AmEx Gift Card

New Amex Offer $10 back on $200+ AmEx GC

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$10 credit on $200 amex gcThere is new Amex Offer through July 30, 2014. You will get one-time $10 statement credit when you spend the total of $200 or more on American Express Gift Card. The offer is available online only, www.americanexpress.com/gift-cards.

I have two American Express cards for Amex Offer. One is Blue Cash Preferred, and the other is Serve. However, you can’t use Serve for the purchase of AmEx GCs. They don’t accept Prepaid Cards as a payment.

Please don’t forget to click a link of shopping portal. As of July 1st 2014, the best rate is BeFrugal’s 3% cash back. Once the rate was down to 2.5%, but it slightly went back up.

American Express Gift Card Portal Rate Down

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After the end of promotion for Father’s Day (there was a code to waive a purchase fee through June 16th 2014), a rate of online shopping portal for American Express Gift Card is down on most portals. The highest rate had been 4% cash back from Lucky Rewards, and the rate is now significantly lowered to 1%. Fuel Rewards Network had been 2x, which was equivalent to 4% cash back, and it is now 1x (equivalent to 2%).

2.5 percent cash back on the purchase of amex gcAs of June 20th, the best rate is 2.5% cash back from BeFrugal.com. Until better rates become available, I will keep using BeFrugal for the purchase of AmEx GCs. BeFrugal online portal is very reliable. I had been using for other retailers, and it seems I will use for AmEx GCs for a while. I even respect for their showing cash back terms of each retailers very clearly. None of other portals bother to describe terms and conditions as detailed as BeFrugal does.

To compare the rates of cash back or travel point, you can use these sites

http://www.cashbackmonitor.com/

http://www.cashbackholic.com/

How you use these sites is the same, type a name of retainers and click search and they show lists of available portals and rates. It is better to check on both sites. Because rates are constantly changing, and sometimes they can’t keep up with changes. They may show different rates, miss some portals, etc. In fact, as of today, I can’t find Befrugal on cashbackholic.com when I searched the rate for AmEx GC. On the other hand, you don’t see ShopDiscover on cashbackmonitor.com on the default search result.

I hope the rate will go back to 4% or better soon.

Target REDcard 5% Discount on Gift Cards

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I love Target. They sell everything. Since they start selling groceries, Target has been my favorite store I visit most frequently. I have REDcard which give you 5% discount on almost everything. Here is the list of items that 5% discount DOESN”T apply:

  • target redcardPrescriptions, Target Clinic services and Target Optical eye exams
  • Target gift cards and prepaid cards
  • Previous purchases
  • Target credit account payments, Target Debit Card cash back and cash advances on the Target Visa Credit Card
  • Target Commercial Interiors purchases
  • Gift wrap and shipping and handling charges on Target.com purchases
  • Where otherwise prohibited by law

From the list, I can clearly see that you can’t get 5% off on Target gift cards purchase, but what about other gift cards? What includes in “prepaid cards”? I had bought Boost Mobile’s refill cards and verified that 5% discount was applied on the purchases. I am not interested in other gift cards such as Starbucks, restaurant’s, and iTunes because you can easily find these gift cards with more than 5% discount on eBay. But, what about Visa and American Express gift cards?. Will I get 5% discount on these gift cards, too?

To check this out, I went online and added them to a cart, and chose REDcard as a payment method. As you see in the picture, REDcard discount doesn’t apply on Target or Visa gift card. .

discount on gift cards

And a purchase fee of Visa gift cards are expensive. $100 charges $6 purchase fee, and $100 is the highest denomination. Only Visa gift cards are available online. So, I went to the store to check the fee of American Express gift cards, but they are all the same. Here is a fee table of Visa and American Express gift cards being sold at Target

  • $100 Visa/Amex – $6 fee (6%)
  • $50 Visa/Amex – $5 fee (10%)
  • $25 Visa/Amex – $4 fee (16%)

Probably, all Visa and American Express gift cards being sold at Target charge at least 6% purchase fee. And also you can’t find any other bank gift cards at Target.

Here is a list of the other gift cards you can find at Target:

AT&T Go Phone
Apple ITunes
Bass Pro Shops
Boost Mobile
Xbox live
Chipotle
Dominos
T-Mobile Prepaid
Nook
Microsoft Office
Tracfone
Nintendo Eshop
Wendy’s
Texas Roadhouse
Southwest Airlines
Sonic
Spotify
Skype
Google Play
Facebook
Harley Davidson
Einstein Brothers Bagels
Fandango
Logans Roadhouse
Burger King
Spa Week
Pandora
Hulu
Groupon
Starbucks
Subway
BenihanaApplebees
Olive Garden
Red Lobster
Buffalo Wild Wings
Coldstone Creamery
Chilis
Red Robin
Ruby Tuesdays
Darden Restaurants
IHOP
Cracker Barrel
AMC theatres
Chic-Fil-A
PF Changs
Disney
Rhapsody
Verizon Wireless prepaid

This is not really a great selection, but keep in mind that Target has these gift cards, and you can buy with REDcard at 5% off price.

