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This is a reminder that several big Ultimate Rewards opportunities end with the close of this month (Sunday):
Sears 20X: Freedom cardholders
If you have a Chase Freedom Visa or MasterCard, you can get 10 points per dollar at Sears this month by shopping through the Ultimate Rewards Mall. With a simple double-dip trick, you can double your earnings. See “Sears 20X” for details.
Buy.com 20X: Ink cardholders
If you have a Chase Ink Bold, Ink Plus, Ink Cash, or Ink Classic card you can get 10 points per dollar at Buy.com this month by shopping through the Ultimate Rewards Mall. If you’re feeling lucky, you can double your earnings. See “Buy.com 20X!” for details. Please read the comments of that post to see other readers’ experiences before jumping into this deal.
Sony 10X: Ink cardholders
If you have an Ink card you can get 10 points per dollar at Sony this month by shopping through the Ultimate Rewards Mall. Previous experiments have shown that you can double dip by buying physical gift cards and then using them, but its too late in the month to count on getting those cards in time (e-gift cards don’t work). See “Sony 30X success” for details. Also, make sure to avoid products excluded via the T&C:
Not eligible on Sony outlet, refurbished, clearance items, and Sony Ericsson locked phones, or Employee Purchase Programs.
Bloomingdale’s 10X: Sapphire Cardholders
If you have the Chase Sapphire or Sapphire Preferred card you can get 10 points per dollar at Bloomingdale’s when shopping through the Ultimate Rewards Mall. Unfortunately, double dips do not work (see “Bloomingdale’s Only 10X”). However, Deals We Like outlined how to maximize savings with this opportunity. See “Use Chase for 40% off at Bloomingdales.”
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i hope your not thinking of stopping this blog anytime soon its great.
Just did my first ever Ultimate Rewards shopping double dip and thought I would describe my experience.
I recently ran out of furnace filters which I have to change every six months. They cost about $50 each. After doing some comparison shopping, I found that Sears was very close to the lowest price. I decided to buy 6 filters giving me a 3-year supply.
Due to comments that I’ve read here, I decided to use Internet Explorer for the purchase even though Google Chrome is my preferred browser. I logged into Ultimate Rewards Shopping Mall, linked into the Sears website, and purchased a $300 Sears e-gift card using my Chase Freedom card. About a half hour later, I got a call from Sears to confirm that I made this purchase. Immediately after that, the gift card was in my email.
Next, I did a practice run of the purchase using Chrome just to make sure I would know each step when I did the actual purchase in Internet Explorer. Then, I started to make my purchase. I applied the funds from my gift card, and charged the small balance that still remained to my Chase Freedom card. This was all done on Monday 9/24.
On Friday 9/28 I received my filters. I logged onto Ultimate rewards and saw two transactions each for 3,000 points added to my account, one for the gift card, and one for the filters purchased with the gift card.
So my first double dip experience went very well. Thank you Frequent Miler for your tips. Over the weekend, I did the same process for a set of tires. If successful I will earn 12,000 more points!
Does the double dip work for Kohl’s 10x ?
Adnan: Kohl’s has been at 10X for over a year, so there’s no hurry with that one. Yes, the double dip sometimes works. I’ve always received 10X when using gift cards, but once I didn’t get points for buying a gift card.
FM, here’s a new one for me. UR points for physical gift cards purchased through the mall with Freedom card posted at 4x. Chase people say because they are “sold by” Kmart they don’t count for 10x. I’m battling them with screenshots and confirmation emails but they are being difficult. Have you seen that one before or anyone else had this problem and been able to resolve it?
[…] Frequent Miler has a recap of some 10X and 20X UR Points offers ending […]
Hi, the buy.com 10 ppd is going on till 10/29/12. Thats what my IB UR malll says
sam: In the terms and conditions at the bottom (in red) I still see:
Greg, any idea if items available in the Sears marketplace for sale from merchants other than Sears itself are eligible for the points? And can gift cards be used to purchase those?
Daniel W: Yes, as long as you can “Add to cart” within Sears.com (make sure the URL still says that), you should get points. Yes, you can use gift cards
FM, if I purchase stuff or e-GC from buy.com today or tomorrow and the shipping won’t take place until after Sept 30. Do you think I’ll still get the 10 points?
xina: Yes, anything you buy while the UR Mall says “10X” will still count for 10X points even if it doesn’t ship or arrive until October
Hi Steven,
I’m a 1st time poster but I think I can be of some help. At least I hope so.
In California, we now have a law which mandates that merchants must give refunds for gift cards, when requested to do so by the consumer.
