bbobbo

looks like audi dealers in only five states are participating:

FL
Prestige Audi

GA
Gwinnett Audi

MA
Audi of Westwood
Bernardi Audi

NJ
Audi Meadowlands
Ditschman Flemington
Jack Daniels Audi of Paramus
Jack Daniels Audi of Upper Saddle River
OpenRoad.com

NY
Audi Brooklyn
Audi Manhattan

lucky for me, the two in MA are close by. in fact, we just test drove a Q5 at bernardi yesterday. now if one or both participate in the zag program, that would be awesome.

NMW1982

I just called the zag program and they said that dealers are only required to accept $2,000 charge on the Amex card. Anything over $2,000 is at the discretion of the dealer you're working with.

bbobbo

that would make sense if the dealer is only signed up for the zag program, but if it the dealer is also part of this separate program from american express, presumably they would have to abide by the terms of it (otherwise, why would they even bother being part of the program?).

hmn4858

It sounds too good to be true. I've never heard of a dealer letting you put the full amt of the car on a card. Amex must be offering them some type of discount. I wonder if there's something in the fine print stating you have to carry a balance for x months or something. Audi didn't disclose that on their first payment paid for until in the finance dept signing papers.

NMW1982

What separate program from Amex?

bbobbo

the program that i linked to in my post. here it is again:

http://carpurchase.amexnetwork.com/

bbobbo

i'm guessing amex is offering them some sort of break on the transaction fee. it seems like not very many dealers are participating, probably why you've never heard of it.

the only thing in the fine print i can see is that not all cards are eligible to earn rewards, so you have to call to make sure. also, you have to call to make sure your card is eligible for the amount you're going to charge.

i just called amex and they confirmed that i can charge $45k, and that i will earn the full reward (1 point per dollar). if i end up doing this, i'll report back.

hmn4858

Well that's pretty cool if they don't have any hidden gotchas. Would have been awesome to put mine on a card. Oh well. There's always next time.

You also might want to check and make sure they don't treat the purchase like a cash advance and start charging you interest from the moment you charge it.

opus360

Is there an equivalent version for Visa or Mastercard?

Also, if we get more data on which dealer accepts how much, that will be great.

I suggest this format:

Dealership name:
State:
Max Amount:

I am planning to charge the maximum a dealership will allow me (to earn points). At the same time, I don't want to ask a dealership this question since it might weaken my negotiating position.

alatsacto

I would first negotiate on a price first, then tell them you were going to charge the maximum allowed on your credit card. Then try to negotiate, what if I did not use a credit card, can I lower the price even more. Typically for credit card rewards points, you'll probably only get 1% back. For the dealership, they may be losing 3% on the transaction. Maybe there's a happy middle ground for both sides at around 2% off of the amount allowed to charge on the credit card? I don't know, maybe I'm being too "logical" in my thinking. Hahah.