16
eNPS Score
Q&A With American Express Employees
Get ideas for team-building activities and creative brainstorming sessions to help fuel collaboration and fun among your staff.
How employees describe working at American Express
I love my job at American Express. The leaders I support are empathetic and truly value their teams. The company offers great benefits, generous paid time off, and flexibility to work from away. Overall, it’s a supportive and rewarding place to wor
Valued, customer focused, responsive to feedback, always evolving.
AmEx nature and structure allow, even invite, with what is in my opinion likely more positive result than with other financial companies, my explanation to the Company of certain unusual aspects in my big case, with follow-on writing elsewhere from my desk benefitting me, AmEx and many others.
Woke/DEI implementation has destroyed American Express beyond repair. I am a forty-year member and I am done. Sad.
Great company with great people, management cares, good work life balance
What it's like to work at American Express
- American Express employees generally work 8.9 hrs a day
- Employees at American Express report the work pace is comfortably fast
- On a typical day, employees at American Express have 4+ meetings
- 77% of American Express employees look forward to interacting with their team every day
- American Express employees most often take 20-30 paid vacation and sick days each year
- 84% of American Express employees report they are happy with their work life balance
- American Express employees typically get valuable feedback on how to improve at work Once a year
- 75% of American Express employees call their work environment positive
Q&A With American Express Employees
IDX: 0 TOT: 66
does the company give bonuses? what % are they on average?
Yes. Bonuses are received based on customer satisfaction surveys.
Yes it does. % varies from 100% to 200%
Depends on seniority - target starts at 8% rising to over 40%
How's the work life balance at American Express?
It’s great. There are several programs in place to help with work life balance.
As part of projects, you have to work late to accommodate US time zone and Asia Pacific time zones.
Continued from previous response.. 3) Documentation: No single document maintened depicting Business Requirements and SRS. Rally has thousands of user stories for each feature, but let's say if anyone wants to understand the application end to end, it becomes impossible. They can't scan through ten thousand user stories. There should be a consolidated document for all business requirements and should be updated regularly. Product owners can move, Tech team members can move, in that situation it'll be night mare to decipher the requirements from code. In case we migrate the application to a different technology, without single document it will be nightmare.. you can see examples of any application in Amex.. we don't learn from mistakes in Amex
If you could make changes, how would you improve the culture at American Express?
Top Employee Response
Amex is so big we frequently have competing objectives. It would be nice if we could streamline that, but it's not realistic
There’s a lot of bureaucracy and passive aggressiveness in the management style. There are definitely “popular” employees that receive better treatment than others.
Find a way to create a level playing field for all parties to give employees the confidence that growth isn't going to be shunted because of politics or brown-nosing by their peers.
What are your coworkers at American Express like?
Toxic.
Clickish
A real mix, some great performers and real characters, some not do, like everywhere.
What do people at American Express think about the CEO? What do they do well and what can they improve?
To my knowledge, most employees are very appreciative of the CEO and how well AMEX takes care of its employees.
Not a great leader, maybe a good manager!
Cautiously optimistic as he’s brand new. But some good changes so far
What benefits does American Express provide?
Top Employee Response
American Express provides standard health insurance, Generous Paid Time Off, Retirement Savings, Flextime, Telecommute
High deductible health insurance, dental, vision, 6% 401k match. Performance based bonuses which can get very good for top performers. Overall though, the best benefit is the flexible work style.
All of the normal benefits
What's the interview process like at American Express?
Phone interview followed by hiring manager interview.
Its not as difficult as in other organizations in the industry
Recruitment do a terrible job. You are better off going through an employees reference.
What's the company culture like at American Express?
If you enjoy woke-ism and Communist style control of not telling the truth, then it's the place for you!
Innovative
Used to be great, but the morale is low now
What part of American Express's business is growing fastest? What part is having difficulties?
International seems to be growing fast.
Lending. Product ownership.
Hard to say
What interview questions does American Express ask?
STAR answers required (Situation, Task, Action, Result).
Competency based
Varies clearly
What's the office layout like at American Express?
open.
Open office floor, no dedicated desks, noisy and loud.
Open seating unless you're a VP or above, in which case you have an office.