In a nutshell: If you have less than $10 remaining on a gift card (whether it’s for a restaurant, retail store or otherwise), the retailer must comply w/ a consumer’s request to exchange it for cash.(For those w/ MORE than $10 left, this still affects you so read on)
I’ve personally cashed in several gift cards w/ less than a couple bucks left on them (at places like Jamba Juice, Body Shop, Subway, Ross). That doesn’t mean it’s always easy. On over half of my visits, retail clerks & sales people (even a few managers) told me “they couldn’t authorize this” or “they weren’t allowed to give cash back, per their corporate policy.”
Wrong! The law says it’s my money.
However, on more than one occasion, I was forced to repeat my request to multiple members of a store’s retail staff. (Each time, fighting my inner urge to leap across the counter & scream, “Just gimme my damn 2 bucks already!!!)”
I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt that maybe they truly weren’t aware of this law & perhaps even corporate hadn’t received the memo. To be fair, this is probably true for most salespeople I encountered. Still ignorance of the law isn’t an excuse to break it and if they don’t comply, they are, in fact, breaking the law.
To nip these “misunderstandings” in the bud, I recently decided to print out a copy of this CA law (easily found on our state gov website and very brief). I now carry it in my wallet for just such occasions & haven’t had a problem since.
So, what if you live in a state that DOESN’T have this gift card law? No problem. The next time you’re planning to visit a state that DOES, there’s no stopping you from bringing all your gift cards (for NATIONAL chains like Sears, Subway, Nordstrom, etc) & making your exchange for cash! My friend does this every time she visits. A quick Google search should provide a list of states that now have this law in place.
**Something to keep in mind: The law was passed due to consumer complaints about having gift cards with too little left on them for a relevant purchase. To be clear, the card has to have LESS than $10 to qualify. If you have MORE than that on any of your cards and you don’t wish to use any of it, my suggestion would be to simply take it into the retailer & ask if they could divide it up onto several smaller ones.(Over the holidays, we wanted to use a $100 Safeway gift card we had for a donation to a local charity that helped struggling families. I brought our $100 card to Safeway & easily exchanged it for (4) $25 cards instead. No reason why you couldn’t do the same with your larger value Sears card & just ask for it to be divided into multiple cards of less than $10. Then just cash those out at your will. Obviously not a good idea to ask them to do the latter on the very same visit. Ha ha
A final thought: It goes without saying that this law is one of the most consumer friendly ones on the books & has benefitted probably millions of us who didn’t know what to do with a junk drawer full of low $ gift cards. And it was quite a longshot that it ever got passed given the fight from the BIG $$ retail lobbyists, who all said a law like this would “open the floodgates for potential fraud & abuse by consumers.”
Having said that, I’m certain I wasn’t the only one out there to recognize the endless pot of gold this law could potentially provide. But despite my little lightbulb moment, making a habit of purchasing gift cards, for the SOLE purpose of cashing them out, just isn’t in the cards for me. (No pun intended, really). I know everyone has their own definition of what it means to “cross the line” so I’m not judging anyone who might feel differently. But I also recognize that a law like this can be taken away in an instant, if the lobbyists can prove they were right. And it sure would be a shame to see such a rare law like this get taken away!
What’s everyone else think?
My points for $1000 Sears gift card posted 7 days after purchase. I used Amex cards to pay.
any luck to buy Gas cards at Kmart with Sears egift cards purchased through 10 % off ?
Woah, hold on there, FM. Isn’t it more accurate to say that we won’t know what Sony, Sears, and Buy.com will offer next month, rather than that they’re going away? (Disclaimer: I regret suddenly needing to purchase a Sony product and finding out only today. Hopefully 10x sticks.)
harvson3: That’s true, it’s possible for any of those stores to extend the 10X deal, but each of them explicitly say ” Special increased earnings now through 9/30/2012″.
PJ: Yes, I’ve done this many times
Karen: Great!
@Greg The Frequent Miler, can steven return sear gift card? What is the rule to return a gift card?
Austin: that’s a pretty big gamble. If you don’t use your Ink card then you will have a very hard time getting Chase to help you if the points don’t post. You just have to ask yourself: do you feel lucky?
Thanks FM. I’m planning on buying this item for $1320 from the 3rd party Buy.com seller. I could get it elsewhere for $1189 without bonus. Effectively, I’d be paying $131 to get the extra 13,200 points…so just under a cent/each. I’m also planning to use my SPG (for Amex’s great customer protection) through the Ink Bold UR portal. Go or no-go?