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American Express Shop Small adds a little money-saving sparkle to the most wonderful time of the year. Christmas shopping and socialising just feels even more fun somehow when you’re effectively only paying half price for a lot of it!

For those of you not already familiar with ‘Shop Small’, it’s an annual promotion sponsored by American Express that gives cardholders a £5.00 statement credit back whenever they spend £10.00 or more at a participating business.

You can only get one credit back per card, per merchant, but if you have a few Amex cards (and most people reading this probably do) and are prepared to hop around a bit, you can save a small fortune on festive drinks and stocking fillers alone.

This year, Shop Small is running between 1st-16th December (inclusive) – so you can get saving right now!

To register your cards for the promotion, simply login to your account, click on “offers” and then “save to card”.

Amex has produced a map showing participating merchants, but it’s a little buggy (as usual), so patience may be required when using it.

The terms state tha the “offer excludes orders made on finance, gift cards and vouchers”, but in reality I don’t see how Amex could differentiate between buying a gift card compared to any other purchase. YMMV, but giftcards should be fine, in practice.

Conclusion

Saving a few fivers might not sound that exciting, but with a bit of planning you can do a lot better than that. I also quite enjoy the ‘game’ element of planning the best way to make the most of Shop Small.

Shop Small gets you to take a look at places you might not otherwise even know existed, and a pub/bar/restaurant crawl with a few good friends/family also ‘playing’ along can be a really fun and (relatively) inexpensive way to catch-up during the runup to Christmas.

Are you enjoying ‘Shop Small’ this year?

Terms

• Offer only available at participating locations.
• To view participating Shop Small locations please visit: https://www.americanexpress.com/en-GB/maps. Eligible locations will be highlighted with a Shop Small logo.
• Offer only applies to spend made in Great British Pound (GBP) on the Card to which the offer is saved, including an American Express Card loaded into a mobile payment wallet.
• Offer does not apply to spend on other Cards you might hold and is only valid for transactions made at small businesses that are eligible to participate in Shop Small. Please see Shop Small map for eligible merchants.
• Only one £5 statement credit per UK Card per merchant.
• A rewarded credit may be reversed if qualifying transaction is refunded or cancelled.
• Offer only available to Cardmembers who save the offer to their Card.
• Credit should appear on your billing statement within 5 days from qualifying spend. If you do not receive your credit within 30 days from 16 December 2018, please contact our customer service team online or by calling the number on the back of your Card.
• Offer excludes Lloyds Bank, Corporate and Pre-Paid Cards.
• Offer excludes orders made on finance, gift cards and vouchers.
• For lodging, travel or car rental you must book and pay within the offer period to receive the statement credit.
• Offer is only intended for the targeted recipient of this offer.
• Spend must be billed to your Card account by 16 December 2018 to be eligible for this offer. If eligible merchant does not charge your Card during this period, you may not be eligible for this offer.
• American Express reserves the right, at its sole discretion, without notice, to remove any individual from the offer or reverse any credits issued for individuals suspected of fraud, gaming, dishonesty, deceit, misconduct or similar action in relation to the offer.
• The services a participating Shop Small merchant will offer to American Express Cardmembers are not expressly endorsed or recommended by American Express.
• For full Offer Terms and more details about statement credits click here.
• By saving the offer to your Card, you agree to the Offer Terms.