Recall that with the American Express Everyday Preferred Card you earn 3X Membership Rewards points and with the Everyday Card, you earn 2X Membership Rewards points per $1 spent at supermarkets.
HOWEVER, these bonus points that you earn at supermarkets are on up to $6,000 per year in purchases. After you spend $6,000 in a given year, you only earn 1X Membership per $1 spent at supermarkets.
If you have another card that you would rather use to spend at supermarkets after you hit this $6,000 threshold, then you need to keep track of your supermarket purchases. Unfortunately, nowhere on your statement nor on your account online, does it give you a running tab of your supermarket spend. So how can you keep track?
1. Actually keep track. That is figure out from your statements how much you are spending on groceries and keep a running tab. If you are only using your card for groceries, it will be simple. But if you are using your card for other purchases (maybe gas too?), it could be tedious and annoying.
2. Periodically call Amex and ask them how much you have spent at supermarkets year to date. This is what I do. When I know I am getting close, I will start to keep track per food shop. I hate going over the spend cap.
A few more things…
First, with the Preferred card you earn 2X Membership Rewards on gas purchases as well. There is no annual spend cap on these gas purchases, so keep using the card gas if you already do.
Second, personally, when I hit the $6,000, I will retire my American Express Everyday Preferred Card for groceries in lieu of another card (maybe my Barclaycard Arrival Plus World Elite MasterCard, where I earn 2x miles on all purchases).
Third, recall that when I got my American Express Everyday Preferred card, I canceled my American Express Premier Rewards card (the card I used to use for 2X per $1 on groceries). Upon choosing the Everyday card over the Premier Rewards card, I did a calculation and figured that I still would earn more points with the Amex Everyday Preferred, even with the $6,000 spend cap. Below is that predicted calculation.
Supermarkets- the 3x bonus with the Everyday card is capped at $6,ooo (after $6,000 your earn 1x points at supermarkets), the Premier Rewards Gold card has a 2x bonus but there is no cap. So for example, I think that I spend about $200 per week at grocery stores (including fresh direct) or about $10,400 per year. With my current Premier Rewards Gold Card, I earn 20,800 Membership Rewards points on these purchases. With the Everyday Preferred card, I will earn 22,400 (18,000+ 4400). I will earn 2,400 more points with the Everyday card.
It is now almost the end of August, and it looks like my predicted calculation is holding true. (I just called Amex and got my annual grocery spend thus far). 🙂