Now that 40k To Far Away is over, it’s time to get back to our regular scheduled programming. Quite a few decent Amex Offers appeared while we were away, one of which offered $15 back or 1,500 Membership Rewards when buying $100+ of Happy gift cards from HappyCards.com.
The Deal
- Buy $100+ on Happy gift cards at HappyCards.com and get $15 back, or
- Buy $100+ on Happy gift cards at HappyCards.com and get 1,500 Membership Rewards
Key Terms
- Expires December 7, 2019.
- Valid on one or more transactions.
- Offer valid online at HappyCards.com US website only.
Quick Thoughts
This is a decent 15% discount on Happy gift cards, or even better than that if you get the Membership Rewards version of the offer and value MR at more than 1cpp. If you’re targeted for both versions of the offer, you should be able to load one of each version of the offer to different cards.
HappyCards.com is listed on the Simply Best Coupons portal, but that redirects to the Happy gift card listings on GiftCards.com. Purchasing from there won’t trigger the Amex Offer, so it’s sadly not possible to also earn portal cashback on the purchase.
Certain brands of Happy gift cards can be used at Home Depot, Bed Bath & Beyond or Buy Buy Baby to buy third party gift cards. MetaBank added terms earlier this year excluding that, but nothing has been hardcoded as far as I’m aware. Having said that, there have been a few reports of Home Depot draining balances of gift cards purchased using Happy Guy gift cards, so that’s something to be aware of.
The good news is that they’ve just launched a new Happy brand – Happy Holidays. That includes both GameStop and Lowe’s as eligible retailers which is good news as Lowe’s stores in particular tend to have a much better third party gift card rack than Home Depot. For example, they usually have both Visa and Mastercard gift cards, Amazon, Kroger, Giant and other grocery stores, so this is a great opportunity to buy those at a 15% discount.
Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.
Does anyone know that whether happy card still could purchase third party gift cards at Lowe’s?
I haven’t tried it yet, but I have a card I need to try it on. From what I’ve heard, it can sometimes require the cashier intervening in some way, so hopefully they don’t have a problem when they see it’s a Happy card.
Thank you Stephen :-). Hope to hear your DP on the card trying.
@stephen
But the Lowe’s webiste T&C says Lowe giftcards cannot be used to purchase another giftcard.
Can you please confirm that we can use Lowe giftcard to buy another third party giftcard?
It’s correct that Lowe’s gift cards can’t be purchased with Lowe’s gift cards. The Happy Holidays gift card is more like a Visa card that can only be used at select retailers though, so that means you can buy a Lowe’s gift card – or any other gift card stocked at Lowe’s – with it.
[…] addition to the Happy gift card Amex Offer, another Amex Offer that’s giving a discount on gift cards is one for Hotels.com. As with the […]
If Home Depot drains the 3rd party gift card did they return the balance to the Happy card or did they just effectively steal the money? Do you think transferring the 3rd party gift card to another 3rd party gift card of the same type would prevent that? Just trying to gauge the risk of buying 3rd party gift cards with the Happy cards,
I think one report I saw said that Home Depot ended up reinstating the balances, but it’s a hassle. Basically, you’d be able to get your money back somehow, but it could be a lot of hassle. For example, it might be that they’d reinstate the funds to the Happy cards themselves, rather than the third party cards you purchased. If you’d tossed the Happy cards once they’d been redeemed, it’d mean you’d have the added hassle of getting them reinstated.
Having said all this, I don’t get the impression that Home Depot is doing this on a widespread basis, as I’d have thought we’d have heard of significantly more data points. I guess it’s all about your risk tolerance and how much potential hassle you want to open yourself up to. Given the fact that Home Depot seems to have done this at least a few times though, I’d figure Bed Bath & Beyond or Lowe’s would be safer options for now.
MtM has an example of what happened here: https://milestomemories.boardingarea.com/home-depot-auto-draining-gift-cards/
Thanks for the link. All of the data points seemed to involve people buying HD gift cards at HD with Happy cards which may be what was attracting scrutiny from the store. I wonder if that happened with non-HD gift card purchases. If they are simply voiding the sale then quickly shifting the funds from the purchased 3rd party card should work although simply avoiding HD for these transactions would seem to be more prudent.
Stephen Pepper
I have a 9/16 Flt.booked by Singapore points flown by LH +$250 FEES !! Can I call Singapore and pay the $50 change fee and get the United Flt (Saver award flown by LH the same flt.) which is only $80 fees ??
CHEERs Mate !!
I did LOOK @ the Bus from NCE to Paris BUT $90 one way in May !!!!!