Bank of Ireland, (Centurion Card Services Ltd) has had an agreement with American Express (American Express Services Europe Ltd) since late 1996 which allows BOI to issue cards in Ireland under the AmEx Brand. It will be recalled that some 10 years after the agreement we published a quotable paragraph
“American Express is, to put it simply the Pepsi of the credit card world, viz a familiar name but always a second choice. Lets examine why. Who is responsible?”
At that time we concluded that, in Ireland at least, Bank of Ireland was failing to promote AmEx. Now, just over a year later we have re-examined the situation and can update our report.
Lets start with a new quotable paragraph
American Express is getting the Diners Club treatment, viz the logo and name are familiar but the only place they are seen is on the peeling window decals of closed restaurants of the service charge/dress code variety, the former haunts of the gray flannel suit businessman
But now back to our business. Bank of Ireland have redesigned their website, and all references to the American Express Blue Credit Card have been removed. It appears that the link between BOI and AmEx has been severed, although AmEx don’t realise it yet!
American Express themselves now offer their range of charge cards (Green, Gold, Platinum) direct to the Irish personal customer. Indeed, AmEx are actively advertising on under “American Express” geo-limited to the Irish market. So AmEx are keen to promote their charge cards, but what about the Blue American Express Credit Card?
Well, AmEx still think that Bank of Ireland are suppying it and link to the root of the bankofireland.ie domain. But as we said there is now no information on the BOI website. To test if BOI are still issuing the card we sent three members of the Ambrand Dot Com to three BOI branches. Each returned with no application forms. We did not bother contacting Centurion Card Services Ltd as last year they said “we do not issue application forms from this office”, we then contacted Bank of Ireland Card Services but to date we have received no reply.
Stepping back for a moment, In many ways the Blue American Express Credit Card was a product ahead of its time in the Irish market, it was almost too good to be true. If offered 1% cashback in a credit card market that had not seen that before, the only other free offerings are from Tesco, Pigsback and so on which only provide gimicky gift points. I imagine the 1% cashback cost too much for BOI, and they made a financial decision to slowly strangle the product, firstly by not advertising it, then making the application form almost impossible to get, refusing applications without giving reasons, and finally by removing it from their website.
I wonder does AmEx know what went on? Do they care? Perhaps the Irish market is so small its success or failure it just pocket change, or perhaps AmEx is now such a large corporation that credit and charge cards worldwide are pocket change and they profit in other diverse areas.
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