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New American Express cashback deals launched – and Shop Small changes?

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American Express has launched a new batch of cashback deals, with a couple of new hotel deals among them.

As usual, you may see all, some or none of these offers on your American Express account. You need to look at the ‘Offers’ section on your online statement pages or the Amex app for every card you hold.

Some offers will also be available for supplementary cardholders, as long as the card is registered with Amex. Other offers will only be for the primary cardholder.

This is what we seem to have that are new and relevant to HfP readers:

Gett

The taxi app is offering 15% cashback on all rides until 30th June.

Financial Times

Instead of the old offer which offered a fixed £25 discount, the FT is now offering 25% cashback on a transaction of any size. This is valid on transactions taken out by 20th June.

If you already pay for the FT, you may want to see if there is a way of adjusting your subscription (can you get a pro-rata refund on an annual sub and then take out a new one?) so that a payment is made during this period.

Red Carnation Hotels

You may not have heard of Red Carnation, but it owns a number of smart boutique hotels in expensive parts of London. It also owns Ashford Castle in Ireland which you may have seen on the recent BBC2 series with Giles Coren, but this is NOT taking part in the offer.

You receive £75 cashback on a £350+ spend by 30th September.

Red Carnation Hotels is no longer a Virgin Atlantic points earning partner.

You can take a look at their full portfolio here.

Hand Picked Hotels

I have no experience of this UK chain, but you can get £50 cashback on a £400 stay by 30th June.

There are a lot of other offers out there too. My wife has 58 on her Preferred Rewards Gold card, which is more than double what I have on my Platinum card. Not bad going given that the shops are shut ….

American Express Amex Shop Small

Meanwhile …. is Shop Small changing?

A reader posted an interesting titbit from Amex Australia in our comments section yesterday.

In Australia, Amex Shop Small is changing into a ‘year round’ event. Instead of getting A$5 cashback on each qualifying A$10 purchase for a short period, cardholders will receive an extra 3 points per A$1 spent for the next year. There is a cap of 40,000 bonus points between now and the end of March 2022.

There is no guarantee that we will see the same in the UK, but this is how the wind is blowing.

If I owned a small shop, I might find this new offer more attractive. Instead of getting ‘once a year’ visits during the Shop Small promo period, a shop may attract new regular customers who know they will get additional rewards on every purchase, every day.

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Category

American Express Gold card, American Express Platinum card, British Airways American Express, Marriott Bonvoy American Express

Comments (76)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • mark2 says:
    3 Apr3 April 09:09

    This sounds to me like the abolition of Shop Small. Mind you they have not bothered to maintain its administration for the last few years: the map/list is very inaccurate.
    I did manage to save about £500 last time so it will be a loss to me. It does seem to depend on where you live/work.

  • Dominic says:
    3 Apr3 April 09:13

    Would be disappointing to see shop small go, as it helps justify the annual card fee (particularly when travel has been limited by COVID!).

    Having said that, a whole year of 4 points for £1 wouldn’t be an awful thing in itself (at shop small locations) – but no way is it better than the current offering

  • James says:
    3 Apr3 April 09:49

    In other words the usual crappy offers

  • David S says:
    3 Apr3 April 09:53

    I would love the new offer if it comes. Coffee and something to eat for two usually comes to £9 so it forced you to spend extra to get the £5 back

  • Axel says:
    3 Apr3 April 10:01

    I think its becoming more and more difficult for Amex to administer Shop Small. Small retailers are moving onto payment aggregators such as Square, Sumup and Stripe with a myriad of features such as out the box ePOS, click n collect etc

    • kt1974 says:
      3 Apr3 April 14:19

      Is that why some of my Shop Smalls didn’t go through? Nothing I spend via Square or Stripe seems to get the £5 back, even if the retailer is listed as participating, but I always forget to call up and query…

  • Harry T says:
    3 Apr3 April 10:55

    I agree that I wouldn’t bother to shift my business to particular shops to get a handful of points rather than 50% off a £10 bill.

    However I do think Shop Small is overrated and some people go to massive lengths to accumulate as many rebates as possible – I question whether that is time well spent when you factor in opportunity cost.

    • Genghis says:
      3 Apr3 April 11:16

      Used to be three figures an hour net for me. Was well worth it.

      • Will says:
        3 Apr3 April 11:47

        Same, live in small town. Could do restaurant gift cards and a few clothes shops that my partner shops at within a day and have £500-1000 saved on what would be genuine purchases throughout the year.

        Different for everyone but not paid £750 a day after tax so worthwhile little jolly.

      • Harry T says:
        3 Apr3 April 12:21

        Maybe Newcastle just doesn’t provide the kind of lucrative opportunities you fellows have encountered elsewhere! Barely anyone on the map in Newcastle and many of them don’t actually take Amex.

    • mark2 says:
      3 Apr3 April 11:26

      Our hairdresser was selling £50 gift vouchers for £40 before Xmas, so I got £50 for £20.
      Assuming that they will still be in business on April 12th!

      • Roy says:
        3 Apr3 April 12:39

        By asking the hairdresser to charge the £40 as four different £10 transactions? You do realise you’re risking getting your account closed for misuse?

        • mark2 says:
          3 Apr3 April 13:10

          They were different cards obviously, belonging too different people.

      • Polly says:
        4 Apr4 April 09:32

        Same here. And bought loads of restaurant vouchers which we used over several months. And still using now through lockdown as takeaways every week. At least we feel we are supporting our local places so they stay open after lockdown.
        Stamps are another good buy at small shops too. Use all our cards on those too.
        If you are careful and spread out the shops, don’t think amex mind, as it is their promotion after all.

  • mark2 says:
    3 Apr3 April 11:24

    Just a reminder:

    My Amex 10% back at Morrison’s expires in 4 days; yours probably does too.

  • Christopher says:
    3 Apr3 April 11:26

    On the subject of Amex offers, I have a spend £40 get £20 back on Craft Gin Club. I’ve done 2x £20 transactions and received no credit and no confirmation email – is this a deal which cumulative spend may not work on.

    • Jonathan says:
      3 Apr3 April 12:29

      Yep, I think they’re wise to the double dipping on Amex as last month they had a free extra bottle of gin on the £40 subscription box except when you added the code it also deducted 1p to make price £39.99.

      This month it’s a code for half price subscription box (£20) but you can’t order/pay for 2 at once.

      They are also very expensive & pricey delivery for other stuff in the online shop which must be ordered/paid for separately to subscription box.

      Essentially they’ve thought this through!

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