Best American Express Casinos Online
About American Express
When it comes to online casinos, many of them accept Amex cards as one of their payment methods. The American Express network offers a more robust platform for secure transactions. Most online casinos that accept this payment method offer attractive sign-up bonuses and wider selections of games for their players.
Despite the reputation it enjoys, you won’t get to hear American Express in the world of online casinos often. This is mainly because a large number of players use either Visa or Mastercard as their preferred payment method.
Founded in 1850, American Express started its operations in Buffalo, New York, as an express mail business. It was the result of a merger of the express companies of William G. Fargo, Henry Wells, and John Warren Butterfield. The first headquarters of the company was established in a building located at the intersection of Hudson Street and Jay Street.
Through affiliations with other express companies, American Express extended its reach across the United States. In 1857, it ventured into financial services by starting a money order business. During the late 19th century, J.C. Fargo, the president of the company, took a trip to Europe. He found it difficult to obtain cash anywhere despite carrying the traditional letters of credit with him.
He could only get cash in the major cities. He returned to the United States frustrated and angry. He approached the American inventor Marcellus Flemming Berry and asked him to come up with a better alternative to the letter of credit.
Thus, the American Express Traveler’s Cheque was introduced in 1891. Today, the company has millions of cards in use with an average spending of over $20,390 annually. The current chairman and CEO of the company is Stephen J Squeri.
In a recent press release, Squeri had hinted at the company’s plans to revamp the American Express Platinum card. According to him, this will give cardholders a great deal of enhancements. During these times of evolving needs, such additions will add value for the Platinum cardholders.
Pros and Cons of using Amex in online casinos
Online casinos have been accepting American Express as one of their payment methods since they first started in the 1990s. In recent times, most casinos that accept cards include Amex as one of their payment methods. However, you need to be aware of the pros and cons.
Pros:
- You can make faster deposits in your casino account with Amex cards
- Transactions made on your casino website using these cards are highly secure
- American Express offers their cardholders some attractive rewards and cashbacks
- You can get higher transfer limits than the cards of other brands
Cons:
- It is not so popular with online casino players today
- The transaction fees are higher than the other cards
- It may take up to 5 days to receive your withdrawal amount
How Amex compares to other payment methods?
Players across the world have varying preferences and not many of them choose to pay via Amex cards. They generally prefer Visa and Mastercard or any of the other payment methods such as bank wire transfers and e-wallets like PayPal, Skrill, and Neosurf. Since the different types of cryptocurrencies are also becoming popular among the players, many casinos include them among their payment methods as well.
Nevertheless, American Express is still a premium option for payments in online casinos. In case of card payments, Visa and Mastercard enjoy a wider acceptance, but they are not accepted by most casinos for withdrawals. Players using e-wallets can enjoy instant deposits and withdrawals, but they can be subject to higher transaction fees.
Cryptocurrencies are currently accepted by a few casinos, but they allow players to remain anonymous and also facilitate instant transactions. When compared with all these payment methods, American Express is not so popular. You can certainly make instant deposits, but withdrawals won’t be allowed in all the online casinos.
Card Fees
When you’re playing with real money in online casinos, transaction fees is an important aspect to consider. Losing a considerable portion of your payout in fees and charges would surely disappoint any player. So, it’s essential that you look out for an online casino that has exclusive offers for Amex cardholders. Even if you’re given certain privileges by such casinos, you’ll still be charged a certain amount of fees.
Usually, the withdrawals carry a fee of 3 percent, while cash advances are subject to 5 percent. Although the fees charged by American Express might seem higher, the company compensates for it by offering you higher transaction limits.
How to use American Express cards for casino deposits
American Express offers a safe and secure way of making deposits in your online casino account. The first step in this process would be to choose a reliable casino that allows deposits using Amex cards. Once you’ve chosen the right online casino, sign up on the website and navigate to the deposits page. Once you’re on this page, you’ll find a list of payment options.
While going through them, you can easily spot the globally renowned American Express logo. Select this option and enter your card number, expiry date, and security code in the fields provided. You can then choose whether to save your card details for future deposits or not.
Next, decide the amount you wish to deposit into your casino account. You might also find an option to key in the bonus code if you have one. When this is done, click the submit button and authorize the transaction with a unique code. This will confirm the deposit with your chosen online casino.
How to use Amex cards for withdrawals
If the online casino allows you to withdraw your winnings using your Amex card, you can cash out the amount just as instantly as your deposits. Head to the casino’s withdrawal page, choose the amount you want to withdraw and select ‘American Express’ as the option for withdrawing your winning amount. You’ll be required to confirm your identity and that fact that you’re the cardholder.
The online casino will further ask you to provide the copy of a recent statement or any other document as a proof. Once this process is complete, it will take about 3 to 5 business days to receive the amount in your bank account. The exact number of days would depend greatly on the online casino you’ve chosen.
How secure is American Express?
One of the benefits of using American Express as your preferred payment method is that you can be assured of the safety of your personal information. The stringent privacy policies of the company apply to online casino transactions as well. Amex uses the latest encryption technologies to make sure that your transactions are highly secure.
The encryptions are done using the Verisign Secure Socket Layer 128-bit encryption protocol. Any unauthorized individual won’t be able to access the data on the server. Besides, the company’s system also uses advanced fraud detection technology and prevents online attacks with malware protection.
Two-factor authentication is done to prevent unauthorized access. The sessions get timed out automatically after 10 minutes of being inactive. Players can also choose Face ID and fingerprint recognition for additional security of their account.