Question about Credit Card AMEX and Balance Transfer

Cpu2007

My question is related to AMEX and balace trasfer services.

I pay mostly everything with american express,which gives me avios points(it does't really give much but..) and want to keep earning avios points. Now the thing is that I've heard about these cc with 0% interest for a certain amount of period.
I understand that the way these cc work is that I pay a minimum amount each month and even if I don't pay the full amount I won't be charged; obviously I have to pay everything off before the 0% period is over in order to avoid charged (correct me if I'm wrong).
Now what I want to know is, is it possible to use one of these 0% cc to pay everything like I do with amex(so basically replace amex), in the meantime put my earnings in a saving account to get some interest and once it's time to pay off everything from the 0% cc, pay it with AMEX cc so I can collect point as well?

Thank you

sfax

How would you pay off the balance with your Amex?

Cpu2007

sfax wrote: »

How would you pay off the balance with your Amex?

Through debit card, my amex is already linked to my debit card.

sfax

You might want to check what points you'd get (if any) for paying a credit card bill. There are usually exclusions for certain types of transactions and things like balance transfers

Re. the rest of plan. Yes, you can do this sort of thing and it's known as stoozing. Not really worth the hassle IMO with interest rates so low

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.php?f=95

[Deleted User]

You don't earn Amex points on balance transfers. Which Amex card do you currently have, the BA one? If you want to earn a load of Avios then your best bet is to apply for another Amex with a sign-up bonus.

The Gold card has a sign up bonus of 20,000 points which you can then transfer to Avios (or many other airlines/hotels). The card is free in the first year and you have to spend £1000 per month for the first three months to qualify for the bonus points. You can get 22,000 points if you are referred for the card by an existing member - I'm happy to do this! Send me a PM if you want a referral.

zerog

What you need to do is make big purchases with the Amex in the same month and then balance transfer this to a 0% card, instead of paying it off.

0% cards usually allow BTs to be made within 60 days of the card opening. Not sure whether any cards prevent transfers from Amex and whether you can BT from the same card twice.

sfax

Tesco allow Amex transfers and there is no limit on the number of balance transfers and no time limit (you can make as many balance transfers as you want for the whole 20-24 months)

Fruit_and_Nut_Case

honguqia wrote: »

pretty random and pretty awesome.

...and pretty :spam: -my too!

InsideInsurance

Cpu2007 wrote: »

once it's time to pay off everything from the 0% cc, pay it with AMEX cc so I can collect point as well?

You cannot "pay" a credit card with a credit card. What you are referring to is a balance transfer and this will not work as you hope as

a) balance transfers dont get reward points etc
b) they often attract a balance transfer fee in the region of 3%
c) if they're not on an interest free deal then they normally start acrewing interest immediately


The first part works in terms of spending and saving the money thus getting interest but the repayment with Amex for Avios doesnt work

What SFax suggest is a possibility if the facts are true in that you spend on the AmEx card and then transfer the balance each month to the Tesco on a 0% BT and fee card which would give you 12 months total with the money in savings

Cpu2007

Thank you everyone.
Most of advices given here are nice but at the same time they don't seem to worth the hassle.

@Lazyloki, the reward through referral that you have mentioned, does it require me to spend £1k every month for the first three months?
I don't spend that much and the cc that I'm using are the ones from lloyds. I got two american express duo avios and mastercard. I use amex as it gives most of the points.


A few questions about the points.
I don't remember where but I've read that if I use the points, e.g 9000 and I had 12000, the remaining 3000 will be lost, is this true?
I have only 12000 avios atm but what I want to know is if is possible to just book flights and not be forced to book other things like hotels etc, again I've read this somewhere saying that I need to book a hotel with them if I'm booking a flight.
-If a person has many points, is it possible to use them to book more than one passenger, e.g if you have 36000, and a flight costs 9000 pp, can I get 4 people on board using 36000?

[Deleted User]

Cpu2007 wrote: »

Thank you everyone.
Most of advices given here are nice but at the same time they don't seem to worth the hassle.

@Lazyloki, the reward through referral that you have mentioned, does it require me to spend £1k every month for the first three months?
I don't spend that much and the cc that I'm using are the ones from lloyds. I got two american express duo avios and mastercard. I use amex as it gives most of the points.


A few questions about the points.
I don't remember where but I've read that if I use the points, e.g 9000 and I had 12000, the remaining 3000 will be lost, is this true?
I have only 12000 avios atm but what I want to know is if is possible to just book flights and not be forced to book other things like hotels etc, again I've read this somewhere saying that I need to book a hotel with them if I'm booking a flight.
-If a person has many points, is it possible to use them to book more than one passenger, e.g if you have 36000, and a flight costs 9000 pp, can I get 4 people on board using 36000?

Sorry my mistake, for the bonus you need to spend a total of £2000 in the first three months. This gives you a bonus of 20,000 (or 22,000 via referral) Amex Member Rewards points which can then be exchanged to Avios (1 points = 1 Avios) or many other Airline/Hotel points). Once you have bagged the sign up bonus you can always just close the account if you like although since the card is free for the first year you could keep using it - you get double points for each pound spent in supermarkets.

One option for hitting spending bonuses on cards is just to go to tesco (or whatever your supermarket is - I recommend tesco as you can transfer clubcard points to Avios) and buy a load of months worth of gift cards. This way you can hit the spending bonus and just use the gift cards to pay for shopping.

In answer to your questions - you don't loose unused Avios points and yes, you can book multiple seats from the same Avios account. The only problem might be availability or reward flights (airlines only release a certain amount on each flight).