Gaming the Amex BigData system

[QF WP]

An important story to assist in everybody's understanding about being targeted for promos: https://www.traveldatadaily.com/hacking-the-american-express-big-data-system-for-your-advantage/

 

[Dr Ralph]

An important story to assist in everybody's understanding about being targeted for promos: https://www.traveldatadaily.com/hacking-the-american-express-big-data-system-for-your-advantage/

'they are designed to influence your spending behavior, and ensure that Amex is the card you use every time on all transactions.'

Well they failed with me.




Questioning the credibility of the article when it states:

'Amex knows the merchant is the tax office, and can easily work backward to get a ballpark idea of your assessable income.'

It already knows my assessable income. I gave them this information when I applied for their card!


I call bullsh#t on 95% of the content in this fairy tale.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

It already knows my assessable income. I gave them this information when I applied for their card!

Indeed. But people's income often increases over time and many Amex Card-members have had their cards for many years. also some people may have fudged their stated income (yes shock, horror I know...)


Many will also have other forms of income. ie I gain share dividends, but I leave this off my CC applications as I am above the income required and some places will then ask you to substantiate that income despite being well above it.

In addition if say Amex wanted to target people for say its Centurion Card it may well look at such spend patterns, along with other spend.


DISCLAIMER: The article is a USA one and I am not familiar with how their tax system works and how tax is paid.


However how much they would look at that particular source of data I have no idea. But they do mine BigData from a number of sources.

A year ago they had 800 data scientists, and so probably have even more now.

“Big Data is a mindset” concludes Gupta, “we see Big Data as a fundamental driver of the future of American Express”. This is the promise and the ambition of Big Data.
Forbes Welcome


BigData is clearly mined by the banks and Amex including their credit card teams. This can be taken advantage of. ie I have not received Coles Mastercard GC offers in the past apart from the generic ones and so I have just started buying some now with the hope that I will be included in future targeted promotions. If I am it will be dueto the use of BigData.

 

[burmans]

Indeed. But people's income often increases over time and many Amex Card-members have had their cards for many years. also some people may have fudged their stated income (yes shock, horror I know...)


Many will also have other forms of income. ie I gain share dividends, but I leave this off my CC applications as I am above the income required and some places will then ask you to substantiate that income despite being well above it.

In addition if say Amex wanted to target people for say its Centurion Card it may well look at such spend patterns, along with other spend.


DISCLAIMER: The article is a USA one and I am not familiar with how their tax system works and how tax is paid.


However how much they would look at that particular source of data I have no idea. But they do mine BigData from a number of sources.

A year ago they had 800 data scientists, and so probably have even more now.

“Big Data is a mindset” concludes Gupta, “we see Big Data as a fundamental driver of the future of American Express”. This is the promise and the ambition of Big Data.
Forbes Welcome


BigData is clearly mined by the banks and Amex including their credit card teams. This can be taken advantage of. ie I have not received Coles Mastercard GC offers in the past apart from the generic ones and so I have just started buying some now with the hope that I will be included in future targeted promotions. If I am it will be dueto the use of BigData.

In short, don't listen to what the say they do, listen to what they actually do.

 

[QF WP]

'they are designed to influence your spending behavior, and ensure that Amex is the card you use every time on all transactions.'

Well they failed with me.

Its what they try to do, but obviously they fail with some as we have Visa/Amex etc and will use the card tht we perceive the best value. Some gamers of systems (or in this case CC's) are beyond most behavioural nuances.

Questioning the credibility of the article when it states:

'Amex knows the merchant is the tax office, and can easily work backward to get a ballpark idea of your assessable income.'

It already knows my assessable income. I gave them this information when I applied for their card!

Perfect answer here from lovestravellingoz

Indeed. But people's income often increases over time and many Amex Card-members have had their cards for many years. also some people may have fudged their stated income (yes shock, horror I know...)

Many will also have other forms of income. ie I gain share dividends, but I leave this off my CC applications as I am above the income required and some places will then ask you to substantiate that income despite being well above it.

Sometimes too much information gives them a LOT of information about you.

I call bullsh#t on 95% of the content in this fairy tale

As I know the writer of the article, I'd disagree agree with you there Dr Ralph. He's well known to a number of us here.

DISCLAIMER: The article is a USA one and I am not familiar with how their tax system works and how tax is paid.

Incorrect, but I'd be thrilled to know how you arrived at that. Written very generally with a wide audience in mind.

 

[andye]

I presume lovestravellingoz was referring to the forbes article

 

[fairbasa]

An important story to assist in everybody's understanding about being targeted for promos: https://www.traveldatadaily.com/hacking-the-american-express-big-data-system-for-your-advantage/

Having your Toyota serviced by BMW? Really???

 

[Plutonus]

Having your Toyota serviced by BMW? Really???

I agree. If you're going to do it, do it right. Get your Daihatsu serviced at Lamborghini

 

[TomVexille]

Having your Toyota serviced by BMW? Really???

If you're truly serious about gaming big data, it doesn't sound far fetched at all...

 

[serfty]

...
As I know the writer of the article, I'd disagree agree with you there Dr Ralph. He's well known to a number of us here. ...

Indeed. ... the author has been a long term member of this site.

 

[Hammando]

"If you get it right – you’ll start receiving monthly gifts, invitation and a host of other exclusive deals which are reserved for Amex’s best customers."

