Thread: FIA B of A "American Express"

I just opened a Fidelity "American Express" card offered by FIA Card Services, which as most people know is Bank of America. It pays 2% cashback on everything with no cap. Based on my spending last year I'll make well over $500 a year from this. The money will be transferred to my Roth IRA at Fidelity, and card balance, etc. is retrievable from Fidelity's site as well.

The only Amex thing about this Amex card seems to be the fact that it uses the Amex network. I'm wondering if I get all the Amex benefits. I can't manage the account on Amex website (I have a Blue Cash card, btw). The web interface is through an FIA site that is the same as I remember having for an old MBNA card (MBNA was acquired by B of A a while back). I'm not wild about dealing with B of A, but the 2% is too good to pass up.

Does anyone know anything more about the Fidelity Amex?

I have been using a Chase Freedom card and getting about 1.8% cashback, give or take, based on my own calculation. Also based on my estimates, Blue Cash would be slightly less lucrative for me than Chase Freedom because I hardly spend anything on gas or drugstores and a fairly modest amount at grocery stores (wish they paid 5% on restaurants).

That's interesting. I was wondering why the Fidelity card is on the Amex network while offered by B of A/FIA. B of A/FIA also offers the Schwab credit card, which has the same benefits as the Fidelity, but it's a MasterCard, if I remember correctly. I had gotten the Schwab card before I learned that Fidelity had a similar deal. My investments are at Fidelity so it just made more sense for me to go with that one. However, the wider acceptance of MasterCard would mean I wouldn't have to carry a backup visa/mc to the Amex in my wallet (Slimmy wallet, google it; you'll be glad you did).

for Fidelity Amex. For the "Retirement Rewards" card, the money has to go into a retirement brokerage/roth, etc. account. However, they have a lookalike card that puts the 2% into a straight brokerage account. Terms look identical for either. FIA doing same thing with Schwab, but it's a MC or Visa.

Worth noting on the retirement rewards... I set mine up to go into a Roth (which is for after-tax contrib.) rather than a traditional IRA, which allows deferral of tax on contribution amount depending on income. I figure the rewards amount from cc is not reported to IRS, so why defer tax on something that isn't going to be taxed anyway. Might be important for those who want to max out traditional IRA at greatest tax efficiency. Anyone else have thots on this?

Be careful with the tax reporting. Double check that to make sure they're not reporting it. I opened a B of A checking account with a signup promo about five years ago. They gave me a $50 gift card for opening the account. Almost a year later during tax time they sent me tax papera for the $50 and had reported it as income to the IRS.

Remember these banks are out to protect their butts, not yours. They would rather play it safe and report this kind of stuff than face penalties for not reporting.

I think I can remember once getting a note that reward cash was reported, so I declared it. But more often than not I've gotten no form, so I've not reported.