As you likely already know, Amazon is a huge reputable and successful online company. You’ve probably previously purchased something from Amazon.com and had a great experience.
I’ve
been hesitant to publish an article on Amazon Payments for a while because
there’s already so much information about it available online. But since April just started and I just
finished using Amazon Payments, I thought I would go ahead and detail the process.
Amazon
Payments is a payment system similar to Paypal. You can use Amazon payments to make purchases on Amazon.com
as well as send money to other users and receive money from other users.
If
you want to Paypal someone money with your credit card, there is a 2.9% fee plus
$0.30 per transaction.
There are currently no fees for sending credit card payment (up to $1,000 per month) to other individuals with Amazon Payments.
How is this handy?
Let’s
say your friend lets you borrow $50 to pay for dinner. You could give your friend $50 cash and
not earn any points, or you could Amazon Payments your friend $50 charged on
your rewards credit card and earn some points.
Let’s
say you need to spend an extra amount of money within a certain time period on
the new rewards credit card you signed up for. Many rewards credit cards require spending a certain amount
within a certain amount of time i.e. “spend $3,000 within 3 months to get 50,000
bonus points.” Amazon Payments can
help you achieve that spend.
Sign up for Amazon Payments here: https://payments.amazon.com
In
order to set up an Amazon Payments account, you first sign in with your Amazon
account. You will need to
give Amazon Payments your social security number and date of birth to prevent duplicate
accounts. Many users who have
created multiple accounts have been shut down.
To
fully take advantage of Amazon Payments, you need to link your personal bank
account. This is necessary to
withdrawal money.
Once
you’re setup your account, click Send Money
and then make sure you select
“Goods/Services"
If you select “Cash Advance” your credit card may charge you a cash
advance fee, which varies by credit card companies.
Select payment method as credit card:
Then
confirm your payment. That's it!
When
receiving funds in your Amazon Payments account, you can either keep the funds
in there to purchase something on Amazon.com or you can withdrawal the funds
directly into your linked checking account, which takes a few business days.
You
can also use Amazon Payments to liquidate any Visa gift cards that you
have. All you have to do is first
go to www.vanillavisa.com and register
your Visa gift card online.
Caution:
When
sending money to friends, it may be safer to send money in one direction, ie A
to B. Users who send money from A
to B and then B back to A may find their Amazon Payments account shut
down. Transferring money from A to
B to C and beyond works well in my experience.
I
personally advise taking it slow with Amazon Payments. I
have never been charged any cash advance fees with multiple Chase, American
Express, and Citibank credit cards.
To make sure you don't get charged a cash advance fee, you can send a smaller amount first as a test payment. You can also call your credit card company and tell them to reduce your cash advance limit to $0.
I usually send money in varying amounts such as $975, $765,
etc and not an even $1,000 each time. With Amazon Payments, I quickly earn free points monthly.
You
can read some more information and discussion about Amazon Payments from other sources:
You
can read the Amazon Payments user agreement here.
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