While I was poking around a shopping cart at Target.com, another question came up. Can I purchase Visa or other gift cards with Target gift cards? When entering billing information, all payment methods are choose-able. At that time, I didn’t have any Target gift cards. So, all I could do was check the box, and there was no error message so far. I really need to make sure of this. I will update a result in blog “Target Visa Gift Card Tips and Tricks“

buy gift cards by gift card

target covert visa gift card

Ultimate Strategy of Fuel Rewards Network 1/2

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fuel rewards networkI believe the best way to save gas money is use Fuel Rewards Network (FRN). FRN is a reward program for Shell gas station. It is free to join. Sign up and request a membership card. You will need the card to redeem rewards, but you don’t need it to earn the rewards. Start earning today! There are two reasons this program is so great. One is there are many ways to earn the rewards, and the other is you can redeem as much reward as a price of gas. (it’s possible to pay only $0.01/gal.) Here are all the ways to earn FRN reward.

  • Linking your participating grocery store card and make a purchase (Participating grocery stores are not around the area I live. If they are in your neighborhood, you can get a steady flow of FRN reward on every day purchase)
  • Shopping at Shell convenience store, get a car wash or auto service at Shell (Buying bonus items in Shell store give you extra reward)
  • Purchasing Quaker State or Pennzoil motor oil (Find a special code under the caps)
  • Linking your MasterCard and use at restaurants (Choose a credit card which offer the best reward on the purchase at restaurants. You will earn both FRN and credit card’s reward)
  • Referring FRN to your friends (Send e-mails with a referral link to your friends. When your friends join FRN, you will earn 5¢/gal discount)
  • Other limited time offers
  • Shopping at FRN Online Mall

When I became a member and found the Online Mall in FRN, I got excited. The Online Mall is similar to credit cards’ such as ShopDiscover and Ultimate Rewards. I’m receiving lots of Cash Back from them on online purchases. I thought it was good opportunity to add another type of Online Mall for gas money. However, soon after I compared FRN Online Mall with ShopDiscover, I got disappointed. Because ShopDiscover’s reward would be better than FRN for all online retailers I usually shop. I might as well forget about FRN and keep using ShopDiscover.

2x reward with fuel rewards networkI couldn’t give up though, because $0.01/gal is so appealing. I looked for another way, then I found “2X Rewards at American Express Gift Cards“. In FRN Online Mall, every $50 purchase gives you 5¢/gal discount. For example, if you buy $500 AmEx gift card:

  • The reward is 5¢ x $500/$50 x 2(Bonus)=$1/gal
  • Since you can redeem the reward up to 20 gallons per transaction, the reward is worth $1×20=$20
  • Amex charge $3.95 as purchase fee and $8.95 for shipping cost, total fee is $12.90
  • $20-$12.90=$7.10 You even made a profit so far (plus, you may get cash back from credit card)

You now have $500 gift card which can be used anywhere it accepts American Express. You may buy groceries at a supermarket or wholesale items at Costco. But, let’s get more reward out of this gift card.

Buy Gift Card by Gift Card

buy gift cards to get frn rewardsGo back to FRN Online Mall and buy store’s gift cards with AmEx gift card and then make a purchase with store’s gift cards. As long as online store accepts AmEx, you can buy stores gift cards with AmEx gift card. It depends on stores that a purchase of gift cards or a purchase with store’s gift card is eligible for FRN reward. If both transactions are eligible for the reward, you will get another 5¢x$500/$50+5¢x$500/$50=$1/gal discount. (If the store gives bonus, $1/gal will be multiplied.) Great! you will have to spend $500 anyway, but you will get at least $2/gal discount.

This is a strategy for those who already have a plan to buy something online. You earn the reward on the purchase of AmEx gift card, and turn AmEx gift card into store’s gift cards, but you will have to make a final purchase at the stores with store’s gift cards. What I do (as an eBay and amazon seller) is buy items with store’s gift cards, and then sell items on eBay and amazon. I set the prices by adding only selling fee and shipping cost to the price I paid to the stores. I don’t make a profit from the sales, but the reward stays! For some items, I buy only on sale. For some items, use coupons, that helps me compete with other sellers. And not only FRN reward, but I also earn the reward of store’s loyalty programs, which will be also your profit!

Is there a way to only earn rewards without such a work as selling on eBay and amazon? See the details in the next article “Ultimate Strategy of Fuel Rewards Network 2/2”

Note you need to avoid using Discover cards to purchase AmEx gift cards. Discover treats the transactions as Cash Advance and charges a fee. As long as I know, Chase and Amex cards are safe to use for the purchase of Amex gift cards.