Amex India is shutting down Reward Multiplier on 30 September, and the deadline is the night before

This one comes from American Express itself, not from an aggregator. The notice sits at the top of the company's own Reward Multiplier page on americanexpress.com/in, and it reads:

"Effective 30 September' 2026, the Reward Multiplier program, through which you earn accelerated Membership Rewards® points on purchases with select brands and through the e-voucher platform, ShopWise, will be discontinued."

Reward Multiplier is the portal Indian Amex holders route brand purchases through to earn several times the normal Membership Rewards rate. Amex's own page advertises the headline as 10X on Centurion and 5X on Platinum. The partner list it displays includes Apple, Forest Essentials, Nykaa, MakeMyTrip, Tanishq, Myntra, Lenovo and Ajio.

After 30 September, that route is gone.

The deadline is not the 30th

Two independent write-ups, Live From A Lounge and Business Today, give the same cutoff, and it is a day earlier than the headline date:

Both sources make the same point about what "eligible" means, and it is the part worth reading twice. The transaction has to be fully completed by the cutoff, not merely started. A booking placed on the 29th that settles on the 30th is a booking that earns the base rate. If you were holding a large purchase for this, the safe move is to finish it several days early rather than on the last evening.

Points already earned are not affected. Amex's notice states that points on eligible purchases up to the cutoff are credited under the programme's existing terms.

What actually survives

The issuer's sentence reads as though ShopWise dies with the programme, because ShopWise is named inside the definition of what is being discontinued. It does not. Amex's rewards page clarifies it in the next breath:

"you can continue to earn accelerated Membership Rewards® points on eligible purchases through ShopWise, an independent platform offering e-vouchers from 200+ brands across shopping, dining, and travel."

So the correct reading is: the Reward Multiplier wrapper closes, and ShopWise continues as a platform of its own. Live From A Lounge, Business Today and Card Insider all give the surviving ShopWise rate as 5X across 200-plus brands. The issuer notice itself says "accelerated" without attaching a figure to the post-change ShopWise, so treat 5X as the outlets' number rather than as an issuer-stated one.

The practical difference is real. ShopWise sells e-vouchers. Reward Multiplier let you buy the thing directly from the brand and still earn the bonus. If a brand you use has no ShopWise voucher, or its voucher denominations do not fit your purchase, the accelerated rate on that brand is simply gone rather than relocated.

This is Amex India's third change of the year

Look at the sequence rather than the individual notice:

• The Etihad Guest transfer partnership was wound down in mid-2026, taking a redemption route off the table.
• The Platinum Travel Credit Card was revised effective 10 September 2026, with milestone rewards cut and lounge access reworked.
• Reward Multiplier closes on 30 September 2026.

None of these touches the Membership Rewards earn rate on the card itself, which is exactly how the industry has been running devaluations all year. The rate on the card stays where the marketing page says it is. What disappears is a way of using it. Amex is presenting this as a programme update rather than a devaluation of Membership Rewards, and on a narrow reading that is accurate. On the reading that matters to a cardholder, the number of points a given rupee of spend produces just fell for anyone who was routing through the portal.

What to do before the 29th

Finish anything you were saving for the portal, with days to spare. The completion rule means a pending order is not a completed one.

Check whether your regular brands exist on ShopWise, and in what denominations. That check is the difference between "the bonus moved" and "the bonus ended" for your particular spending.

Reprice the card once the portal is gone. If a meaningful share of your Membership Rewards came through Reward Multiplier, the card's real return for you is not what it was in August, and the annual fee is unchanged.

Polo Match ranks cards on net annual value against how you actually spend, so you can see what an Amex still returns once a bonus route closes. If you are sitting on a Membership Rewards balance and wondering where it goes furthest, the transfer partner matrix lists the routes we have a sourced ratio for and says plainly which ones we do not.