American Express added a pop up that shows you’re ineligible for a sign up bonus during the card application in late 2018. Currently a lot of people are applying (or trying to apply) for the increased Hilton offers (personal | business) and running into this pop up. Walter Credit Card has found out that if you click the apply link from an American Express e-mail promoting the offer the pop up doesn’t show up (even for people where the pop up previously did show). This makes sense as you wouldn’t want to be sending e-mails encouraging people to apply for an offer that you’re then going to say they are ineligible for.
All of that being said, I’d recommend extreme caution. American Express has denied sign up bonuses previously even when no pop up appeared and are known for making things up on the fly. I personally wouldn’t be applying if a pop up showed at all. Obviously for this method to work you need to click through from an e-mail advertising the offer, it has been confirmed that using an e-mail not addressed to you also works but again consider the risks.
Hat tip to Walter Credit Card
so this is interesting – I tried multiple times for the Hilton Surpass via a referral during the 1 weekend night free promo – always got the dreaded pop-up so canceled application. Saw this post my Doc, and checked my email – and I had received an invitation to apply attached to my Hilton Honors numbers for the Hilton Surpass card. I applied through the link in the email and did not get the pop-up! I lost out on the P2 referral, but thought it was worth the gamble. When completing the app before I did not include my HH number, but don’t think that made the difference. I met the MSR quick, and the bonus points posted today!
I got a popup, I have only 2 amex cards: spg and brilliant. How do people get approved for so many amex cards.
No one really knows what is causing the pop up for people that haven’t cancelled before the 1-year mark.
Do you spend on your cards after the MSR? The only cards I get the pop-up for our Hilton cards. I have had 6 credit cards and 4 charge cards in the last 2 year receiving bonuses for all of them.
Good point. $0 on spg and 6-7k on Brilliant. I had no intentions to open this card because redemption value is so bad. But then last week I saw the post about Starwood lurker joining Hilton and thought he might improve the program.
Now I am sure he might have put some freeze on points before he overhauls the point system.
I’ll wager that Amex tries to deny most of these bonuses after the MSR is met. Sounds like just an error that this bypasses the popup.
About to find out! :/
Still got pop up for me – clicked on link through hilton email tho technically not amex. Couldn’t find one from them.
Think it needs to be American Express.
Won’t it be in legitimate CFPB territory for them to deny the offer arbitrarily after offering it as part of the email?
CFPB is no longer your friend, they are the bank’s friend. I’ve seen too many people have obvious cases decided in the bank’s favor when it should should have been their win. Yay 2019.
More like Yeah MAGA.
If you’ve met all of the qualifications, maybe (e.g. no no lifetime language, no suspicious spend, not gaming rewards ….)
It says, at their SOLE DISCRETION, they can basically do whatever they want. When you agree to a condition like that, you don’t have a case/claim against them. You know in advance that you’re taking a chance, so you can’t possibly be upset if it blows up. Even DOC says they wouldn’t risk it. Sound advice.
y, mine was told ‘sole discretion’ even after more than 1 rep via chat previously confirmed bonus eligibility; got no help from CFPB; then got help thru an arbitration; mine is likely on amex’s blacklist, but will deal with it later
Wish chase would stop sending me United CC emails then too
Looks like the links may be dying. The link in the email I received and the link in the site are both returning 400 bad request
Can confirm that I stumbled on this last night and it worked for me. At least for the surpass. It’s worth a shot. If they don’t give the bonus, we’ll worry about it then
Let us know once you reach the MSR. I applied as well.
You also would not get a referral bonus…
Yeah, pretty big difference in value when it’s 15k-20k MR without the referral.
Lets see 130k points and a free weekend vs a 20k referral bonus. Seems pretty irrelevant