Update 12/11/23: Deal has now increased from 5% to 10% (ht Bockrr). In-app the offer has a $30 max and expiration of 12/17; online the max is $15 and has a longer expiration of 12/24. (ht Tikky)
The Offer
- Rakuten has added Staples as an in-store cashback store for 5% back when you save the offer and use a linked card.
The Fine Print
- Offer valid through 12/24/2023.
- Maximum Cash Back of $15.
- Maximum 3 redemptions per member.
- Offer not valid at locations in US territories.
- In-Store offers not valid for online purchases and cannot be combined with other offers.
- Offer not valid for gift card purchases.
Our Verdict
Excludes gift card purchases, but maybe it’ll work anyway.
Hat tip to GC Galore
I did one in-store purchase on December 14 that included minimal non-gift cards, and then three back-to-back GC purchases on December 17. The last three never showed up, but the first one’s $30 is still there. They say I’ll be getting a check for it next month,
My one only purchase wasn’t reversed. I did toss in a small item to make the amount an odd amount.
Throwing in an extra item has always been good practice we just grew complacent. My odd amount transaction has also remained unlike my 3 even amount transactions.
It’s been over 7 days since I made my purchases, no claw backs. I added small item to each of my GC purchases, maybe that has helped. Nothing for certain until the payout comes, of course.
12/12 & 12/14 no clawbacks for me! Gift card purchases.
Even $ amounts or did you add an item to mix up the $?
Another clawback here, 2 of my 4 $30 amounts were clawed back yesterday, I’m sure the other ones will be today.
It was in the terms that gift cards are excluded, so I(and everyone else here) have absolutely nothing to moan about. Oh well, on to the next offer/bonus
Welp my 12/14 transaction disappeared from my account now. So yeah all transactions involving gift cards are being clawed back.
Yep 12/14 and 12/15 disappeared for me sometime this afternoon.
Also seeing clawbacks though I am not terribly surprised. Some may recall it was Staples that led to clawbacks for folks hitting multiple Amex offers at Staples some years back. In my case I was going buy the GCs anyway so easy come, easy go.
My transactions were also clawed back. So looking forward, should I have added a pack of gum or misc to each order to keep this from happening in the future or does their system have receipt level info that would still remove the gift card amount?
It’s too early to tell that those that added gum or something else would qualify. We need to give it another week or so before all the 12/14 transactions clear and more data points to know if any transactions involving GC were honored. I don’t think Staples is looking at a certain dollar amount to determine the cash back. They have the records and can easily validate it if they want to especially if they are a huge influx of cash back requests.
just adding my DP, my 1 txn for $1000 ($30 cashback) got clawed back this morning.
1 of 2 $30 cash backs were clawed back. I expect the second one to be clawed back. Not surlrised. They did have gift cards as excluded so people shouldn’t cry foul.
Oh there will be people crying foul no matter what. People feel entitled nowadays.