Amex Platinum Business - Hilton $200 credit ($50/quarter)

[Eric B]

WRT the discussion on ethics, IMHO there is nothing unethical about identifying incentives that large very profitable corporations put in place in an effort to drive consumer behavior and choosing whether to, and to what extent to behave in a way that triggers the incentives. Many TS developers offer incentives to attend discussions with their sales staff that are thinly disguised sales pitches - the incentive is provided to get you in the seat and often includes the disclaimer that you need not buy to get it. Had I realized that T-Mobile designed their incentive system in such a way that it was to merely sign up for direct payment from a bank account rather than to actually make a payment directly from that bank account I might have started making credit card payments for my bills instead.

The problem I see with the cell phone situation isn't an ethical one but instead a sign of the difficulty of setting up incentive systems to trigger the behavior you really want. T-Mobile used to give the automatic payment discount for credit card payments but decided they wanted to reduce the fee costs and eliminated that option but left in place the ability to make credit card payments - there was never an agreement between me or T-Mobile on this topic but instead the exertion of bargaining strength by T-Mobile to impose this particular framework on the consumer. It shouldn't be much of a surprise that some folks figure out how to behave in a way that aligns with the incentive systems T-Mobile and American Express have in place - we don't have much in the way of input into the form those incentive systems are set up and nothing obligates us to behave in a way that minimizes their costs. Some day they may figure out how to improve the incentive systems but as long as I can still get to the cheese I won't have any ethical dilemmas to deal with doing it - if they want to influence my behavior without truly bargaining with me that's on them.

 

[frank808]

Hello Frank / Eric,

While I don't have the AMEX Plat Business card, I do have the same problem with TMobile. I put in my Debit card as the autopayment method to maintain the $40 autopay discount with TMobile, but I go in and manually pay with my person AMEX Plat card about 10 days before the autopayment is taken. After paying off the bill for the month, the autopay gets reset to 0 for that month, so nothing gets auto-debited. This way I get the cell phone protection from the Amex Plat card. It's what works for me so far, keeping my finger crossed. I imagine you can do something similar to get the autopay discount and make use of the $120 wireless credit from AMEX.

Great3

Edit: Guess it been discussed multiple times already the workaround.

Thanks for the information. I also was not willing to lose my discount to use credit card.

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[frank808]

Lol, I wouldn't call it ethical either, in fact, I would call it the exact opposite , as I know that's not their intent, so I completely agree with you on that point. Was just saying, it's each person own judgement call if they can live with their own decisions of what to do (so a poor choice of wording on my part - I can see how what I said/typed can be interpreted differently than my original intent).

Moving back on topic, I am still scratching my head on Frank saying put the cell phone bill on his Elan card to get 5% + cell phone protection, if he is leaving $120 on the table in wireless credits, unless his cell phone bill is so huge that it's greater than $10 a month for the 5% cash back rewards. Let's face it, we are all here to maximize credit card benefits to justify keeping it.

Great3

It is a wash as my cell phone bill is $230 a month. Well I get $11.50 in rebate vs $10 with Amex credit.

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[hurnik]

The AMEX Business Platinum is based on spend made directly with a property in the Hilton portfolio and isn't limited to Hilton resorts as is the case with the Hilton Aspire AMEX. The terms for the Hilton Honors Business AMEX are similar to the AMEX Business Platinum. I think you're absolutely right that what triggers Aspire would trigger either of the business cards but it would also include stuff beyond that - The Quin isn't on the list of resorts.

Yes, that would be my guess as well. Although I wasn't sure if paying Maintenance Fees via HGV portal would trigger the Platinum benefit, which is nice that it does/did. Now, whether it'll work for ALL properties (affiliates, etc.) remains to be seen.

 

[1Kflyerguy]

Yes, that would be my guess as well. Although I wasn't sure if paying Maintenance Fees via HGV portal would trigger the Platinum benefit, which is nice that it does/did. Now, whether it'll work for ALL properties (affiliates, etc.) remains to be seen.

I don't have this card, but most of the points bloggers seem to expect this to work just like the Surpass credit and work at all Hilton properties. I have the Surpass card, and so far, that credit has triggered for MF and HVG reservation fees.