Great new Amex offer for NYC Subway riders

New York City transit has been putting off a upgrading to a modern farecard for so long it's become a joke. In May, though, the first signs of of a new system – called OMNY – appeared on the 4/5/6 line between downtown and Grand Central. Though this seems like a small trial, keep in mind this subway line carries more people per day than the entire Chicago El, San Franciso's BART, and the Boston T combined.

At this point, the new card readers are only being used for cash fares (i.e., you cannot load a monthly pass onto your phone), but if you want to give it a try, this Amex offer will give you 4 bonus points per dollar spent on OMNY – putting it ahead of the Chase Sapphire Reserve's 3.

The OMNY gates work several ways:

• directly with your physical card, if it has the little Wi-Fi-like tap card symbol on it
• traditional ApplePay (i.e., authenticate on your phone or watch, then tap the reader)
• Suica-style instant pay (i.e., you just tap your phone on the reader, no authentication required, nothing to launch, nothing to click – just touch your phone on the reader and you're in)

The latter is super convenient, but you have to set it up first. Open Settings > Wallet & Apple Pay and then choose a credit card to link to the Express Transit Card feature. The one downer of this convenience is that if someone steals your phone, the thief could use it (even when locked) to pay for their subway rides. (You can remotely disable all forms of payment by using the Find My Phone feature, though).

Even if you aren't targeted for the offer it's a fun preview of New York City transit finally joining the 21st century.

 Open your Settings, then go to Wallet & Apple Pay, then Express Transit Card

Select a card to use