… with any pre-paid American Express card. Through June 30th, receive a $25 gift card FOR FREE when you order an American Express prepaid card and load $200 or more on the card at the time of ordering.
Many people already have these prepaid cards by purchasing them at Office Depot where they earn 5x points by using their Chase Ink Bold card! However, for those of you who do not have this particular credit card, are not interested in the hassle of going to Office Depot, or live in a state/city that does not sell them (i.e, NYC!), then this is the perfect opportunity to still get some FREE money!
Card Info:
- This card has no fees (unless purchased at Office Depot)
- Can be used as a form of payment anywhere American Express is accepted
- Has the same purchase protection benefits as all other Amex credit cards!
- Can withdraw up to $400 per day at ATM machines.
- Amex Fees: First withdrawal per month is free. There after you will be charged $2 per withdrawal
- ATM Fees: Each ATM machine imposes varying fees
- (note: Amex will not charge any fees, but the ATM might charge a fee)
- Cannot be sent to residents in the states of Arkansas or Vermont
Steps to get your FREE $25:
- Step 1: Order an American Express Prepaid Card here.
- Select the option: “I would like to order a new Card (I don’t have a temporary Card).”
- Must add $200+ to the card to get the free $25
- You will be asked for your SS#, however, no credit check will be run
- Step 2: Once your card has shipped, activate your card and set up your account
- Your $25 FREE American Express gift card will be sent to you via mail within 6 weeks
- Step 3: Use your American Express Prepaid Card at a merchant to purchase an item or withdraw the cash from an ATM (note: DO NOT abuse the ATM privilege)
- Step 4: People have reported being able to order a maximum of three of these cards and received three $25 gift cards – that is now $75 for FREE!
How to continue to utilize this card
Many people will solely use this card for the FREE $25, however, there are great points and miles opportunities by sticking with this card for your everyday purchases. If you have the Chase Ink Bold credit card, you can purchase prepaid re-loadable cards at office supply stores. This will give you 5x on your purchase. Many have purchased the myVanilla Prepaid Reload card at Office Depot stores. Each card costs $3.95 regardless of the dollar value. The best bang for your buck is to purchase the $500 card (the highest amount available).
You can then load the value of this card to the American Express Prepaid Card you just purchased. You can load a maximum of $1,000 in any 24-hour period and $2,500 every 28 days. Note though that some stores are no longer allowing you to use your credit card to purchase these cards, only cash is accepted. If that is the case then you are out of luck. However, I’d recommend asking a manager if they’ll allow the transaction to go through. The main reason they are limiting this is due to fraud, not our little crew trying to earn more points and miles! Also, these cards cannot be purchased in New Jersey, Arkansas, and Vermont. NYC does not sell these cards either.
Just make sure not to abuse this as Chase is allowed to close down your account at any point for any reason.
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.
The responses below are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.
Do you know if foreign transaction fees are charged on this AmEx prepaid card? I did a search on the AmEx site (from the link in your post) but it did not seem to address that.
@Meg – There are no foreign transaction fees!
I have not heard it mentioned… but with the Ink card all everyone seems to mention is Office Depot. I am assuming that the 5X points will also work at Staples. Is this right?
@Susan – 5x points will absolutely work at Staples. However, for the purpose of buying reloadable cards, they do not have any. They do have, however, regular gift cards, i.e., Marriott, Southwest, various restaurants, so you can get 5x points on those purchases.
Does GreenDot MoneyPaks work for this card? I plan to pick up some to maximize my freedom 5% before the end of Jun.
@Rayn – Many of those retailers wont allow credit cards to purchase them. They can be purchased at Walmart, Walgreens, CVS, kmart, and RiteAid. I believe only Walmart as long as it has a super center will be coded as a grocery store to get the 5x points.
@Meg, I don’t know about any gift cards that can be used abroad. So, no there is no foreign exchange fee. There may be a few caribbean places where you can use AmEX gift cards. I learnt this the hard way
Can I use other credit card to fund this AMEX?
@yyyccclll – From my experience (and what I’ve read) Jivepicnic is correct. You can only use a checking/savings account.
@yyyccclll: When I purchased mine today, I only had the options to fund from a checking or savings account or get the card with 0 balance so that I could fund it with cash or one of the reload packs available at some stores.
