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I received an interesting email from a reader this afternoon. She found a number of products at Staples with nearly 100% rebates. By using her Chase Ink Bold card, she will get 5 points per dollar for all of these purchases, and then get most of her money back thanks to the rebates. Here are the details of what she bought:
- Package of 50 Staples Photo paper for $14.99, but just $1 after Easy REBATE. Limit 2 per household.
- Package of Hammermill copy plus paper for $5.99 but just $1 after Easy REBATE, also limit 2.
- “View”” binders (range in price from 6.99 & up depending on the size) but FREE after REWARDS, limit 4.
- Legal/letter plastic storage totes for $13.49 ea but FREE after REWARDS, limit 2 (**but they had an unadvertised buy 2 get 1 free sale!!!!! SCORE. So I grabbed 3, paid for 2)
For those of you with the new Chase Ink Bold which awards 5 points per dollar for office supplies, this could be a nice way to get mostly free points! If you can find similar deals online, you could also go through the Ultimate Rewards Mall which is currently offering a very generous 5 points per dollar at Staples. So, ideally you would do both: visit Staples.com through the UR mall and use the new Chase Ink Bold for a total of 10 points per dollar! I’m not sure if any of these deals are available online though.
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Try Kaspersky anti-virus instead which is free after rebate
http://www.staples.com/Kaspersky-Internet-Security-2012-1-User-Boxed-CD/product_368246
http://www.staples.com/Kaspersky-Internet-Security-2012-1-User-Download/product_398331
If you add a few fillers or useful to you products to get it up to $75 mark, you can buy a coupon for $25 off $75 and essentially not only get the points, but $25 worth of products you want for effort + tax + any filler amount over $75.
I take it the deals your reader emailed you about are not this week’s current deals? Trying to find the Hammermill copy paper and cannot find anything for $5.99 with a $4.99 rebate.
I think they were in-store only deals. Hopefully we’ll see similar deals online occasionally.
How much is shipping?
Rebates and rewards are different. Rebates will get you money back, where as the rewards offers will get you the amount back in Staples rewards points. Ideally, you want to buy the rewards items first (getting most or all the amount back in Staples points, plus the 5+5 UR points) and then when the Staples points post, you want to purchase the rebate items with your Staples rewards (I would have to check the T&C on the UR Mall to see if that could earn points) in order to cash back out. Doing this would earn two rounds of free items minus tax plus the 10 (or possibly 15) UR points per $ spend.
Mike, won’t necessarily get more value from working unless you’re paid hourly.
Mike, if you have a net cost of $1 to buy a pack of paper at $14.99 (let’s call it $15), the purchase will go through at $15. If you do this through the UR mall with the Bold card, that’s $15 x 10 points/$ = 150 points. Even using a poor valuation of 1 cent/point, that’s at least $1.50 return on a $1 expense after the rebate.
Wanderluster, actual Staples rebates are typically Visa gift cards, what you’re probably thinking about are the “rebates” you get when purchasing printer ink through them.
If I recall correctly, Staples rebates aren’t cashback rebates, but are Staples giftcards. Not sure this will work out, but if it does I’m probably in.
So basically spend spend a dollar to get about a dollar worth of points? Sounds like just a lot of wasting time and start hoarding. Id rather go work for a hour and get more value. No?