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# Network Loyalty APIs

### Card Acquisition/Profile Creation

1. A Card Member acquires an eligible American Express® Card through the Issuer. The Issuer's, or their Concierge Provider's, backend system gathers the required Customer details and calls the R42's Loyalty Customer Management - Create Profile API (`account.yaml`) to set up a Customer profile.
2. The R42 Platform completes the profile setup asynchronously for the Card Member; this is a mandatory step before the Issuer can complete points transfer or Elite - Tier Benefit subscription requests through the R42 Platform.
3. The final status of the profile setup, also known as acquisition, is sent from the R42 Platform back to the Issuer via the notification API (`notification.yaml`) that the Issuer or their Concierge Provider will build.

NOTE: A Card acquisition and subsequent profile creation flow may differ for co-branded Card products.

### Points Transfer

1. When a Card Member initiates a points transfer to an airline or hotel benefit Provider, the Card Member contacts the Issuer or their Concierge Provider through the channels that the Issuer provides (web, phone, servicing, etc.), and the data is transferred from the Issuer to the R42 Platform via the points transfer API (`points_transfer.yaml`).
2. The R42 Platform communicates to the benefit provider asynchronously, adding the requested points to the Card Member's airline or hotel reward account.
3. The R42 Platform sends the final status of the Points transfer back to the Issuer via the Issuer or their Concierge Provider's notification API (`notification.yaml`).

### Elite - Tier Benefit Subscription

1. When initiating enrollment in their Card's Elite - Tier Benefit, the Card Member contacts the Issuer through the channel provided by the Issuer or its Concierge Provider (web, phone, servicing, etc.), and a real-time API transfers the data from the Issuer to the R42 Platform.
2. The R42 Platform communicates asynchronously with the benefit provider to subscribe the Card Member's hotel reward account into the Elite - Tier Benefit level. Some benefit providers have a real-time integration with the R42 Platform, but others may take several days to process the batch request.
3. The final status of the Elite - Tier subscription is sent back to the Issuer via the notification API (`notification.yaml`) built by the Issuer or its Concierge Provider.

### Notification

1. The Issuer builds a notification API. The R42 Platform calls this API with the final status of each unique request sent by the Issuer or its Concierge Provider, using a shared correlation ID.
2. The Issuer, or their Concierge Provider, shares the security authentication that the R42 Platform supports when calling the Issuer or their Concierge Provider's notification API.
3. The notification message does not contain any Customer Personal Identifiable Information (PII) and does not need to be decrypted.

### Secured Secret Management

1. The Issuer, or their Concierge Provider, receives a secret from the R42 Platform, which the crypto API (`crypto.yaml`) uses when calling to retrieve the unique key that the Issuer uses to encrypt every acquisition, benefit, and points transfer request.
2. The call to retrieve the key is done once and the key is cached on the Issuer's side and reused.
3. If the unique key expires, the Issuer calls the crypto API again to retrieve a new, active key.