Can you explain to me why you would want to buy the Vanilla Reload Cards at Office Depot and then load the value onto this pre-paid Amex Card, as opposed to simply using the Vanilla Reload Card directly and this pre-paid Amex Card directly? Is it just for convenience, to consolidate your funds, or is there some benefit I’m not understanding? Thanks.
@Elle – You are correct. It is simply for convenience so you can load multiple cards at one time and not have to worry about multiple cards in your pocket. Also, this card includes many american express protection benefits.
Thanks a lot, @dealswelike. 😉
[…] 3 per person which means a free $75!! This offer expires June 30th (tomorrow) so do not delay. Read this prior blog post for more […]
[…] FREE $25 American Express Gift Card […]
I ordered 3 yesterday, thanks in advance for the heads up.
no to wait and see if it all works out.
New offer for july $10 for every $50 -https://www.americanexpress.com/us/content/prepaid/american-express-prepaid-card.html
@Lenny – thanks for letting me know!
Any idea when they will start sending out the $25 cards? I signed up for this when the promo first started…still no $25 yet.
@Ozaer – they said up to 6 weeks.
[…] June, American Express was offering a free $25 gift card with every $200 loaded prepaid American Express card. While this was a great promotion for FREE money it is unfortunately over. However, reader Lenny […]
[…] June, American Express was offering a free $25 gift card with every $200 loaded prepaid American Express card. While this was a great promotion for FREE money it is unfortunately over. However, reader Lenny […]
So far ( 7/4) they have only sent me a verification email for one of 3 cards. I ordered that was 7/2.
latest update for my cards.
got the email to confirm my bank account info. ( only for one of 3 cards) but $200 taken out now for each card ($600)
now wait and see when they show up
2 of the 3 $200 prepaid cards arrived in todays mail.
still come computer time needed to complete the accounts.
@Mikey – That s great! I just received the “your cards have been shipped” email today.
All 3 $200 cards here now, waiting for the $25 cards now.
on thing thats a pain , the pin numbers arrive in mail, and no indication which cards they match. ( have to go online to deal with it)
[…] that! Oh, and you are able to order three of them, so that will give you $75 in total! This is the exact same offer that was back in June, so for those of you who missed out, here is your 2nd chance. This current offer end August […]
So far no $25 cards here 8/21
@Mikey – Same here. I ordered on 6/30. Thanks for reminding me to make that phone call.
@Mikey – I just counted the weeks, however, and although I placed the card order on 6/30, I did not actually confirm the small deposit amounts and officially order the card until 7/14. Others have stated that it does take the full 6 weeks, so this weekend will be 6 weeks for me.
Maybe we missed something in the “fine print” that says the orig cards need to be used before the $25 cards are issued.
I was saving my 3 $200 cards to use in thailand next month, and also planned to bring the $25 cards.
Ordered two $200 AMEX cards on 6/28. No $25 cards yet.
@Bill and Mikey – I am in the same boat. I will be calling tomorrow. I will let you know how it goes.
Bill, same here, where do we complain?
I received two $10, NOT $25, AMEX cards today. What a fiasco!
Called AMEX (tel. # on back of card). CSR said because card created after 6/30 AMEX issued a $10 gift card. CSR added the additional $15 due to may prepaid card. It took effect immediately. CSR did the same for my wife’s card.
@Bill – Glad to hear that worked out. I agree, this promo was definitely a fiasco!
What a scam, got 3 $10 cards finally today, not the 3 $25 cards as advertised,
now for the b.s. of calling them.
@Mikey – let me know how that call goes. I haven’t received any so they’ve escalated it to the promotions department.
What a huge waste of time, called in just now, got as far as starting to read the second card number to the agent, and they
disconnected my call.
@Mikey – Oh no! Sorry to hear that. I had luck yesterday, so maybe just a bad agent.
2nd call, got disconnected after hearing the agents name.
3rd call,go the same agent.
Seems “in the fine” print of the application, it only gives one $25 gift card per applicants name, so all we (I) got was the $10 gift card per $200 card.
also, pain in the neck ( much lower actually) is finding out which pin numbers match which card.
total waste of my time IMHO.
Now ( just after mail arrived today) I am totally amazed, got 3 $25 gift cards from amex , so total of $105 in gift cards for my 3 $200 pre paid cards I ordered.
maybe my gripe call got some results.
anyone else luck out?