So has anyone on here received anything like the above from Amex? I haven't heard of it before.

I've received "invitations" for events but they were invitations to buy tickets to events.

I spent a lot and receive what I believe to be the maximum number of points Amex offer on customer retentions when I call every year when the annual fee is due. I have also received an invitation to apply for a Centurion card but no freebies.

You'd want to get some decent offers to pay your taxes wit

 

[lovetravellingoz]

In short, don't listen to what the say they do, listen to what they actually do.

Indeed.

But even though I am an engineer and not a Data Analyst I do have a little idea of what occurs as I been involved with marketing for two decades, have a wife who is a Data Manager at large Telco and a daughter who for 12 months while working for a Top Tier Services company just spent a year heading a group of Israeli Hackers to test all the systems of a Top 4 Aussie Bank.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Incorrect, but I'd be thrilled to know how you arrived at that. Written very generally with a wide audience in mind.

No offence intended, but I thought that it included the USA market and as I know that their tax system is quite different in many, many ways, I was just pointing out to AFF readers that I did not have specific knowledge of it.

Perhaps I should have picked up better on the Toyota/BMW reference

 

[Happy Dude]

"If you get it right – you’ll start receiving monthly gifts, invitation and a host of other exclusive deals which are reserved for Amex’s best customers."

So has anyone on here received anything like the above from Amex? I haven't heard of it before.

Seems odd that examples of what's been bagged wasn't in the article.

I might send an AmEx card up to a shop assistant I know in Noosa. They'll think I'm rich and give me free stuff, right?

 

[fairbasa]

If you're truly serious about gaming big data, it doesn't sound far fetched at all...

No doubt - but to what end? It means you would:
- Potentially be paying for services otherwise included under warranty (if vehicle is still under warranty)
- Be paying significantly more for the service (It's BMW)
- Have maintainers with limited knowledge of that vehicle type and its flaws
- Likely be paying significantly more for parts as well as longer lead times to receive them as they're not carried by that shop
- Make potential buyers scratch their head when they open the service books

I understand the idea of gaming big data - I just think this was a far-fetched example.

 

[unfunkable]

Can you just buy a minimal item from BMW...ask what their cheapest product is and buy it...

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Can you just buy a minimal item from BMW...ask what their cheapest product is and buy it...

To know, one would have to know what rules etc Amex has in place. And unfortunately these days the rules (using multiple data sources and not just Amex ones) and machine learning they can set up can be very complex making it more difficult to game.

I suspect that better use of BigData has made it harder to game. Up until a couple years ago when Amex was mainly running points promos rather cashbacks, I had a good record of being in most of the good promos.

The Woolworths Everyday Rewards was easy to game and while it ran I averaged over 5QFF points per $ spent (plus credit card earn on top). The new version has been harder, but I am now back to earning some form of points bonus on almost every shop.

 

[ap_member]

I would've thought your eligibility for being treated as a high end American Express customer would be based on your annual spend. I'd love to hear from someone who has tried these little tricks to see whether they've actually had any significant benefit. Wouldn't using a VPN every other day just confuse their fraud algorithm? Interesting ideas nonetheless and it is an important reminder that companies are collecting a lot of data about us, for better or worse.

 

[Happy Dude]

There must be more than a few members here that, like the authors wife, actually travel OS a lot on the company dime and then use their own card. Haven't seen too many stories here about these fabulous freebies.

The idea that spending money in posh stores/suburbs, perhaps needlessly, is hardly financially sensible, and to get what? A $5k/yr card that is aimed at a high-end frequent traveller, which the author states he isn't? Spending more money just to own a card that isn't particularly coveted by the frequent travellers on this site (here and here) doesn't sound like a good prize at all.

As for paying tax, there's 700-odd pages here about not using your AmEx to do that. If it were a good idea, there'd be that many pages again. Plus, if you're wealthy/silly enough to not care about the surcharge, or not savvy enough to seek a better points earn, you probably care little for whatever monthly gift AmEx might fling you.

While I don't doubt that bigdata is a thing or whatever, gaming the AmEx system seems more than a little pointless, requires a fair amount of effort and with potentially no reward at all. None of it is guaranteed to work, right? Item 5 is very interesting though, in a tinfoil hat kinda way.

 

[trippin_the_rift]

To know, one would have to know what rules etc Amex has in place. And unfortunately these days the rules (using multiple data sources and not just Amex ones) and machine learning they can set up can be very complex making it more difficult to game.

I suspect that better use of BigData has made it harder to game. Up until a couple years ago when Amex was mainly running points promos rather cashbacks, I had a good record of being in most of the good promos.

The Woolworths Everyday Rewards was easy to game and while it ran I averaged over 5QFF points per $ spent (plus credit card earn on top). The new version has been harder, but I am now back to earning some form of points bonus on almost every shop.

Most ML predictive models are pattern recognition based, looking for similar features in the dataset. This is especially the case with supervised ML. Amex is the new Santa ... they know when you're sleeping and know when you're awake.

An important story to assist in everybody's understanding about being targeted for promos: https://www.traveldatadaily.com/hacking-the-american-express-big-data-system-for-your-advantage/

Excellent reading, thanks for sharing QF WP!

For anyone interested, here's an introduction to Amex Australia and data services; https://mumbrella.com.au/white-rabbit-project-ins-outs-netflix-production-414523