OK, so the recent thread about Esso and AP where some people are buying gas in $3 increments to maximize their mileage got me thinking......how many of us have tried to maximize our rewards by eliminating rounding errors? I'll confess to the following:

1) The Canadian Tire Options Mastercard claims that "you will receive a reward of 1% of all non-CT purchases as CT 'Money on the Card'". In reality, they give you $0.10 for every $10 you spend. To make matters worse, this rule is applied on a per transaction basis. So if I make two $15 purchases, I get $0.10 from each purchase, for a grand total of $0.20, which works out to 0.67% in this case. In response to significant loss due to round-off error, I will only use my CT options MC for non-CT purchases only when the purchase amount is a multiple of $10.

2) Petro points are awarded as 1 petro point for every $0.10 of gas purchased. I have been known to round my purchases up to the next $0.10 increment, even if it meant buying an extra $0.09 of gas.

3) When purchasing gas at Canadian Tire Gas Bars, I usually purchase gas in multiples of 10 liters to maximize the amount of Canadian Tire money that I receive.

4) When purchasing gas at Pioneer, I usually purchase gas in multiples of 10 liters to maximize the number of Bonus Bucks that I receive.

5) Purchasing gas in $3 increments at Esso, so as to maximize the number of AP that I receive.

I know this is fairly insignificant (except for #1), but I just can't help myself sometimes. My name is notam, and I'm a mileage whore.