What is American Express?
An American Express card, also called “AmEx,” is an electronic payment card. It is created by the publicly-traded financial services company American Express (AXP).
AXP issues and processes prepaid, charge, and credit cards. American Express cards are available to individuals, small businesses, and corporate consumers in the U.S. and around the world. Here are the three most important facts about American Express card:
- American Express credit and charged cards are issued by American Express (a publicly-traded financial services company).
- An American Express card, also known as AmEx, provides its users with a wide range of benefits. For example, rewards points, cashback, and travel perks.
- Unlike Visa and MasterCard, American Express both runs a network and issued cards.
Understanding American Express Cards
American Express cards are issued by American Express. They are processed on the American Express network as well. That is very rare as just a few companies in the industry that can both issue and process electronic payment cards. American Express runs its own processing network. It now competes with MasterCard (MA) and Visa (V). However, its main competitor is Discover Financial Services (DFS). That is due to a fact that Discover also offers both credit card lending and a processing service network. With multi-product capabilities, American Express earns its revenue from both issuing credit cards and processing transaction services.
Accepted in over 130 countries, with over 100 million cards in use, the American Express payment method is a secure and fast credit card payment method. According to the data, Amex cardholders spend to four times as much as Visa and Mastercard cardholders. That what makes American Express one of the most desirable payment methods on the market. Here are the core benefits of offering Amex on your website/e-store:
- A wide range of supported currencies;
- 24/7 service and support from Amex;
- SafeKey 3D Secure protection.
Special Considerations
The greatest part of American Express revenue comes from transaction processing. A lot of merchants from all over the globe accept American Express cards. To do so, they are obligated to pay the transactional fee. Merchants pay per transaction fee to American Express for its processing network services which are part of the comprehensive fees involved with a single transaction.
Types of American Express Cards
As for today, American Express offers prepaid debit cards and credit cards. They are available to a variety of businesses and individuals globally. American Express is a leading provider of charge cards (those with credit balances that must be paid off every other month)
