tracking bce $6,000 grocery spend

[Andypanda]

Can I track my grocery spend on the amex site/app to see if i even get close to the limit, or if it is worth me at sometime pc to the bcp, or do I just need to create a spreadsheet?

[Anonymous]

Yeah ... it's not exactly straightforward cause as far as i know you can't sort by reward category but you can identify which merchants code as groceries and sort by merchant and add them up.

If you re willing to go as far as to create a spreadsheet to check your spend doing a little more work to get it doesn't seem unreasonable to me.

[Anonymous]

This is with BCP, but I would imagine the BCE interface should be similar.

If you click "View Reward Details", it will bring up a chart with rewards earned year to date in each category. Just divide your grocery rewards by 0.03. That will give you your ytd spend, but keep in mind that this will probably be a month behind due to the way Amex delays rewards being credited.

EDIT: The break even point on BCE/BCP is closer to the $3000 mark. That would be where you have covered the annual fee, and start to see a greater return using the BCP.

[bergrides]

Best way is to create a spreadhseet, which also allows you to make sure you agree with what AMEX has.  Aside from the web site, you can call them and they can tell you what your grocery spend is for the year.  I have not found a good way with the site to find the spend.

One thing to note:  Grocery spend is from Jan 1 to Dec 31 each year - it doesn't start with your account start date.

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[Anonymous]

goto statement and activities

select year to date from drop down

click the merchanidise and supplies part of the pie

you should then see how much is grocery

(ps, shockingly, I am spending less on grocery than I thought, more reason that amex airline fee credit change may negatively impact its value for me)

[calyx]

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@bergrides wrote:

Best way is to create a spreadhseet, which also allows you to make sure you agree with what AMEX has.  Aside from the web site, you can call them and they can tell you what your grocery spend is for the year.  I have not found a good way with the site to find the spend.

One thing to note:  Grocery spend is from Jan 1 to Dec 31 each year - it doesn't start with your account start date.

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Thanks for the tip, that will help me because my grocery spend is over 6k, and I didn't get open my account until May, so I don't need to sweat the spend this year.

[bergrides]

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@calyx wrote:

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@bergrides wrote:

Best way is to create a spreadhseet, which also allows you to make sure you agree with what AMEX has.  Aside from the web site, you can call them and they can tell you what your grocery spend is for the year.  I have not found a good way with the site to find the spend.

One thing to note:  Grocery spend is from Jan 1 to Dec 31 each year - it doesn't start with your account start date.

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Thanks for the tip, that will help me because my grocery spend is over 6k, and I didn't get open my account until May, so I don't need to sweat the spend this year.

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I didn't realize this until I talked to customer service.  I opened my BCP in Nov 2018 and thought it was from Nov to Nov

[bergrides]

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@Anonymous wrote:

goto statement and activities

select year to date from drop down

click the merchanidise and supplies part of the pie

you should then see how much is grocery

(ps, shockingly, I am spending less on grocery than I thought, more reason that amex airline fee credit change may negatively impact its value for me)

FortifiedHM - This will show you everything in the Grocery classification, but that includes grocery items that do not count against the Grocery reward, and therefore don't go against the 6K limit.  For instance mine shows the meat market and wine store I go to,which doesn't count. 

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[Anonymous]

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@bergrides wrote:

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@calyx wrote:

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@bergrides wrote:

Best way is to create a spreadhseet, which also allows you to make sure you agree with what AMEX has.  Aside from the web site, you can call them and they can tell you what your grocery spend is for the year.  I have not found a good way with the site to find the spend.

One thing to note:  Grocery spend is from Jan 1 to Dec 31 each year - it doesn't start with your account start date.

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Thanks for the tip, that will help me because my grocery spend is over 6k, and I didn't get open my account until May, so I don't need to sweat the spend this year.

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I didn't realize this until I talked to customer service.  I opened my BCP in Nov 2018 and thought it was from Nov to Nov

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If I am not mistaken, the $6000 is calculated per calendar year. I don't think it goes by your card date anymore, so ytd is the number you want to look at.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

goto statement and activities

select year to date from drop down

click the merchanidise and supplies part of the pie

you should then see how much is grocery

(ps, shockingly, I am spending less on grocery than I thought, more reason that amex airline fee credit change may negatively impact its value for me)

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Everyone finds out that they shockingly spend less in the grocery category and are earning less rewards than they assumed because AMEX only assigns the 6% to grocery categorized as supermarket, which tends to be relatively narrow and higher priced to begin with. I downgraded after my first year once I saw how pathetic the return was. YMMV. Here's the example list: https://www.americanexpress.com/us/rewards-info/retail.html

To be fair to AMEX, they specifically state supermarket in all of their advertising and people just seem to extrapolate that to 'grocery'.