Quick question about co-branded terminology

[aftermath]

This one is issued directly by American Express:

 

This one is issued by Bank of America and uses the Amex network:

Which one is a CO-BRANDED and what is the other one called?

[john398]

Cobranded is the hilton honors, and I beleve the other one would be called Non-proprietary card

[aftermath]

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@john398 wrote:

Cobranded is the hilton honors, and I beleve the other one would be called Non-proprietary card

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Close, but I remember someone calling it by something else when they were exlaining the difference between the two.

[john398]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Express#Non-proprietary_cards

I was looking here

[DI]

Co-branded is the BOA AMEX card.

[aftermath]

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@DI wrote:

Co-branded is the BOA AMEX card.

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So what's the other one called?

[Walt_K]

They're both co-branded.  But on this site, when people are talking about co-branded Amex cards, they are often talking about cards not issued by Amex, so they would generally be referring to the BofA Amex.  But a Hilton or Starwood Amex is no less co-branded.  They both bear two different brands.  You could even say that something like a Chase United Visa is tri-branded. 

That would be how I would view it.  And I think it is consistent with this view of co-branding from Mastercard's perspective: http://www.mastercard.com/us/merchant/solutions/co-branded_cards.html

[DI]

To me, any card the bears the name of a bank that didn't issue the card is a co-brand card.  For example, the BOA AMEX bears the name of AMEX, but the card wasn't issued by AMEX.   That always been my understanding of co-branded cards.  I could be wrong. 

[Anonymous]

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@DI wrote:

To me, any card the bears the name of a bank that didn't issue the card is a co-brand card.  For example, the BOA AMEX bears the name of AMEX, but the card wasn't issued by AMEX.   That always been my understanding of co-branded cards.  I could be wrong. 

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You are wrong.

Cobranded does not involve issuing bank.   The combination of a Network and Retail is co-branded.

In the first example

Hilton  and AMEX(the network) are the brands

The second card

is an AMEX card issued by BofA.

[Anonymous]

From the glossary at http://www.creditcards.com/glossary/term-cobranded-card.php:

"Co-branded card

A co-branded credit card is sponsored by two parties. Typically one is a retailer -- such as a department store, gas retailer or airline. The other is a bank or card network such as Visa, MasterCard, Discover or American Express. With co-branded credit cards, cardholders may get merchandise discounts or rewards points when they buy from the sponsoring merchant, but can also use the cards any other retailer that takes cards from the bank or card network."

So, the Hilton Honors hotel branded credit card would definitely fall under this category.

I'm not sure how to categorize the BoA card, because if it is considered cobranded, then ALL cards would be. A Citi MasterCard. A Chase Visa. etc... And I don't believe that this is the intent behind the term "co-branded." In the case of the BoA AMEX, Band of America is the issuing bank and the card runs on the AMEX network.