One of our most popular posts is about the difficulties in paying our CFE (electric) bill online, especially using a US-based credit card.
Well – good news – CFE has just made it a bit easier – you can now pay online at the CFE website using an AMEX (American Express) card – even if it’s a US-based card!
Update – August 2024 – CFE no longer seems to accept American Express.
It’s selectable on their website, and you can proceed through all the way through the payment process, but it fails at the final payment step. Major bummer. 😢
Visa and Mastercard
When our bill arrived this week – I wanted to try again paying directly on the CFE website using my US-based Visa or Mastercard – just in case something had changed.
I tried both a Visa and a Mastercard, but same results as in the past – it wouldn’t go through.
American Express
But – I did notice a new option – pay with American Express!
CFE – Pay Online
Since I’m an American Express Platinum cardholder – lets see if this works…
I entered my Amex details, and they also asked for my address information, so I entered the billing address for my Amex card.
It all seemed to work just fine. My CFE account was showing paid. But the charge didn’t immediately show up in my Amex account.
I did get an email from American Express though, saying that a recent transaction was secure:
You recently used American Express ® SafeKey for your online transaction at Flap México SA de CV.
SafeKey is an enhanced layer of security that uses the latest technology to help protect you against fraud while shopping online with your Card.
Whenever you shop online at a participating retailer, SafeKey will appear towards the end of your checkout process letting you know that American Express is working to keep you secure.
The next day I checked my Amex account, and sure enough – the transaction had posted!
American Express – Posted Activity
w00t!
Not only was I able to pay my CFE bill online, I was able to do it without any additional fee (such as the fee when paying via pagamobil) – AND I was able to earn Membership Rewards points!
CFE Tweet
I also noticed that just yesterday, CFE tweeted that they’re now accepting American Express.
En todos nuestros Centros de Atención, ya puedes realizar tu #PagoOportuno con tarjetas American Express pic.twitter.com/pnZnuRPzin
— CFEmx (@CFEmx) October 21, 2018
CFE Contigo App
The CFE mobile app wasn’t loading for me for some reason, so I wasn’t able to check if it was possible to pay using Amex on the CFE mobile app. I’ll try to remember to test this next billing cycle. In the meantime, if someone tries this – please leave a comment below and let us know.
Credit card points FTW!
For those that know me well, you probably know I’m a bit of a junkie when it comes to airline and reward points.
For example, we recently spent a couple of days at a resort in Cancun, and paid for it with points. We also just got back from a trip to Greece – where we flew first class for free – using Membership Rewards points! So earning points are important and valuable to us!
In addition to earning points – the Amex Platinum card also gets us into airline lounges – which makes long layovers a lot more enjoyable. We get access to the Amex Centurion lounges (which are amazing!), Delta SkyClubs, as well as over a thousand Priority Pass lounges around the world.
Amex is currently offering 60,000 Membership Reward points after spending $5000 in the first three months – enough to get your own free flights or hotel stays.
Wrap Up
It’s kinda crazy that doing something simple – like paying a utility bill online – isn’t as easy as it should be – even today.
But, this is Mexico. So I’m not that surprised.
Every two months, when we get our electric bill, it feels like a game, seeing how I can pay my bill, without leaving my house, paying the least amount of fees, and earning some reward points as well.
I think I finally have a winning strategy. Hopefully CFE doesn’t change things for the worse.
I also tried with a US Chase Visa card with 0% Foreign eXchange … and got “use a different card”. But my Amex Everyday card (also with 0%FX) worked like a charm. I also got the SafeKey notification, but it said no action was required on my part. My CFE bill showed a zero balance immediately. This was on December 18, 2018. I got an Email from Amex immediately that it went through, but it did not show up online on my account till the next day. I paid 718Pesos and Amex showed $35.32 in my account, or 20.33 pesos per dollar. The official exchange rate today shows 20.12 pesos per dollar, but it may have been higher yesterday. Oddly, I have yet to see anybody accept Discover in BC Mexico, but they seem to love Amex. This proves it! Thanks for a fun site! I also have that odd fetish where I just love trying to pay bills for free in Mexico! This was the last one that previously had not worked without something like PagaMobil. 8^}
Got an AMEX card especially to be able to pay cfe. Unfortunately another failure!!!! Frustrating!!!!
Hmmm…that’s odd. I just paid my CFE bill with my Amex within the last 2 weeks. Worked perfectly.
