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New Amex cashback offers: Harrods, Boots, Uber Eats, FREE NOW

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A number of interesting Amex offers have dropped over the weekend now that non-essential retail has been allowed to open.

I thought it would be worth running through some of them here:

£50 back on £200 spend at Harrods

A new offer on Harrods spend has appeared on many – but not all – card types. There appear to be two versions.

Harrods

On the Centurion and Platinum cards the first 7,000 people to save the offer get “Spend £200, get £50 back” whilst on my BA Amex the first 5,000 people to save the offer get “20% back up to £50”.

It doesn’t look like either offer is on my American Express Rewards Credit Card (ARCC).

On the face of it the 20% offer is sightly worse: you would have to spend £250 to get the same £50 cashback, versus £200. However, it does allow you to earn money back if you don’t plan on spending £200, as you’ll get 20% back on all transactions.

This isn’t the case for the Platinum offer, which has a minimum spend of £200 to trigger the cashback.

It makes sense that Harrods is offering two different variants depending on the card type, with more premium cards such as The Platinum card requiring a higher minimum spend.

Note that giftcards are excluded from the offer, according to the terms and conditions, but this may not necessarily be the case in practice.

It is showing on supplementary cards as well as primary cards, for the Platinum version at least, so you can benefit twice if you register twice.

Boots: spend £10 or more, get 7% back

Boots is offering 7% cashback when you spend £10 or more to the first 22,000 people to save the offer.

This offer is only valid once per card, so you should think carefully how and when you wish to use it – and use another card if you need to shop in Boots in the meantime.

Boots is generally very good at stocking a broad range of gift cards which do not appear to be excluded from the offer …….

Boots Opticians and Hearingcare are excluded, as is baby milk, prescriptions and the carrier bag levy. This may not be true in reality, given Amex’s inability to see what you purchased.

Uber Eats: 10% back

This is another decent offer – albeit one that popped up a while back which we didn’t mention at the time – that you should have little trouble using in the coming month. Uber Eats is offering 10% back on an Uber Eats transaction.

This is another offer that is only valid once per card, although there is no upper limit on the cashback you can earn.

FREE NOW: Get 50% back up to £7

FREE NOW, the black taxi cab app owned by BMW and Daimler, is offering 50% back up to £7 for travel up to 13th July.

In other words, it’s half price up to £14 spend. This isn’t far in a black cab, admittedly, but should be good for a short trip.

The offer is valid once per card to the first 100,000 cardmembers to save it.

If you don’t already have a FREE NOW account, using my promo code ‘rhys.jon’ after downloading the app will earn you an additional £4 credit.

Get a 50% FREE NOW discount on top

Code YOUAREFREENOW, typed into the app in the vouchers section, gets you a 50% discount on your next ride within one month. The discount is capped at £6.

This would stack with the American Express cashback. A £20 ride would be charged at £14 after using the YOUAREFREENOW code, of which Amex would refund you £7 – meaning the ride cost just £7.

As we mentioned last week, there is also a ‘15% cashback on all rides’ offer available with competing taxi app Gett available too.

And, of course, if you are an American Express Platinum cardholder in London, you will have your £10 monthly Addison Lee credit to use as well. Decisions, decisions …..

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Category

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Comments (66)

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

  • Ian says:
    13 Apr13 April 05:33

    No Boots on my BAPP or Platinum cards.

    The Harrods is only on my Platinum and not the BAPP.

  • Andrew says:
    13 Apr13 April 07:27

    Great to see the retailers straight out of the gate offering these – hopefully others will be joining them this week as Amex staggers the release. Bicester Village offer popped up today on Plat (and supps) with £50 back on £500, similar to previously, not overly generous, but if you’re spending anyway (and gift cards are specifically included and can be bought from the visitor centre).

    • Harry T says:
      13 Apr13 April 07:45

      Honestly, I was hoping for more this month. I suspect retailers think the demand is there without showering us with incentives. Fingers crossed for some hotel offers soon too.

      • Andrew says:
        13 Apr13 April 07:56

        Well it is only day 2! Amex do like to drip these things day by day, so fingers crossed more will come – like the hotel offers once one does they all do. It’s about Harrods saying come and spend your money here instead of Selfridges, rather than creating demand as such – so the others will want to do the same. And I would imagine hotel offers will wait until next month when they are scheduled to open for leisure travel.

        • Harry T says:
          13 Apr13 April 08:09

          Fair points, Andrew. With hotels, I think there is some hope they will put out offers earlier, to encourage advance bookings. I kind of thought the shops might encourage us to go and spend with them on day one too, but perhaps they are drip feeding as you say.

