Get "UNLIMITED" AA miles for less than $0.01 per mile

 
Old Apr 20, 2004, 10:48 am
  #76  
 
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I think the max you can get 90,000 miles as 50,000 miles is the limit on the bonus miles. (I am including the Pointsplus bonus miles in the 50k)

You would need to get 86000ish ebay anypoints to get the 40k miles which then would attracted the 50k in bonus miles (Special 3rd birthday promo on www.points.com).

Also should you not be the buyer at the auction as he/she is the one who receives the ebay points for buying the item?

I still quite like the idea of earning 1500 ebaypoints/1600 miles per priceline stay.

The limit on my paypal account is 550GBP (1000US).
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 11:20 am
  #77  
 
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One more wrench to throw in the works:
For those who plan on receiving large CC payments via Paypal, I received the following Policy Update last month:

"U.S. User Business Information

Notice Date: March 4, 2004
Effective Date: April 13, 2004

Effective May 2004, PayPal will require U.S. Premier and Business users who receive more than $2,000.00 USD a month in payment volume through PayPal over three consecutive months to provide supplemental information about their businesses including business categorization, sales venue and business URL information. "


--
According to my math, in order to maximize your bonus and receive 100K AA mi, you'd have to setup an auction for $9555.56
This would cost you (via the seller): $842.41
Assuming you paid with a CC, your effective cost per AA mi: 0.769cents/mi.

No thanks, I'll stick with CharterOne for now.
By my calc ($2.46 per 1K mi for CharterOne/Money Orders), that's only $246 for 100K AA mi. Sure, it's over 20 months but hey, that's a ~$600 savings -- and I can make up a good chunk of the $246 in interest.
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 11:58 am
  #78  
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A warning...

Originally Posted by verse99

With a special promotion 1 point is a little more than 1 mile.

The cost are also a little more than that since you also have to pay fees to eBay for "selling" a $ 5000 items.

Look at my original post.

If PayPal puts your account in "limited access" status-- and yes, for some reason it is PayPal, not eBay who enforces this-- they can and will freeze your balance at the drop of a hat, and hold onto your money for 180 days, or even worse. Contacting them via phone, e-mail and fax will have no effect.

Any sign of an auction that is "not an auction" as it were can result in this "limited" status at PayPal-- even if both parties are mutually agreeable and it is 100% apparent (and conceded by PayPal) that no fraud or illegality has been committed, you will be treated the same way as a fraudster would be, w/ no chance to appeal in a meaningful way. Trust me.

For more on what PayPal does and does not do, take a look here: http://www.paypalsucks.com/

It's quite sobering.
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 12:33 pm
  #79  
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Originally Posted by JonNYC
If PayPal puts your account in "limited access" status-- and yes, for some reason it is PayPal, not eBay who enforces this-- they can and will freeze your balance at the drop of a hat, and hold onto your money for 180 days, or even worse. Contacting them via phone, e-mail and fax will have no effect.

Any sign of an auction that is "not an auction" as it were can result in this "limited" status at PayPal-- even if both parties are mutually agreeable and it is 100% apparent (and conceded by PayPal) that no fraud or illegality has been committed, you will be treated the same way as a fraudster would be, w/ no chance to appeal in a meaningful way. Trust me.

For more on what PayPal does and does not do, take a look here: http://www.paypalsucks.com/

It's quite sobering.
Paypal is infamous for a reason. Paypal's BBB complaints are near legendary.
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 1:02 pm
  #80  
 
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Originally Posted by verse99
Why? It's not stealing! As long as you pay the eBay fees they still make almost $ 500 off you. It's all within the guidelines so they shouldn't care if my wife sells me a domain.



It's not stealing just like it is not stealing miles buyng 5000 cases of Kellogg's


Personal account have low limits.....


Okay guys, I want to clarify something. Ebay rules specifically state that family members and close friends CANNOT bid on one another's auctions. If you do, it is grounds for suspension. If you're suspended, you will lose your anything points as well. If you decide to take that risk, don't say I didn't warn you because you could get caught. That is why I said to use a more distant family member who lives in a different place and has a different last name. If you wife sells you something, you are going against ebay's policies and you could end up with more trouble than it was worth.

Perhaps stealing is a misleading word. I think it is just how ebay's mind would work if you're manipulating the system like this.

I never thought about the low limit thing. That is a good point.


But I want to re-emphasize not to bid on your wife's auction. If you bid on an item listed from your IP address, it sends off red flags to ebay, and they could investigate, especially if there are anything points involved. Sure, you're paying their fees, but they may not see your logic, and they do often suspend without reason. In looking through someone's feedback profile the other day, I saw half the sellers were no longer registered. It is like an ebay epidemic. If you want to risk it, then fine, but you're taking a big risk.