As it has for almost a year now.
Regarding previous posts about paying CFE bills online.
I have successfully used my US AMEX card in the past (once); however, no success using VISA or MasterCard.
For the past 18 mo, I have been paying my CFE bills via funds transfer using a special web portal available under my Actinver bank account. Actinver has a special MX Gov related payments options, that supports making payments to different gov agencies in MX, including CFE.
All that is necessary is the select the CFE payment option, enter your CFE account number and the amount, then submit.
It has worked well over the past year; however, I have now encountered a recent issue with CFE receiving the funds, but not acknowledging funds receipt on my monthly statements.
My goal was to never have to set foot in a CFE office again to make payments; however, now I am stuck visiting the very CFE office again, to have them correct their accounting errors and to acknowledge my payments.
I do have a solar system installed, that generates more electricity than consumed; hence, my monthly CFE bill is always the minimum Admin charge of $25P.
CFE has screwed up their accounting, after I paid the minimum monthly charges for one year at a time. Still working on resolution.
As an odd side now to this situation, after my 1st CFE office visit to investigate why they did not acknowledge my $300P payment for one year, I subsequently received a letter from a main CFE office requiring that I establish a bank account and an MX Hacienda tax account to receive my funds back.
Apparently, the local CFE office some how screwed up and presented my request for credit of funds paid, as my desire to become a commercial electricity generator so that I could sell my excess electricity generated back to CFE and be paid for excess electricity produced!
I told the local office staff, that I certainly had no interest in being paid for any excess electricity my solar system generates, but to simply receive credits for all funds wire transferred to CFE. The situation is as yet unresolved.
Ed
Does anyone know how we can open a CFE account for the condo that we purchased in SJD? We are in the USA and wont be down until mid dec. Our seller agreed to keep the power on until we got there, but this did not happen. He turned it off! any suggestions? thanks in advance!
I tried using a Bluebird prepaid card, which is supposed to work “virtually” anywhere that American Express is accepted, but so far it has not worked on the CFE site.
Can anyone confirm that a US American Express card still works to pay CFE online? I heard somewhere that it does not.
Yes, it does. I still pay CFE online using mu US-based AMEX.
So I’ve entered the 15 digits of my card, and tried using the cvv number in the back of my card but it’s not populating to submit the payment
Amex told me I should use the 4 digit number on the front of the card but CFE portal only takes 3 numbers
Advice?
For AMEX, you should use the 4 digits. I’ve used my AMEX for users with CFE, never had a problem.
Did you select American Express from the dropdown on the payment page?
I tried American Express and it won’t take?
Hmmm – that seems strange. I just paid CFE this morning using my Amex. It worked perfectly.
I entered my BBVA card and completed all the in up until it requested a cv code on the back. Since this card doesn’t have one I decided to switch to my AMEX card. However, the CFE site has this info stuck in their cookies memory and when I try to pay with AMEX it tries to redirect my to my BBVA card. Tried multiple times but with no success. One problem besides needing to delete the cookies, is that it asks for a zip code and because I am Canadian, I have a postal code. Not sure if the postal code is the issue or that it is stuck on expecting me to pay by BBVA. I would appreciate any advice you could give.
Coreen Jackson
Hi Coreen,
Hmmm – that sounds odd. Perhaps try using a different web browser?
I tried paying my CFE bill with my American Express “Cash Card.” I even had the Amex representative stay on the phone with me while I try to complete the online transaction and Amex released the funds. My payment was still rejected. Amex said it must be the CFE Web portal blocking the payment. I’m wondering, if those who have an Amex platinum card are able to pay online only and the other type of Amex cards are not accepted? Just a thought.
oh, interesting. Personally, I don’t have any experience with an Amex Cash Card. I wonder if CFE sees that as a debit card, which is why it doesn’t work. Unsure.
I still use my Amex Platinum every month to pay CFE.
As of April 2024, American Express is no longer allowing payments through the CFE portal. I contacted AMEX and confirmed the details. I was told the decision was made to cancel their agreement with CFE due to increased fraud. It is unfortunate for many of us who relied on this service and even procured an AMEX card without foreign transaction fees in order to do this.
Yep, I confirm that. Just got an Amex card to pay my CFE bills, and it wouldn’t go through. The specialist at Amex stated exactly what Mel said-that they will no longer pay CFE bills. I found Xoom (part of PayPal) to work well though-they have a direct connection for paying CFE bills.