Marijuana Purchases in Southern California Cut Off by American Express?
Yes stoners, leave home without it.
American Express Should Bruins be offended that there's a Trojan on this bitch?
Turns out the popular practice of using mom's gold card to pay for that Acapulco gold is no longer possible, at least not if that card is issued by American Express.
LA Snark via our friends at OC Weekly broadcast the report that Amex is pulling the plug on weed procurements. We have a call into the kind (not kine) folks at American Express to see if we can confirm it.
[Added]: An Amex spokesperson confirmed it to the Weekly, stating:
American Express has made a decision to not allow card acceptance for medical marijuana. It is our policy to adhere to the federal law in such matters.
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Reports indicate the policy in nationwide and would thus affect the more than dozen states where you can buy pot legally.
No explanation for the policy was given, but we can dream one up: Many Amex cards are corporate-issue. Meaning your boss gets to see what you've been using your gold for, and the company might even be paying for it (depends).
This would be a platinum-level purchase.
So, yeah, we can imagine Amex getting complaints from corporate suits about unauthorized purchases of eighth ounces of "Chuck Norris" from a place called Compassionate Herbal Remedies On Nordhoff (CHRON -- we made that up).
Looks like Visa and Mastercard are still everywhere you wanna be. It would suck if they weren't, as so many folks' debit cards are tied to Visa, at least.
Look on the bright side, though: You can still get hookers, porn and alcohol with your Amex card. Just don't tell the boss.
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