AMEX & Paypal

Dan83

Hi,
Someone has suggested transferring money from their AMEX credit card to me via PayPal friends and family. I then move the money from my PayPal account to my bank account and send it back. They say this won’t incur any charges.

Is this correct?

Thanks.

Mark_d

It doesn't sound right to me.  Since nothing is being purchased I believe Amex would treat the transfer as a cash advance - meaning that there are cash advance fees plus interest (depending on specific card)

DullGreyGuy

Dan83 said:

Hi,
Someone has suggested transferring money from their AMEX credit card to me via PayPal friends and family. I then move the money from my PayPal account to my bank account and send it back. They say this won’t incur any charges.

Is this correct?

Thanks.

Why don't they do a small transaction to check?
If it does incur charges it will be AmEx applying a cash advance fee to your "someone" and so not your problem. 

Have done it historically with multiple cards but banks are getting wiser to tricks and AmEx rules vary by type of card. 

Dan83

Thanks for the replies.
It doesn’t sound like a good idea to me and I thought about the fee’s but didn’t consider the cash advance fee.

By transferring £4000 a month, he thinks he will get £40 a month cash back. My first thought was, something sounds dodgy here.

prettyandfluffy

Just feels like something to be avoided.  It may be quite innocent or you could get drawn into something that is perceived as money laundering or a scam.

lisyloo

I've paid cash this way before and there has been NO cash advance fee.
However who is asking you to do this? It has all the hallmarks of a scam if it's not someone you know VERY well and trust 100%.
Why don't they get their own paypal account?

Fingerbobs

I don't know about Amex, but I've never been charged any fees for sending PayPal payments to friends and family using a Barclaycard, and this is something I do regularly. 
I always used to use my Santander card for this, and was never charged any fees, until a new warning started popping up on PayPal that they may charge fees, so I switched over to using Barclaycard, for which the warning does not appear and I am not charged any fees. Whether Santander would actually charge fees I am not sure, but the warning was enough to stop me trying. 

PloughmansLunch

I’ve used PayPal friends and family to send, and receive back, a couple of hundred pounds to my brother from my Amex Gold once or twice and there were no fees. However, I’ve read that both PayPal and Amex take a dim view of this as neither of them can skim any fees. Sending thousands each month and then back again sounds like a surefire way for something to end up getting flagged for closure.

Dan83

Thanks for the replies everyone. 

It is someone I know very well and trust, not just some random person I’ve met in the pub.

I’ve better things to do with my time if I’m honest. I don’t do internet banking so it would take me ages to draw £4000 out of a cash machine, with banks being very few and far between these days and only opening during school hours, getting to a bank is practically impossible to transfer money back.

Seems a lot of work for £40 cash back.

retiredbanker1

Dan83 said:

Thanks for the replies.
It doesn’t sound like a good idea to me and I thought about the fee’s but didn’t consider the cash advance fee.

By transferring £4000 a month, he thinks he will get £40 a month cash back. My first thought was, something sounds dodgy here.

Although what he wants to is legal - what will AMEX 's take be on this?

Worst case scenario they will do money laundering checks on him, block and close his account.

400ixl

retiredbanker1 said:

Worst case scenario they will do money laundering checks on him, block and close his account.

Or the OP's bank will do the same seeing the money coming in and then going out to a 3rd party. It could be the OP who ends up getting their bank account closed.