring me to plat would earn her more bonus but I would spend and cancel asap as I don’t want to wear the fee.. Can I go to gold for free leaving me to refer her later once her 6 months has passed..

        What’s the better option if there is one?

        • Genghis says:

          13 Apr13 April 14:39

          Yes.

          I thought the income assessment is truly done on household income so it sounds like you should be OK for your wife to get plat.

          If you downgrade from Plat to Gold, you pay the £140 Gold fee (i.e. not free).

          It sounds like you should do what we do. You take out plat, refer wife, she takes out plat. Cancel as soon as the points post. Wait 6 months and then repeat.

      • Liz says:

        13 Apr13 April 14:40

        Where is the link for upgrading from gold to platinum ? I can’t find it .

        • Genghis says:

          13 Apr13 April 14:41

          https://www.americanexpress.com/uk/content/upgrade-to-platinum/

        • Liz says:

          13 Apr13 April 14:54

          Thanks – is this a limited time offer or is it on all the time? Thinking about doing it but want to time it right for going on holiday in Aug and then do a platinum to platinum referral then cancel when we come back.

        • Rob says:

          13 Apr13 April 14:57

          It isn’t clear. It ran for a long time, then stopped, then they recently relaunched it.

        • Liz says:

          13 Apr13 April 15:02

          Ok thanks – need to work out my timings as I can’t get referred again till mid June!

      • VP says:

        13 Apr13 April 15:39

        Genghis, in our case Option 2 & 3 are worth extra 9K/18K as my wife can refer me back for Gold/Plat after 6 months. Of course this can also be done with Option1 but there is no way we would be keeping a £450 fee card for 6 months given our current travel patterns

        • Liz says:

          13 Apr13 April 15:48

          If my hubby upgrades from gold to platinum can he refer me as soon as he is accepted and got his card. Are there any time restrictions on referring from a new card? Doing my sums here and working on dates!

        • Lawro says:

          13 Apr13 April 16:02

          He can refer immediately as far as I know.
          I have def done so in the past.

        • Genghis says:

          13 Apr13 April 19:33

          No time limit. I’ve referred my wife for a card almost as soon as I got the card myself

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