Discover 1% Cashback Checking Adds Restriction for Cash Equivalents, Bank Funding, and Peer Payments

Last December, Discover introduced a new 1% cashback rewards offer for using the debit card associated with a Discover Cashback Checking account, up to $30 cashback per month. Today, Discover sent out an email indicating updated terms on the account (new terms can be found on this PDF). The new terms exclude certain transactions from earning cashback.

The following transactions are now excluded:

  • ATM transactions (I assume this was always the case)
  • The purchase of money orders or cash equivalents
  • Cash over portions of point-of-sale transactions
  • Loan payments
  • Prepaid card funding
  • Peer-to-Peer (P2P) payments are not eligible for cash back rewards
  • In addition, purchases made using third-party payment accounts (services such as Venmo and PayPal, who also provide P2P payments) may not be eligible for cash back rewards

Venmo allows using a debit card free for peer payments, and that’s now excluded. Loan payments via Plastiq or other bill payment services are excluded in the terms, as are prepaid card funding, and likely bank account funding.

No idea if these new restrictions are actually being actually enforced or not. Looks like tax payments are not excluded so that idea can still be used to turn a small profit. I’m sure there are still other possible plays as well.

 

Hat tip to ram16x on r/churning

[Post has been updated]

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23 Comments
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vic
vic (@guest_1071459)
October 11, 2020 15:09
Paolo
Paolo (@guest_816207)
September 29, 2019 18:15

Will paying for rent using debit card qualify? Thanks

Dheeraj
Dheeraj (@guest_866902)
January 7, 2020 02:33

Any update?

JoBob
JoBob (@guest_876218)
January 14, 2020 17:37

Been paying rent with the card and getting cashback after opening back in August

don
don (@guest_904487)
February 10, 2020 12:01

have you been paying directly through an apartment’s portal or indirectly through something else?

OZ
OZ (@guest_767146)
June 5, 2019 13:03

Bummer. Was thinking about getting one to pay for mortgage.

brad
brad (@guest_611622)
July 2, 2018 11:40

Thought most of those terms were there from the start???

David
David (@guest_609128)
June 27, 2018 07:52

Meh, don’t care. When they got rid of Bill pay 10 cent rewards I stopped using billpay… and 1% for using a debit card is junk too.

Phill
Phill (@guest_609172)
June 27, 2018 11:19

+1….waste of MO’s and time as well. Although I certainly miss ST Delta debit card days.

Max
Max (@guest_609039)
June 26, 2018 23:26

This language has been there from the start?

Dan
Dan (@guest_609004)
June 26, 2018 22:18

discover debit never earned cashback for venmo peer to peer transactions. I tried it when it first came out

Gatrix
Gatrix (@guest_609016)
June 26, 2018 22:45

That is weird. I tried to send $2 last month via venmo. There were two debits (-$2 each) and one credit (+$2) finally posted on my account. And I got $0.04 bonus. I checked that “Peer-to-Peer (P2P) payments are not eligible” at that time. But I didn’t know why this happened. Never tried that since then.

Dan
Dan (@guest_609771)
June 28, 2018 13:12

Not really following… are you disputing what i said or not?

Dan
Dan (@guest_760796)
May 19, 2019 02:39

Not really following? He earned 1% cashback sending p2p payments on Venmo. Still with me?

The next part is tricky: you said it never earned cashback for p2p payments on Venmo.

Conclusion: he’s disputing what you said.

So am I. It definitely did earn cashback for p2p payments on Venmo for a period, though it wasn’t supposed to per the terms.

whodidntante
whodidntante (@guest_608995)
June 26, 2018 22:02

It’s almost like they don’t want to give me money for nothing.

W
W (@guest_609091)
June 27, 2018 01:32

Weird

Wilson
Wilson (@guest_609126)
June 27, 2018 07:06

it’s almost like Discover doesn’t want to make money, assuming they collected more than a 1% processing fee, since customers will stop using the card with no incentive

JT
JT (@guest_608993)
June 26, 2018 21:58

Discover debit also hardcoded against WM MOs with this rollout as well.

Brandon
Brandon (@guest_609043)
June 26, 2018 23:31

They’ve given cashback on every pin transaction I’ve performed so far

JT
JT (@guest_609046)
June 26, 2018 23:33

I got the $30 one time at the end of May for $3000 worth of MOs. Tried it again here in june and my card gets declined at the money center for MOs but works fine to buy an item in the store.

Radster
Radster (@guest_609840)
June 28, 2018 14:16
  JT

I had the same experience. They also sent me a letter stating CB for my first MO purchase would be reversed. But that hasn’t happened yet.