          • Andrew says:
            13 Apr13 April 08:21

            Probably the feeling is everyone’s priority this week and next is to shop and go to a pub garden, then once the novelty dies down, attention will pass to planning for hotel stays in May, so maybe in a couple of weeks offers will start. Although there are some hotel offers already showing.

        • Rob says:
          13 Apr13 April 09:48

          Harrods is slightly different. It has spent the last 5 years redesigning the store to alientate domestic customers and cater exclusively for the Middle East and Chinese tourist market. This market has now gone and they are a bit stuck. Even after covid, the removal of VAT reclaim will hit them hard.

          • George K says:
            13 Apr13 April 10:08

            I agree with this assessment, but couldn’t quite put my finger on which of changes alienated the domestic customers. Care to share an example or two?

          • Andrew says:
            13 Apr13 April 10:54

            They have created an extremely luxurious environment which is commonplace in the Middle East but perhaps is intimidating to some people in the UK. And Rob has also reflected before on the layout of the shop being predominately a souk of small boutiques which maybe doesn’t suit the browsing style of the UK customer who maybe prefer the open plan nature of Selfridges. But the company is diversifying to attract a UK customer, particularly with these new H Beauty shops at Lakeside and Milton Keynes. And I think we’ll see more changes in Knightsbridge too, but as we all hope, this pandemic won’t affect our ability to travel the world indefinitely, so hopefully the foreign spending will be back in due course.

          • flyforfun says:
            13 Apr13 April 11:14

            Agreed. I often found things cheaper at Harrods, particularly if you were buying during their sale and were a member of their rewards scheme. When I bought my flat 2 decades ago I wanted modern furniture and the high street was still stock post war designs. The alternative was Ikea. There were individual retailers scattered over the place, but Harrods had great collection under one roof. I got Linge Roset furniture cheaper there than at Ligne Rosets own store. Clearing out some old receipts recently I found I bought a Psion personal organiser using membership reward points, a digital camera, a HDD TV tuner and the most resent was a Samsung combi built in Microwave/Grill/Oven. Samsung were shutting down their concession there at the time so got a deal. The guy said they had to go because Harrods wanted the space back. It was about 5 years ago, so would tie in with what Rob said.

            I last went a couple of years ago taking tourists. The retail had changed, the food hall less exciting and opulent, but the prices just as high.

          • DeB20 says:
            13 Apr13 April 14:26

            Just been to Harrods and used the offer on one of my two Platinum cards. To my surprise, there were many Middle Eastern customers in the store, despite the fact that Ramadan has begun. And in my neighbourhood, the Egyptian owned cafés (one particular chain) also had many Middle Eastern customers yesterday. Apparently they are still visiting and spending money here, albeit the numbers are definitely down.

          • George K says:
            13 Apr13 April 16:26

            Thank you all – any signs of sale on? 😛

          • KBuffett says:
            13 Apr13 April 17:01

            I was there yesterday. There were many many shoppers, the type that have no fixed address but brand new Range Rovers and £30k Rolexes and only pay cash.
            I think there is a lot of pent up cash that can’t be spent online

          • Mr(s) Entitled says:
            13 Apr13 April 19:37

            While you may be unhappy with the change I doubt very much that they tried to “alienate” anyone.

    • Carol says:
      13 Apr13 April 07:59

      This offer is also on my BAPP. As you say, great for buying a gift card.

    • Andy D says:
      13 Apr13 April 08:05

      Can you try on clothes yet in the shops before buying? The Bicester Village one is a good one given how my body shape has evolved during lockdowns, requiring wardrobe intervention.

      • Andrew says:
        13 Apr13 April 08:23

        Yes, BBC reported that fitting rooms are allowed to open, but as has been the case since June last year, it is at the discretion of the retailer – some do and some can’t be bothered with the hassle.

      • Lord Doncaster says:
        13 Apr13 April 14:34

        Buy a size up and wear a belt 😁

        • chabuddy geezy says:
          13 Apr13 April 22:46

          A lot of the Harrods stock of designer goods is aimed at middle Eastern customers (eg being bling designs, shiny metallic colours) and East Asian customers ( eg rose gold, special collections around CNY and valentines). These items were heavily discounted due to the lack of tourists.

  • George says:
    13 Apr13 April 08:30

    I have the standard BA Amex and don’t have any of these. I keep getting offers for obscure brands that I don’t use and won’t use, and nothing on brands I may actually spend on…

    • Marm says:
      13 Apr13 April 09:01

      That happens to me most of the time. I have the Platinum and standard BA Amex.

  • Andrew says:
    13 Apr13 April 08:44

    Boots. Boots Opticians transactions usually go through a separate till system and appear as “Boots Opticians” on the statement (sadly).