Last edited by chicaloca453; Apr 20, 2004 at 1:10 pm
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 1:47 pm
  #81  
 
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Question What's wrong with PayPal?

Originally Posted by GUWonder
Paypal is infamous for a reason. Paypal's BBB complaints are near legendary.
I've found PayPal to be quite helpful in transferring funds between bank accounts (for free). Why is everyone down on them?
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 2:23 pm
  #82  
 
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It does work... and fast

A 4000USD auction offering 5ebay pts per dollar will result in fees of:

Ebay Anything Points Cost 200.00
Listing Fee 4.80
Sales Fee 73.12
PayPal 116.30

This will get you 20,000 ebay points that are doubled to 40,000. The person you send this to can then simply buy a separate item from you and send you your money back. If you so choose you could then simply ping the 4000 back and forth until you get bored while racking up points along the way.

The ebay points post in under 24 hours and are doubled immediately. Approximately 2 hours after your ebay anything points post you new balance will be reflected at points.com (except weekends for some reason). You can then transfer to the mileage program of your choice which in some cases is instant. Any special bonuses seem to run on a batch and seem to happen on a weekly basis. So from auction to points in a mileage program is under 28 hours.

Good luck but pay attention to the paypal warnings.

Rich
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 3:27 pm
  #83  
 
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One more note of warning for those who plan on opening a sharebuilder.com acct just for the extra eBay Anything pts:
* Have you tried closing your acct?

This thread reminded me that I should
* You can turn off your emails
* You can turn off your automatic deposit plan
* You can withdraw your funds

However, there is NO WAY to close your acct from being accessible online.
It's complete BS! I called them and they gave me some line about "per NASD regulations" we are unable to comply with your request. They said that the acct was put on "restricted" status so no trades can be made and no one will be able to access your acct anyway without a username/password. My argument was that I didn't care if they backed up my information on some secure intranet - I didn't want my personal address information web-accessible page. In the end, since they won't completely remove my acct I just populated all the data fields with crap information.

Just a word of warning.
-g
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 3:35 pm
  #84  
 
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Originally Posted by ScottTexas
I've found PayPal to be quite helpful in transferring funds between bank accounts (for free). Why is everyone down on them?


Paypal IS quite helpful UNTIL you sell something to a dishonest buyer and ship to an unconfirmed address (which I'll never do again). And then the buyer has the item and files a chargeback claim, which freezes your Paypal account as if you were a crook who never sent it out. Then, your money is tied up in Paypal. You can't receive payments for new auctions, and you can't get anywhere near the money in your account pending investigation. Then, in the end, you're out the item and the money plus some major headaches.

If you just want to use Paypal to pay for auctions and simple money management, it is great, especially the billpay function. BUT if you ever get caught in the middle of someone else's scam, Paypal really stinks.
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 3:56 pm
  #85  
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I would advise to be very careful with the eBay/PayPal if you try to do a single $5000 transaction or multiple relatively big transactions in a very short period of time.

It is very likely that your PayPal account will be frozen and the money held for 180 days before released.

Last edited by holtju2; Apr 20, 2004 at 6:15 pm Reason: typo
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 4:54 pm
  #86  
 
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NY Times

Has anyone figured out if the electronic edition of the NY Times qualifies for the anything points? That is the best deal for the points.
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 7:30 pm
  #87  
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EDIT: This deal is now on FW - this creates a huge problem, it'll die really really soon...so get your points and get out
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 9:10 pm
  #88  
 
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Question What is FW?

Originally Posted by MazdaMP
EDIT: This deal is now on FW - this creates a huge problem, it'll die really really soon...so get your points and get out
What is FW and why is this a problem?
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 9:12 pm
  #89  
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Originally Posted by ScottTexas
What is FW and why is this a problem?
FW = www.fatwallet.com which is one of the hot sites for deals and freebies. Tons of visitors.
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Old Apr 20, 2004, 9:49 pm
  #90  
 
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Originally Posted by MazdaMP
EDIT: This deal is now on FW - this creates a huge problem, it'll die really really soon...so get your points and get out
NOOOOO.... what have I done...????

In any case the math worked, but some of you got me a little scared now of having 5K stuck in PayPal and loosing my eBay feedback of 5000.

I did send the following message to eBay and will let you know what they respond....


Message: I understand friends or family members may not bid on once auctions in order to prevent proxy bidding.

However, is the following scenario allowed?

My friend sells me an Buy It Now item on eBay for $ 5000. I earn double eBay points with your promotion that I will than turn into AA Miles using points.com

eBay and PayPal still get almost $ 500 for this transaction in fees.

Let me know if eBay or PayPal would have a problem with this?
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