How to transfer Amex MR points to a family member before closing account?

Hi all,

With Amex increasing their referral bonus points offerings it is now time for us to act!

I have a Platinum Edge and my wife has just completed the 18 month waiting period. I am going to refer her for the Amex explorer, which I believe is MR gateway points.

Plan is for my wife to sign up, meet the minimum spend, transfer the points to me (either directly or indirectly), and then close the account and start the 18 month waiting period again.
We also collect QFF points, and love the ability to be able to ‘family transfer’ them.
I remember reading somewhere on this site about Amex points not being able to be transferred between family members…
Does anyone know of a way to get around this?

Thank you.

A Google search brings up a form you have to fill out which specifically says that you can transfer to your “family or friend”. It also mentions a 50,000 point-per-year limit. The problem is, there’s no date on the form so there’s no way of knowing whether the information on it is up-t0-date or not.

The AmEx live chat feature is pretty good and is available 24/7 (or you could call them). With the greatest respect to the esteemed members of the Point Hacks community, maybe you’ll get a faster and more accurate answer if you simply contact AmEx and ask about family gifting (and the 50,000 point annual limit)? You could then let us all know the answer!

If those limitations do apply, you’ll have to get around them by either transferring the points into a FF account that, like Qantas, can do family transfers, or by simply transferring points from both your accounts into a single FF account.

I’d be interested to hear how you go!

It is a bit of an effort but depending where you ultimately want the points you can transfer them to velocity (during a bonus points promotion ) then transfer them to your velocity using family pooling.   This would allow the transfer into your name for Krisflyer or velocity.