    Baby Milk – The law is complex, but it’s illegal to offer “special sales” on it. Every so often minimum wage supermarket staff make the mistake of reducing a near-dated packet of formula to clear, it’ll make headline news, and the BMA (Baby Milk Action) will demand that they and the Supermarket are prosecuted.

    That’s why it’s always excluded from various points, multi-buy and threshold spend discounts.

    • Andrew says:
      13 Apr13 April 08:50

      But of course with this offer, like the Morrison’s ones etc, there’s no way to limit the items the offer can be applied to by Amex so they have to say that cover themselves, but in reality the offer applies to baby milk. (Different Andrew, not having a discussion with myself!)

    • C says:
      13 Apr13 April 09:05

      Sainsburys even exclude it from Nectar earning. One can pick up Tesco ClubCard points on baby milk, however, so there clearly is some interpretation involved.

  • Alan says:
    13 Apr13 April 08:59

    Harrods £50 off on my Plat Xmas Plat a/c but no idea what I’d spend £200 on their website on! No Boots offer showing yet – they have very generous Advantage card offers too, I’ve had £12 off £20 spend on in the last month!

    • Rob says:
      13 Apr13 April 09:40

      I’ll probably buy some more wine – that’s where the £100 credit went before Christmas. I bought stupidly expensive stuff (as it was totally free) and my wife went crazy about one of them so I need to restock at standard price ….

      • Andrew says:
        13 Apr13 April 10:18

        Wait for a 10% Rewards weekend – wine is always included, although other food and drink isn’t.

      • sunguy says:
        13 Apr13 April 13:45

        ….and thats why they have these offers!!!

      • DeB20 says:
        13 Apr13 April 14:31

        Stocked up on a few bottles of champagne for myself today. Total spend £215, triggered the offer, email received confirming it. So £175 for a couple of vintage champagne bottles is pretty good.

      • Alan says:
        13 Apr13 April 16:42

        Haha yep if I’d ever been given the 100% back offer I’d have definitely used it, not so keen with 20% off 🙂

  • Rhys says:
    13 Apr13 April 09:01

    See yesterday’s article…

  • Rob says:
    13 Apr13 April 09:59

    Yes, except for Shop Small.

    Sometimes the maths is very easy to understand – Harrods will average a 50% margin, so if you spend £200 and get £50 back it will still make £50 (let’s ignore VAT for now). Many people will spend £500 and Harrods is laughing.

    FREE NOW will lose money on the taxi offer but not much and once you’ve downloaded the app and added your card details (for new customers) it will work for them.

    All companies know the cost of attracting a new customer. It can be shockingly high. Even when these deals look over-generous, they at least driving business. You can spend £10,000 on a couple of newspaper ads and have no idea if they drive a single sale. At least spending £10,000 on a campaign like this will shift some stock, get the stores busy and hopefully generate new long-term customers.

    • Dave says:
      13 Apr13 April 10:21

      I guess it’s the opt-in and subsequent tracking of spend that makes it attractive for the merchants. It makes for a tight, transparent campaign with minimal risk to the merchant (and plenty of successful case studies for Amex to go out and acquire new offers from new merchants). It’s a neat model.

      • Andrew says:
        13 Apr13 April 10:23

        And one that keeps customers happy, both in terms of customers of the retailers and customers of Amex.

        • Alan says:
          13 Apr13 April 16:44

          Agree, Rob, Dave and Andrew – good points. I hadn’t really thought through the background to these offers before.

    • Andrew says:
      13 Apr13 April 10:22

      Plus one of the general terms of the offers is that you agree to your details being passed to the offer provider, so you’re selling some of your data by accepting the offer.

    • C says:
      13 Apr13 April 10:36

      Prior Amex FreeNow and Gett promos introduced me to the services, and I continued to use them after the promos ended. They accomplished their objectives.

      • TGLoyalty says:
        13 Apr13 April 11:00

        Exactly and the direct marketing approach is a real bonus

        You know every single use resulted in a customer sale where marketing campaigns funnel down (interactions, leads, conversions etc)

        Rob do you know if AMEX charge a fee or commission for running the offers?

        • Rhys says:
          13 Apr13 April 11:20

          I doubt Amex do it for free 🙂

          • Rob says:
            13 Apr13 April 14:41

            Oddly, I think they do. They may ask for a few quid if you want them to email cardholders or be promoted inside the app but I don’t believe they look to make a fortune from it. They see it as a member retention measure. Will ask the Malaysia Airlines team next time I see them.

        • Aston100 says:
          13 Apr13 April 21:20

          Can you also ask them to stick the overnight MH1 flight back on.
          Thanks.

        • KBuffett says:
          13 Apr13 April 23:16

          AmEx don’t charge to run these offers on behalf of retailers

  • C says:
    13 Apr13 April 10:34

    None of these on my BA PP.

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