Foursquare and American Express started a partnership last year offering cashback for purchases at select major retailers. There is a new special offer for April 2013.
I understand many readers of this blog will be familiar with the relationship between American Express and Foursquare. However, there are those who are new to this blog and the points world in general, so this post will start with a full explanation of how to take advantage of this amazing opportunity.
What is Foursquare?
Foursquare is a location-based social network. Users “check-in” via mobile devices, such as smartphone or tablets, that use GPS-based hardware to calculate the user’s location. Each check-in rewards the users with points and occasional badges. Users can have their check-in posted on Twitter and Facebook allowing them to connect with friends and share tips about locations.
In June 2011, Foursquare partnered with American Express to offer location-based special offers for American Express cardmembers. This initially was for the United States but was eventually extended to the United Kingdom in 2012.
How It Works
To take advantage of the Foursquare / American Express partnership you must be an American Express cardmember and registered with Foursquare.
There are many American Express branded cards available in the United Kingdom. For this blog I only focus on cards that award the user with travel-related points, such as British Airway’s frequent flyer currency Avios. I have a list of the current UK travel credit card offers here. It is important to note that you can use any American Express card with the Foursquare offer.
It is best to download the Foursquare application onto your smartphone or tablet and you can do it here. You can download and register with your home computer but you will not be able to check-in as that software requires GPS-based hardware.
Once you have registered with Foursquare you then need to sync your American Express card. This matches your Foursquare account with your American Express card details granting you access to the location-based special offers. You can sync your card here.
Now you have synced your American Express card with your Foursquare account you next need to check-in to a participating location. You do not have to be at the location to check-in. You can check-in from home before you travel. Simply click the explore option on Foursquare then search the location you wish to check-in. If you are already at the location then you can just click check-in and the location-based software should recognise where you are and prompt the location for you.
After you check-in to the location an American Express-branded special offer should appear automatically. Tap the special offer then click “load to card”. You do not need to do anything else. You do not need to show your phone or tablet to anyone in the store. No codes or vouchers are required. Everything is done automatically. Simply pay with your synced American Express card and you will earn the special offer as a statement credit within 3-5 working days.
Important Extra Information
This blog is always looking to maximize every offer for our readers and this partnership is no different. There are couple ways you can take full advantage of this offer. Everything I discuss here is perfectly legal and within the term and conditions of the special offer.
You can register any American Express card. This means supplementary cards as well. A supplementary card is an additional card for a family member living at the same address connected to the same credit account. You can usually have a certain number of free supplementary card before being charged. You can register all these cards with Foursquare and enjoy the same special offer multiple times. Each card requires its own Foursquare account but a Foursquare account only requires an email address. Simply register an email address for each card and remember to write down which card is registered to which email address as many cards can make it quickly confusing. When you wish to take advantage of a special offer just log in to each individual Foursquare account, check-in to the location, load to card then log out and repeat.
The retailer participating in the special offer does not place any restriction on what can be purchased. They simply place a minimum qualifying spend amount. This means you can purchase gift cards for that minimum amount and combine gift cards for more expensive items, or use gift cards on their website, or save those gift cards for a sale period later on. You need to be careful with gift cards for three reasons.
- Gift cards are worthless if the company goes into administration, like HMV. You need to be confident the company will survive, at least until you redeem the cards.
- Gift cards usually have an expiry date. Make sure you note that date in your calendar if you don’t intend to use the gift cards immediately.
- Gift cards usually have spend restrictions. For example, Harrods gift cards cannot be used at their Heathrow Airport store. Check what are the restrictions before purchase.
The use of gift cards and sale discounting can provide substantial savings. I used the recent Debenhams 50% sale and Foursquare / American Express spend £50, get £25 back promotion for an effective 75% discount on my purchase.
Foursquare/American Express Special Offers – April 2013
There are two special offers for April 2013.
- Spend £100 at Harrods and earn £25 statement credit (ends 30 April)
- Spend £50 at Shell and earn £15 statement credit (ends 18 April)
The Shell offer has been around for some time and I expect many of the readers of this blog have already taken advantage of it. If you haven’t then act quickly as it ends on 18 April. Remember, you can use supplementary cards as well!
The Harrods offer does not appeal unless you are expecting to spend a hefty amount at the store already. It is significantly less value than the offer available in February.
I do hope that Foursquare and American Express launch new special offers throughout April that will appeal to a wider audience. If they do then be sure to check out this blog for all the latest news!
Before You Go…
If this is the first post you have read of my website and are interested in learning more about collecting travel points/air miles then may I suggest you try the following beginner posts:
Also, you can sign up to my subscription list through the link on the left of this page. You will receive every new post as an email. I usually send one email a day (two is the maximum) and you can unsubscribe at any time. This will keep you up-to-date with all the latest offers, especially useful for the time-limited ones that need to be taken advantage of as soon as possible.
Foursquare / American Express Cashback - April 2013
cashback stores are very helpful in order to save money and most interesting part is one saves money buy purchasing items.
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