Lock in eBay Gift Cards at 5% Off

5% Off eBay

We’ve mentioned in the past that eBay is currently paying out on eBay e-gift cards purchased from Paypal Digital Gifts. We also mentioned that Ebates is offering 5% back on gift cards. This is a very odd phenomenon where gift cards are being bonused at a higher rate than other purchases.

You can now lock in 5% off all future eBay purchases, whether you’ll be purchasing gift cards on eBay or other products. Note, that officially eBay gift cards aren’t supposed to get cashback at all, so you won’t be able to file a missing cashback claim if it doesn’t post automatically. And there’s always the possibility of the cashback getting clawed back and not paid out.

5% is really a top portal rate for eBay and it may be worthwhile locking in all future purchases at the 5% discounted rate. And you’ll be able to get the  portal cashback again – at whatever rate it will be – when you make the purchase. The 5% is just an additional bonus on top of that.

I have no idea how long this 5% will last, but it’s been a couple days now, both on Ebates and on FatWallet cashback sites. Hopefully, it will keep up.

My Thoughts

I was inspired to post this because Ebates just sent me an email confirming that I had received cashback for my eBay e-gift card purchase.

I had purchased the $100 Sears deal immediately but the $200 Sears gift card for $175 I held off on. I first purchased $200 in eBay e-gift cards and after getting those, I waited a few hours (for the activation to complete) and I then purchased the $200 Sears gift card. The confirmation just came in from Ebates reporting both cashback transactions in my account.

 

The first purchase is the 5% of $200 eBay e-gift cards, and the second purchase is for the $175 Sears gift card. (I now have $25 left over.)

The $200 Sears gift card deal is still around, so you may still be able to take advantage of the double-dip, with a risk of the Sears gift card dying.

Once I got that confirmation from Ebates, I purchased another $200 worth of eBay e-gift cards which I’ll use for some purchase in the future.

And remember that Frequent Miler reported that Chase INK is apparently paying out 5x on these eBay purchases.

[RELATED: Stacking Discounts with eBay]