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Office Depot/OfficeMax are reportedly offering a $10 instant discount when buying $100 or more of Mastercard gift cards in-store.
The Deal
- Buy $100+ Mastercard gift cards in-store at Office Depot or OfficeMax & get $10 off.
Key Terms
- Expires August 22, 2020.
- Limit 1.
Quick Thoughts
Office Depot/Office Max has decided to out-do Staples on the gift card front this week. Staples is only offering a $5 instant discount on $200 Visa gift cards which results in you still paying a $1.95 activation fee.
This deal at Office Depot/OfficeMax on the other hand will be instantly profitable by $4.05 or $3.05 depending on if you buy a $100 or $200 Mastercard gift card.
The fact that these are Mastercard gift cards will be off-putting to some though due to past issues with them. I’ve not heard of people having problems with Mastercard gift cards recently though (e.g. drained cards), so hopefully whatever issues they were having in the past have now been resolved.
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[…] week, another profitable gift card deal at Office Depot and OfficeMax. Last week they were offering $10 off when spending $100 or more on Mastercard gift cards; this week it’s a similar deal but on Visa gift […]
Hi Stephen,
I’m new to using my Chase Ink Plus for GC purchase. I’m curious if there is a point/$ amount at which Chase would frown on this. I have purchased 4 x $200 MCGC this week and it seems like one cashier will allow me to buy more than the advertised limit of 1 per customer. I could likely buy 10 more if I’d like. Any data on this becoming a negative issue with Chase or raise a red flag on my account?
In theory, no – the Chase Ink Plus has a limit of $50,000 worth of bonused spend at 5x and Chase has put that limit there for a reason.
Having said that, it’s always worth being careful before ramping up spend on any card, so if your Ink Plus has rarely been used for the last couple of years, I’d be careful about suddenly spending several thousand on it within the space of a week.
Ok. I’ve had automatic payments of about $700-1000/month on my Ink Plus so I’m guessing spending an extra $1000 this week on GC won’t seem too ambitious. Thanks for the quick reply.
Yep, you should be fine with that seeing as you’re already putting a reasonable amount of spend on the card.
This didn’t work on the $100 GC. The cashier said it was for 100+, not for-100.
The terms of the offer are for $100 or more, so buying a $100 gift card is fine. It sounds like there might be a problem with how the offer works at checkout on their end.
Walked into my local Office Depot yesterday, system still showed a $6.95 activation fee. Will try again later.
They always show the activation fee initially, but once it’s time to pay the $10 should come off. Also, just to check – were you buying a Mastercard rather than a Visa gift card.
Definitely a MCGC. I ask the cashier to ring up a $200 and the activation fee rung up as well. I will try again.
Hello Stephen —- thanks for the post. Last year, at the end of June, 2019, I had a 3 card Master Card drain issue. Took me 5 months to resolve it and it was a huge and complicated battle. I stood to lose $600, but, in the end, I got it back. I learned a lot along the way and I eventually got it back via the processor, Black Hawk. I have done tens of thousands of dollars in Mastercards since then and have had no problem at all. They appear to have fixed whatever glitch they had.
Great – I’m glad you eventually managed to get that issue resolved and haven’t had any problems since 🙂
What’s the current status for these at Walmart for MO? Still YMMV?
They still work but are a pain, especially for MO’s. Use them to load Bluebird, no problem. Use them to load Serve, u have to do the “cancel trick.” – this is more difficult than BB but easier than MO. If getting MO, make sure it’s a friendly CSR(one that knows what we’re doing and doesn’t care). It’s all about timing. u have to slide it before the csr is ready for it and then hit cancel at the right time. Have to repeat for each card. Highly recommended to only do 1 card, not multiple swipes. I pulled off a 3 card swipe the other day but it was after trying 3 times and was with a super friendly csr.
Thanks man. Good info. I do have some WU that take debit card. I wonder if they are easier there than WM.