Introduction
Ebates started doing in-store cashback around the summer of 2016, written about DoC here. The initial list of participating merchants wasn’t very exciting. Then if you kept checking, you’ll notice that they eventually added Office Depot/Max to that list and giving out 3% cashback. Well, it didn’t take a rocket science to realize to link your Ink card to your Ebates account, thus earning 5X AND 3% back. If you were buying the $200 VGC for $6.95, the cashback knocked the fee down to $.95 for ~1000 UR, essentially a cost of $.1 cents per UR, which was much better than the Staples cost of $.6 cents per UR.
Scaling up
The drawback of the promo was that it was limited to 30 uses per account. Well, you know what that means – get a new Ebates account for your wife, family member, friend, etc.
Ebates clawback
Everything was going fine until Office Depot/Max had a $20 off $300 VGC promo and most people bought 3 cards for $580 or so. It seemed that Ebates was watching for that exact amount and sending out nastygrams to accounts to stop buying gift cards. Of course we pivoted to adding a filler item like a Sharpie to throw off their sensors. Ironically, I always bought 10 cards and never got flagged. However, one reader did get flagged here and got his account shut down.
Conclusion
The initial promo went through September and then got extended through October and maybe even November. You would have thought they would have ended it earlier and kept it dead but it lasted longer than we expected. They have not brought it back over 6 months and my guess is that Office Depot didn’t expect the surge of payouts and stopped the in-store program with Ebates. I’m 99% sure it won’t come back and that’s why I’m comfortable writing about it now. While this deal is dead, keep checking the list to see if anything pops up down the road.
I like when Bed bath and beyond has their $15 off of $200 gift card deals and then are on ebates in store list 🙂
So… you got a batch of extra Sharpies for sale? Lol! Good column to point out things to watch for. I am SO over 5/24 and Chase seems to not want me to have a 5X card… It gives me a sad. But eventually. What we really need up here in Bellingham though is a Staples. Marysville is too darn far away for walk in stuff. We do have the OD and OM though. Thanks for this article, it did trigger a different idea for me that can get me a few extra points in a different way. That’s what I like about your writings, Vinh, makes a guy think! Thanks!