Office Depot OfficeMax (I literally never remember which parts of that store name are supposed to have a space and which aren’t) has another negative cost manufactured spend opportunity available: $15 back on a purchase of $300 or more in Mastercard Gift Cards. For the best bang for your buck:
- Link your credit card(s) to Dosh in the mobile app before heading to the store. You’ll get an extra 2% back, up to $10 per day
- Buy two $200 Mastercard gift cards
- Get two more $200 Mastercard gift cards, and go to step (2) with another transaction (if you’ve got a friendly cashier)
- Log in to Dosh a few hours after the transaction to claim your cash back
You’ll spend $398.90 per transaction for $400.00 in gift cards and you’ll get another $7.97 cash back from Dosh.
One of the frequent questions I get lately is “How can you liquidate these from home?” I’ve got a few answers that I’m glad to share publicly, and a few that are more fragile so I won’t share them here. I will however drop the generic tip that I encourage you to explore around — opportunities do exist. Start looking for payment processors and bill payment platforms because that’s where pay dirt usually lies. In the mean time though, you can liquidate from home via:
- Bravo payment app: see the defunct Middle Aged Miles blog for more. Side note: do some great internet sleuthing and app hacking if you want better than 2.9% rates, but it’s fraught with peril and you should probably never take my advice about anything
- Paying estimated taxes quarterly, two per payment processor (PayUSATax, PayTax1040, ACI Payments)
- Micro-lending on Kiva
- Reloading your Amazon balance
- Pay your utility bills, most accept “debit” card payments
Good luck out there!
