Shop Small with American Express will be returning in June

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• John says:

  18 May18 May 08:04

  Used to get excited but this offer when it was £5 off £5 unlimited but I haven’t even bothered last few years as it’s not worth the hassle of chasing every other £5 that hasn’t automatically been credited. Amex used to credit you £5 when you reported a business was listed but didn’t accept Amex but they don’t even do that now so again not worth making special trips.

• Nick says:

  18 May18 May 08:22

  Lol love how they’re trying to promote the world’s least accurate and up-to-date map as a selling point to merchants 😂

  While they’re at it, they need to clamp down on merchants signing up to get the stickers/flyers and then switching to izettle (etc). I had to threaten FOS last time to get a SS credit, despite sending photos of the promo stickers plastered all over the shop’s door and window.

  • dougzz99 says:

    18 May18 May 08:57

    That’s like work though, way too much bother for a couple of fivers. This is a nice idea that doesn’t really work anymore, not for me anyway.

  • Andrew. says:

    18 May18 May 09:17

    I’ve had izettle ShopSmall offers trigger ok.

    Seems a nonsense to claim that they don’t count. I pay in a ShopSmall location by tapping my Amex card on a reader.

  • Chas says:

    18 May18 May 18:40

    That was my reaction when I read that too! The whole izettle thing really annoys me too – I completely agree with Andrew.’s analogy of it.

• Max says:

  18 May18 May 08:43

  The map is dreadful, really difficult to use.

• Sue says:

  18 May18 May 08:47

  Agree with most of above – a virtually useless “offer” not worth the effort anymore.

• JDB says:

  18 May18 May 08:59

  It doesn’t cost anything to save the offer and I find it triggers in unusual places so we always end up benefiting from the promo, so not sure what the problem is.

  • Rui N. says:

    18 May18 May 09:22

    +1. I don’t understand how people get so upset for getting free money.

    • Cheshire Pete says:

      18 May18 May 09:30

      That’s easy to answer. Someone may go out of my way to search out a business they’d never used before, and factoring in they’re expecting to get £5 back in the cost/value of what they’re purchasing. If that £5 then doesn’t turn up, they’ve made a transaction probably otherwise they wouldn’t have made. That would certainly grate with some people, and so understandable.

      • Rui N. says:

        18 May18 May 09:35

        Maybe don’t go through all that trouble for £5 then? But some people here (not necessarily on this thread, but it has been common last few times shop small was around) claim they don’t even bother to save the offer. What exactly do they achieve with that?

        • Cheshire Pete says:

          18 May18 May 09:39

          I’m guessing, as I would always save it, and go about my usual business, but some might see saving it as the initial temptation to then go out and chase something that does occasionally go wrong. So they’re are removing that temptation hence avoiding the disappointment when it sometimes doesn’t turn up as expected!

        • MattB says:

          18 May18 May 10:35

          Amex will see how fewer people are opting in, and using the offers. Perhaps realise customers don’t find it worthwhile.

          But they probably don’t care as its less free money to give away but they can still boast about helping small businesses.

      • ChrisC says:

        18 May18 May 11:53

        Before going to said out of the way shop not pick up phone and call them?

        “Hello can you tell me if you take AMEX?”

        Is thst really so difficult?

        • RussellH says:

          18 May18 May 14:02

          My dentist used to post notices in the waiting room stating “Sorry, we do not take Amex”.

          His practice appeared on Shop Small this time last year, so I phoned and checked. Receptionist said “Sorry, we do not take Amex”.

          I went for my appointment and he told me that yes, the system would accept Amex, but he did not like to accept it as he saw Amex as a firm that rips off its merchants. He was quite happy for me (we have always got on very well together) to use Amex to pay for a check-up and for me to get the £5 shop small, but he did ask that I not tell others about it.

          On the other hand, my partner’s sister, who runs a pub 10 miles from here, thinks Shop Small is brilliant. She reckons it brings in significant extra turnover.

          Experience has suggested to me that there are some dubious merchant acquirers out there that sign businesses up for a package that includes Amex, but they do not tell their merchants that. I have seen too many small firms appearing on Shop Small that insist that they do not take Amex and are seriously surprised when they see an Amex transaction go through.

    • Chris says:

      19 May19 May 21:26

      At £250 a year for a card that was £30 for me, for an offer that’s gone from unlimited 50% discounts to very limited 33% discounts – it’s serious devaluation.

      Where is the line at which you would stop defending Amex? £1 off one one tx?

  • Andrew. says:

    18 May18 May 09:47

    It’s really handy that my dentist is on ShopSmall and my six-monthly checkups happen to fall within the relevant periods.

    I’ll go into my local shops and buy tea/coffee, cake, pies, and chocolates and spend £60-80 in them instead of Sazbo’s. It’s the whole point of the arrangement.

    • Mike says:

      18 May18 May 10:11

      Not too many chocolates or you will be back at the dentist !

    • Polly says:

      18 May18 May 10:22

      Our dentist went crazy after she discovered what a Saturday temp did 2nd last day of an older promo £5 back for £10 spend. I had used 10 family cards to get £50 credit on a due visit. Apparently she had some small fee charge with each one…both parties pretty annoyed as l wouldn’t have wanted her to be charged extra. But equally it was on our cards to use. Felt bad, not repeated, of course. Now only got a few cards.
      Will just get some gift vouchers for the local pub this time. Cover the tip, just about!

      • AirMax says:

        18 May18 May 15:20

        £100 for a checkup tho?

• Scottydogg says:

  18 May18 May 09:06

  Every time ive used this it has ended up in problems . Went to a chinese from the shop small map , went to pay to be told they dont accept Amex and never have .
  Contacted Amex to let they know , they said they would investigate , never heard anything back . About a week later i checked the shop small list and the Chinese was still on there .
  This promotion is best avoided , not worth it for a fiver

  • Polly says:

    18 May18 May 10:30

    Our local Chinese similar. The daughter was just about to accept my card, when mum came screaming out from the back “no amex, no amex” so had to use mc instead, but l did tell amex and got the credit. Had the sticker in the window etc.. as you say, using the sticker to maybe draw in new customers.

    • John says:

      18 May18 May 17:01

      I’d have responded with no amex then they can dump the food – especially as they had to purposely put up that sticker.

      With the dentist I might have offered to reimburse them the extra fees, it can’t have been more than 50p per transaction so hardly worth them getting annoyed – my dentist could save £5 per patient per year by stopping sending us things in the post

• David S says:

  18 May18 May 09:49

  £15 rules out all the Coffee Shops again. Bring back the £10 threshold

  • Polly says:

    18 May18 May 10:33

    Yes agree, the £10 deal (meal vouchers effectively half price) got a lot of support, but the £15 is probably not worth the effort, sadly. Unless it’s really convenient and one you want to support anyway. Like our local eatery.

• Mark Bates says:

  18 May18 May 10:04

  It is worth noting that many businesses that accept AMEX will not be able to take part in this. Our business uses ‘Zettle’ for card payments (other similar systems are Sum Up and Square) any business that uses these whilst being able to accept AMEX I believe won’t be able to take part(I called AMEX last year over this and they confirmed this) There is no way we could afford the hefty costs with a ‘traditional’ card machines that big businesses use.

  • FSC says:

    18 May18 May 14:28

    When I did the maths the breakeven last time was £1200 turnover a month. Anything over that you are saving money. The breakeven is lower if you use wifi terminal and lower still for a wired terminal.

  • Axel says:

    18 May18 May 15:17

    Amex actually ran a pilot with SumUp on the last ShopSmall. Not had any update if they are running it this time or expanding to other payment aggregators.

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