Amex gift cards

[catleg]

You mean you're even lying to us? C'mon.

[Trixie007]

Hi NoLawyerYet, I think that you're in a place where most of us have been - or are! - worrying about what you can do to protect yourself/assets and how you can make it through a BK with the most possible to show for it. That's understandable!

What you'll find on this forum is a lot of good pointers on how to stay out of trouble, and I've read here many times that the best way to have a less stressful BK is to NOT have anything to hide. Not 30k cars, gift cards purchased on the eve of BK... etc. I'm not trying to knock you though, really. It seems to me that if you play your cards straight, live on that tax refund and any other money that comes your way as long as you can -whether that's one month or 18 - then file when it runs out or something happens that forces your hand. There are ways to plan a BK that are legal and will fly you right under the radar, and ways that will buy you a lot of stress and trouble. Good luck to you.

[NoLawyerYet]

thank you

[catleg]

You know, bottom line, that's just like saying 5k cash advance, and what's the big deal with that right? The trustee only cares that you're not hiding assets or asset transfers, otherwise it's really not his place to object, that would be Amex's responsibility, and you know the odds of that are about zero as long as a few months pass and a few payments are made.

[rockyroad]

It's not like taking a cash advance at all! AMEX will not put the points in your account until you pay your bill. If you do not pay your bill in full on time, you forfeit your points. So any points accumluated in your account have been paid for so to speak.
For the record, I was earning between 180-200k points per month on my account and paid the bill in full every month. I had nearly a million points in my account when the economy turned south and my business started failing.
Knowing I could be looking at defaulting on my Biz AMEX account, I cashed out all my points purchasing gift cards.
Granted I have not filed for BK yet, the account was charged off and yes, my gift cards still work.
No, I did not earn the points for the charges I incurred my last month of using the card because I never paid that bill. I forfeited 186k points.
As far as the other million points, they were points I earned and paid for and AMEX never said a word.
At the time I cashed them out, I was still current and still following the contract agreements with AMEX.
They are your points....if AMEX doesn't want you to use them, they will freeze the account so you cannot cash them out!
Again, as long as you are still in good standing, you CAN use YOUR points EARNED with AMEX and no one is going to jail! Hope that helps!

[rockyroad]

and if I read this wrong and you actually purchased the cards, charging the 5K to your AMEX, then NO, they are still not going to cancel the cards. They aren't going to track down everything you charged to your AMEX. And if you gave them as Christmas gifts the cards should be long used by the time your accounts ever goes into default.
It takes a while with AMEX is you are a long time card holder in good standing.
Didn't pay my bill for 5 months and they literally called once a week just to check and see if things were any better. Then they called to notify me they were going to charge it off ar the end of the 5 months. When you are dealing with a large balance on a Biz card, then the writing is kinda on the wall with them.
From what I've read on here, they do seem to be quite more aggressive with regular accounts and smaller balances.
Nevertheless...all the charges, no matter what they're for are all non-secured, so they aren't going to comb through your statement circling what they want back...including gift cards. They may scrutinize luxury purchases within so many days before filing, however I'm betting you are some time away from filing based on the few facts you've provided.

[chloe0724]

http://www.bkforum.com/showthread.php?t=22066&highlight=AMEX+gift+cards

This is the link from Major Mikes AMEX gift card purchase and what he went through.