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Big Habitat shares a reader report that Discover is clawing back some Discover Deals portal purchases paid for with cards other than Discover cards. In the comments of the post, the same reader says that he hasn’t actually seen any rewards taken away from his account yet.
The letter read, in part:
During a recent review of your account we found that one or more of the purchases you have made through Discover Deals recently were no made using a Discover card as the method of payment. As a result, any rewards you received in connection with purchases made using a card other than Discover were erroneously added to your account. These rewards have now been identified and removed from your account.
Discover Deals overall seems to have paused notifications of portal rewards since early to mid October. Perhaps they’re closely reviewing all such purchases before awarding any?
Personally, I’m going to back off using the Discover Deals portal for a while unless I plan pay directly with a Discover card.
See also: Is the Sears double dip dead for real this time?
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[…] claws back portal cash back when the Discover card is not used to pay for an order. See: Quick Tip: Discover claws back portal purchases made with non-Discover cards. This means that you could risk losing your rewards if you go through this portal and buy items […]
I got an email from discover deals giving me a cashback from a purchase I expected a month ago. I did not use Discover card so I thought that loophole had closed. Apparently it hasn’t. For some reason, it was just delayed.
Your recent purchase at PetSmart online earned you Cashback Bonus.
Discover Deals
Transaction Details:
Merchant XXXXXXXXX
Transaction Date
Not Available
Order ID
Not Available
Reward Amount
$1.00
Reward Type
Cashback Bonus
The resulting Reward amount will appear on your next statement.
Big Brands. Big Savings. Made Easy
I just received an email from Discover that reads (subject line “Thanks for using Discover Deals”):
“Nicole, thanks for visiting!
Discover Deals
We’re reviewing your purchases. Once we receive confirmation from Saks Off 5th online, you will receive an email letting you know whether or not your purchase(s) qualified for Cashback Bonus. You’ll be hearing from us again in 30 days.
Thanks for visiting Discover Deals!”
I used Discover Deals for two separate Saks orders, both with my Discover card (for one, due to the increase 5% bonus cash back (which should be 10% in a year or so) and secondly due to the notice on here, so thanks for that!).
I will say I’m slightly annoyed that I don’t have confirmation from these deals, because I will return the items if I don’t get the cash back they promised me. So now I have to wait what appears to be another month before I can know if I should wear these (cute, but overpriced) shoes. I did use my Discover card and did follow all T&Cs, so I’m confident I will get the cash back, but this sort of email is not something I’m happy about receiving.
[…] Be careful to pay with your Discover card after you click through the portal, though. They’ve been cracking down on that recently. […]
Slightly off topic here. Given the recent changes to the cashback portals what is the best way to maximize the 5% Cashback Bonus at Amazon.com & More on up to $1,500 in Purchases.I am also signed up for the double cashback bonus promotion.
Does the quarterly bonus trigger if I buy gift cards at amazon.com ? Are there places where I can buy visa/MC gift cards and get this bonus ?
A reply to subscribe to the thread
The 5% should trigger for any Amazon.com purchase. The only place I know of that sells Visa gc that will receive 5% is Sears.
I noticed that a couple of other portals clawback cancelled purchases without notification. They just disappear.
That’s most likely due to the merchant clawing back rather than the portal. If the merchant goes back to the portal to report that a transaction was returned or didn’t meet the rewards criteria, then it will be clawed back.
In the immortal words of Tommy Smothers, SOUR GRAPES
Discover cash back monitoring system is miserable, so let’s not go being so trump-like quick to say well, we knew the terms. why the heck is it that discover’s tracking system takes MONTHS apparently, when competing cashback portals can post our activity within days, if not hours. ?? (and I’m referring to purchases made via the portal with the card too)
I have had a claw back for non discover purchases. Purchase was made on Sept. 4th, merchant was brook stone.
In many cases clawbacks come from the merchant rather than the portal. I don’t know this to be true, but it could be that Brookstone clawed back the transaction. The unusual thing is for Discover to unilaterally take back portal rewards even if the merchant paid them for the referral.
Does anyone know if there’s a way to see itemized cash-back activity? I can’t find anything on the site..
Not a perfect method, but I go through my emails by searching gmail for: from:discover@service.discover.com extra cashback bonus
“Discover Deals overall seems to have paused notifications of portal rewards since early to mid October.”
FYI, for a data point, I did get a notification of portal rewards on October 13th for a purchase made 10/8 (I *did*, however, pay with my Discover card).
Wonder if they will refund the company they got cash back from. LOL >
I didn’t get the letter but I did notice they did not provide cashback on my last purchase a few weeks ago where I didn’t pay with discover.
Cant understand how they view it as fraud. We used their portal. They should get cashback from the merchant.
let’s be honest.. the portal terms and condition says cash back is awarded to the purchase made using discover card. We all did it anyway because it was known that portal will still award cash back on purchases made using other cards or gift cards. Yes, it’s a glitch and mistake on Discover portal part but we all (mostly) exploited that glitch knowingly.
The letter isn’t accusing the card hold of any fraud… it admitted that cash back was awarded ‘erroneously’ and just removing it.
Yeah, we shouldn’t be pissed off as we were exploiting the fact that Discover wasn’t enforcing their terms. Also, keep in mind that they added an “in-store pickup” exclusion so the only way to be sure you will qualify for cash back is to have the entire order shipped and pay entirely with Discover card.
Discover Portals has been great over the years, and I will continue to use their portals when it makes sense with my discover card of course. They could have easily shut down my account, but they took the high road and I am grateful for that. Also grateful they didn’t claw back past rewards, I have always liked discover and their customer service has been mostly exemplary.
The only concern I have now is that I have made a few purchase with my discover through the discover portal and have not received any kind of confirmation. It has been several weeks, maybe its simply delayed.