What should I wear for an interview at American Express?
Suit
Professional Attire
Not sure about tech, but if you're a guy coming to the Tower, I'd recommend a suit.
How's the morale at American Express?
Not as great as one would hope - growth opportunities are limited and marred with political and brown-nosing individuals. While the stock maybe rising, employees struggle with the lack of acknowledgement from leaders who seem to be on the lookout for their personal growth versus that of the teams that they support.
Low
Morale is high but declining. Tech problems and staff shortages are main factors.
Is it a high-pressure environment? If so, why do you think it is?
Top Employee Response
Amex is currently becoming a high pressure environment as there are economic forces at hand related to the decline in Consumer spending overall and there appears to be only traditional solutions to the same problems (layoffs, increasing lending risk and volatility in the provisions for loan losses, continued outsourcing of entire functions)
It's high pressure if your leader is incompetent and doesn't understand what needs to be done. It all depends on your leader
Yes. Call volume is often times high and changes happen frequently.
Why do you feel undervalued and what would make you feel better about your compensation at American Express?
Top Employee Response
Make us aligned with others as some groups get paid more with incentives than others with no aswers as to why.
Salary and benefits are not competitive to market
I feel strongly that as an employee I should have access to higher tier healthcare options. I am forced into the cheapest tier.
Does American Express drug test or do a background check?
Top Employee Response
Yes both
No drug test, not sure about background.
Yes
What is the dress code at American Express?
I've seen everything, depends on the location. Sweatpants in the call centers to suits in corporate.
Depends on the location, NY is the most formal.
Business Casual
How long does it take to hear back after applying to American Express?
Forever and don't be surprised if you're ghosted your first try.
A few weeks
It depends on the role, it could be a really long time. A long wait doesn't mean you didn't get the role.
What is the best advice you could give someone during their first month at American Express?
Clear your personal life, you'll work a ton of hours. Expect your first week to be sorting out onboarding and taking mandatory trainings. The best groups assign you a buddy so ask for one.
Listen and be prepared to absorb information quickly.
Try to get the lay of the land. This is a relationship based company so try to really get an understanding of who your key partners will be, what they do, and what they don't do.
What are the team outings like at American Express?
Cheap. Don't expect nice meals. Annual team event is like $50 budget for dinner. You can't even find places to go eat in NYC for that amount. We don't have Christmas parties anymore, just free lunch in the cafeteria!
We don't have those.
Cheap
How much and how often do raises happen at American Express?
Annually and typically 3%. You will never get rich, it just keeps up with inflation. At some point, your salary will be below market rate.
Raises are pretty pitiful. Even high rated employees can expect to only receive 3-5% a year.
Annually
How's the feedback proccess at American Express?
One way
Feedback depends on the manager. Feedback rarely leads to action because people do not want to rock the boat or address hard issues (technical and policy).
Convoluted and politically motivated. Not encouraging at all
How does American Express make decisions around promotions?
If you're leader likes you (not necessarily because your good at your job), you will get promoted. They value loyalty over competence. If your leader does not like you, you will never get promoted despite being hard working, smart and a solid performer. The place is toxic.
A list is already prepared and the process is just a farce
Promotions are mostly made by friends of friends. I witnessed several promotions based on articulation versus skills, and this was the pivotal undoing of a highly technical team. Leadership and analyst positions were made based on how much the interviewer(s) liked a candidate. No real evidence of technical skill or competence were major factors in the candidates' promotion.
What are you most excited about working at American Express?
The benefits package
Nothing
When given the opportunity to work on a new technology that has the ability to remove bottlenecks and process from the developers hands, it is exciting to see the focus drain away from process and procedure.
What needs to change to make the company culture better at American Express?
Treating people with respect and recognizing good work.
Political
Politics politics politics and over ridiculous things
Curious about what work's like at American Express?
Anonymously Ask American Express Employees Any Question
Should I work at American Express?
47% of American Express employees would encourage their friends to become coworkers, whereas 22% are neutral and 31% would not recommend working at American Express to their friends.
| 47% | Promoters |
|---|---|
| 22% | Passive |
| 31% | Detractors |
