That’s really the reason my family has kept the AmEx Platinum cards once Dad retired - just sent the whole family to Hawaii on the FF miles Mom and Dad get from the purchases they’d make anyway. Even if they do pull all that tax shit, it’s still a way, way better deal than the Visa cards they tried - what a waste!
Yes, this is it. I’m just about loyal enough to my (Am)ex employer to not give the rules away, but we did plenty of immediate chargebacks. So if there was doubt the onus was not on the cardholder to prove he did not make the charge, but on the establishment to prove that he did. I think Amex does this more often than some of the credit cards.
I wonder if esbalishment are actually not very keen an accepting the card because of this, which may just explain why Visa and Master are more widely accepted. That’s just a wild guess, though.
For lots of people, something like this is the reason they prefer a AMEX over a Visa card. They HAVE to pay it off each month, and don’t want temptation of not paying it off. I expect that all of the debit cards (Visa or AMEX logo, but direct withdrawl from your account) that banks now issue with a checking/savings account are cutting into this part of the AMEX business.
I don’t know about that - I know I almost never use my debit card, simply because I don’t like the idea of it being directly connected to my account. At least with a credit card I can review the bill and contest any suspicious or innaccurate charges before actually having to dish out the money.
What will AMEX do to you if you don’t pay your bill on time?
I don’t know about non-credit affecting … my li bro couldn’t get a card for anything so I co signed an amex with him … he used, paid me, I paid off.
after a few months he was able to get his own amex and credit cards.
There are two dominant grocery store chains in this area: one accepts AmEx, the other does not. An employee of the latter store once told me that merchants have to pay AmEx a fee (recurring, it seemed like) in order to accept the card. I got the impression that said fee is not required by Visa or MC.
Does anyone know if this is true?
If so, it goes a long way toward explaining why some places (especially smaller stores) don’t accept AmEx…
When I had a blue card they had a “Sign And Travel” option where you could actually extend payments over time, for certain things. I’m sure the interest rate was exorbitant, but at least if you were in a bind and needed to go somewhere you could.
The “Sign & Travel” rate isn’t too bad: I used it last year after I went on a cruise. I was able to lump pretty much anything together that totalled more than I could afford to pay – it didn’t have to be a travel-related charge (I was ‘approved’ for that option because of my payment history, not because of the type of charges I wanted to pay over time). It was pretty handy.
There may be access fees to get set up/stay an approved merchant. By far the more significant factor, I’d think, is that MC/Visa and AMEX all charge a flat (well, possibly tiered) percentage rate of all sales. IIRC (and I’m sure it varies on volume, etc.), one merchant told me he hated AMEX b/c they raked off 4% whereas he only had to pay MC/Visa 2%-2.5% of all sales.
The U.S. Post Office takes credit cards, now, but I’ve been told they recently amended their policy to stop allowing you to buy money orders – reason: too many wisenheimers were buying tons of money orders simply to rack up frequent flyer miles, and the USPS was getting stuck with the $20 credit card merchant charges for these $1000 money orders that they sold for a $1 service fee.
Similarly, the fee is a reason many dirt-cheap merchants and mail-order places don’t take the cards. From what I understand, car dealers also aren’t big fans (though buying on credit does encourage impulse shopping).
Look at it this way:
You pay for things with money, that being an agreed standard of value, and the government stands by these claims of value. If I give you something, and you give me money, I know that the trade leaves me with something of value that I may further exchange (in this country, and many other palces as well) for something else.
But suppose you don’t have any money. You could write me a check, which does not have government backing attesting to its value. However, if I know the bank on which the check is drawn to be reputable, I know that I can exchange the check for money. Good enough in many cases.
Or you could present a charge or credit card. This has the backing of the issuing company, who is basically promising that if I accept presentation of the card they issued to you as payment, I will receive money when I inform them of the transaction. My perception of their reputation is key here as to whether I wish to take this form of payment. Some card companies charge me a fee for providing the mechanisms necessary to accept and report the payments from their cards, but that is supposed to me made up by an increased customer flow, since so many people carry these cards for convenient payment.
Amex did a HUGE advertising push in the 1970s and 1980s to position themselves as the only card smart business people carry, and have been living off that reputation ever since.
If you are young, you can not remember a time when there were no ATMs and credit cards were not widely carried or accepted. You either had cash, which you stood in line at the bank to get, or you wrote checks, if the bank deemed you reputable enough to give allow you to do so.
Cards (and widespread acceptance of them) allow you to never carry either cash or checks, as you trade the reputation of the card issuer for items of value.
A standard credit card says, “here’s a card, use it to pay for things, and pay us back each month. Whatever you don’t pay, we’ll treat as a bank loan for x amount of interest.”
American Express says, “here’s a card, use it to pay for things, and pay us back each month. Period.”
If you hold an American Express card, everyone who sees it knows you to be a person who can afford to pay his bills each month.
In other words, it’s a status symbol.
Actually, wouldn’t everyone who sees it just know you to be a person who can afford to pay THAT bill every month? 
I keep it because of the fact that there’s no limit. You never know when that’ll be handy in an emergency situation.
Sorry, call me cynical, but I see it as a person who doesn’t have the self discipline and smarts to pay off a regular no annual fee credit card each month, to not pay any interest either, so they have to enter into a contract that binds them to such. But that’s just me… :wally
One thing I always enjoyed about my Amex card is that you can PREPAY your account and draw off the balance. So, if you’re going on a trip where you know you’ll have a lot of out-of-pocket expenses, you don’t have to carry a lot of cash/traveler’s checks with you and you’ll have written documentation via your bill of what you spend instead of having to collect and keep track of receipts.
Well, apparently you need an American Express card so that you can shop at Neiman Marcus. They don’t take Visa or Master Card! As I found out yesterday when I tried to pay for my purchase. I’ve gotta wonder what the thinking behind that little policy is.
I suspect it’s like costco. They brokered some sort of deal. My guess is that lots of small business owners use costco to buy their supplies. Forcing them to use Amex means Amex will have more customers whom have the ability to spend alot. In exchange costco gets charged less of a % or no % at all.
My guess for Neiman marcus is that the deal is essentially the same. Upscale stores mean the people whom frequent them have money to spend on other big ticket items as well. Win win deals.
This is why I have 4 credit cards: a Visa, Mastercard, Discover, and American Express Optima card. All four of them have no annual fee, and all four are credit cards (as opposed to charge cards) and do not necessarily have to be paid off each month (though I try to keep them paid off).
With one card of each of the majors, I’m guaranteed that at least one will be accepted if the merchant takes plastic. Also, I don’t need gas station cards or store cards (such as Macy’s).
BTW, I originally had an Amex green card, with an annual fee. I got this back in 1987 when I was in college, when the credit/charge card companies were a little more strict than today with respect to offering credit to college students with no credit history. Amex was the only company to offer me a charge card. I converted the card to their Optima credit card in 1994 when I got tired of paying the annual fee. My Amex Optima card still says “Member since '87” on it, though. 
You know, now that I think about it–I seem to remember that the major department stores didn’t accept plastic other than their own cards until fairly recently. Is that true?
This thread has actually convinced me that it might be a good idea to consider getting an Amex. (And not just so that I can buy stuff at Neiman’s!)
Do your research. Each card has different benifets. Blue cash has this 5% cash back thing(not really 5%, more like 2-3, and only on certain purchases). Costco small business I believe still has BVG, Starwood is supposed to have great hotel benifets, optima… um I forgot.
I know nothing of their charge cards.