Sad news for all of us who have played the cash-advance-for-miles game at Home Depot...they will quit giving cash advances on Gift Certificates effective tomorrow, Sept. 3. This news just came from a local store manager, who did not know at what time on Sept. 3 the change would occur.

The game was that you purchased a $100 gift certificate with your mileage credit card, then used the GC to buy something small that you needed. According to Home Depot's rules, they would give you cash back for the difference.

Ref: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum.../004517-2.html

It was fun while it lasted, since you could get miles for cash advances and simultaneously avoid ATM fees when you needed cash.

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Middle_Seat

Did he say what the alternative will be? Will they let you use the card multiple times until it's all used up, or force you to use it all at once?

Sorry, (s)he did not say how it would work in the future. And, I did not look on the back of the GC package to see if there was any change in the text.


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Middle_Seat

It was great while it lasted. It always seemed very strange to me to be getting $90 change from a $100 gift certicate. I guess it finally seemed strange to Home Depot as well.

There was a thread a couple of months ago about discounted gift certs for Home Depot. It was through a program called Simple Rewards or something like that (I do remember that Readers Digest owned part of the company). The gift certs were 20% off in a rather complex rebate program. Did anyone try the 30 day trial and buy Home Depot certs?

Man, missed out on a neat trick! I always need something small at Home Depot. (Actually, probably always want to spend quite a few bucks there, but I try to *keep* it to something small.)

Anyway, slight topic drift, but since Dave asked about discounted certs I thought I would point out that Home Depot gift certs are one of the awards (probably one of the better ones, though that's a matter of preference) you can get in MyPoints. Since I've so far gotten all my points in that program without buying anything, to me it's like free money at Home Depot (or Barnes and Noble, etc).

But, good news for us stockholders!! That game and HD's practice of refunds in cash on card purchases always rankled me.

Does anyone know of any other nation brand stores where one can get cash back on a GC? Sears and Blockbusters have GC's - but they have 'stored value' so one cannot get extra miles. What made Home Depot so great was they took AmEx and I could get double miles.
Guess I'll go there today one last time for any GC's they still may be selling.

In most stores you can get a small amount of cash back from a gift certificate, if it's less than $5 for instance. Otherwise they would issue more store credit if you didn't use the entire value. With those cards, though, I don't know. Since they store the value in there electronically, it probably avoids altogether the idea of getting cash back from them. Though apparently these cards were in use at Home Depot and still they gave cash back. I don't know why that should be. Those cards should be able to be used over and over again deducting whatever necessary value.

Indeed this is very very sad!!!
This schem helped me when i was in Livonia running out of cash!!

Oh well...good things always end..



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Albert

Some of the larger shopping malls offer gift certificates that one may use at any of the stores in the mall. Last Christmas, I received one of these for $50 at a large mall in Northern Virginia, purchased something for $12 and receievd the rest of the change in cash. Not sure if the giver paid cash or used a credit card or paid cash, but there was no notation on the gift certificate. I believe cash is given since it would be difficult to equip every store with the ability to offer a "mall credit" for the balance.

This may be an option for those of you who find that this is no longer possible at Home Depot. With a shopping mall, you can cash certificates at multiple stores without making multiple purchases at the same store. Also, you would have multiple options if some stores are more strict on giving back cash.

Hope this helps.

I have tried the programs where you can buy Home Depot GC for 20% off. The way it works is send and pay (via CC) for the $25 GC and at the end of the next month you get a $5 credit back to your CC. I bought a bunch from Home Depot (since you can always find stuff you need there). I haven't seen the rebate yet, but I'm sure it will come shortly. The program was called HomeWorks. don't have details with me.

GYK, I wonder whether the company cited in the following thread is coordinating the HomeWorks program - ?

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum...ML/001047.html


Please let us know of details regarding your experience, particularly if the 20% credit does get applied, & in the ~timeframe cited. Thanks in advance...

Getting a 20% rebate for Home Depot GCs was the primary reason for my posting the inquiry I did in the referenced thread.

Yes, the 20% does get applied. The time frame that it gets applied depends on when you order your certificates. In any case, in whatever month you order the 20% is applied back to your credit card at the end of the month.

For example, if you bought $100 worth at the beginning of August (you would earn $20 for this order) and then you order another $100 on August 28 (for another $20 in rebate), the $40 should post by the end of August, or in the beginning of September.

I can confirm this because I ordered all my gift cert's from them from August 20 of this year on, and I got the rebate posted to my credit card on September 4, just a few days ago.

hoangb, w/ what program did you sign up (i.e. specific name that was used)? I'm just wondering...

Does the program that you signed up w/ have a yearly limit re: $ amount total for GCs purchased?

Thanks for the post re: confirming that the rebate gets applied, & in ~the next month.

Thanks for sending me the link to the thread about Simple Rewards, it was the one I was thinking about. Unfortunately, in trying to link to their site, first, up comes a security certificate warning. Ignoring that and attempting to sign up for he 30 day trial gets yet another error message.