Here's something to consider, if you're buying one of each of those listed above:

During this time of year, before Christmas, Applebees and Chili's usually offer a bonus card for gift cards purchased at their brick and mortar stores.

Keep in mind a bonus card is more like a coupon than an actual gift card, and is usually usable after January 2nd.

From time to time around the holidays, Regal Cinemas have also offered a bonus card-- usually valid for a free soda or popcorn when you buy a gift card at one of their theatres.

I'm not really familiar with how it works with Bath and Body Works, but it's possible they also offer some sort of bonus card during the holidays.

If you redeem your points for Gift Cards from MyPoints, you won't see any of the Christmas promotional bonus cards these places offer.

Just something to ponder. :)

Max,
Thank you for the feedback. You are correct it is something to ponder.

When do you prefer to purchase gift cards through MyPoints.com?

-Sandra

Hey Sandra,

I now personally redeem my MyPoints only for United Mileage Plus miles, as to me this holds the most personal value. But for many other people--- especially those wanting to save money on expenses, they redeem for gift cards.

Years ago however, I would redeem MyPoints for JCPenney gift cards to redeem them in store to purchase Jewelry when they'd have huge markdowns. You can use more JCPenney Gift Cards in store than you can online.

As to the timing, I'd redeem when I would have enough points for the max gift card, since most of the high value redemptions are the best values-- of course one should always do the math.

But again now I just redeem for Mileage Plus miles. [even though every 6 months or so MyPoints keeps increasing the redemption price for the miles]

-Max M

I'll use up my points and then drop MyPoints -- just not worth the bother anymore.

My husband's account balance jumped by 500 points on Nov 4. The description reads "other."

Anyone know what it may be? He hasn't purchased anything, and all his points are via 5 point clicks on ads or surveys.

If you buy gift cards, you may want to stick with MyPoints. They have been offering 1000 points per gift card purchased at Swappable for the last two months. These are often e-gift cards without any shipping fees. Swappable also offers cash back on many of their gift cards. Of course, MyPoints could stop promoting that at any time . . .

Arghhh..

I just went to try to redeem some points for an e gift card. The system is asking me to authenticate with my password and date of birth. I put it all in, and it rejects it, probably due to the DOB not being in their system. Well, I opened this account in 1999 and it's not likely they were asking for a DOB at that time. I can't find anywhere in the account profile/settings where I can enter it.

I tested with my husband's account, which is from 2002, and it accepted his DOB and I was able to redeem. I also looked for where his DOB might be entered and can't find it either.

After it didn't authenticate me it sent me to a form to fill out to go to their customer service - and who knows how long that's going to take.

I still can't believe they're trying to authenticate against information that can't be entered anywhere, nor was universally requested at account open.

Anyone else run into this?

Happened to my girlfriend too. She filled out the form Tuesday and got a boilerplate email saying they'd received her inquiry, but because of so many inquiries it was taking longer than normal to respond. So far, nothing further. tls

Arrgh... I can't find United MP on the mypoints site, have they dropped them? I am just about at the new 13,000 point level. I seem to recall a few years ago they disappeared for a while too, hopefully they don't reappear at an even higher redemption level.

It disappears from time to time, and then reappears. I redeemed for United miles not too long ago, maybe a few weeks. I expect they'll be back. tls

Could be it's my fault, I redeemed 13,000 earlier this week. Probably got all they had.

MyPoints Redemptions
 

I normally redeem for Amazon gift cards. I just keep them until I want to order something online as they don't seem to expire and Amazon carries most everything. You can use more than one at a time. :)

Amazon does not count "each" gift card. Your gift card balance is the sum of all your gift cards and Amazon just deduct the order value from your balance. it is a good place to "store" all your incentive earning because it does not expire and small amounts do add up over time. :)

My beef with My Point is their Surveys. Too many times the surveys took a lot of info then abruptly disqualified you. Or some surveys before you even started, immediately thrown you out. The latter actually is slightly better than wasting a bunch of time and only got back 5 pts.

Did this when they ran the promotion on 11/5/15, the 10k bonus was supposed to post by 12/5 but so far nothing. And their feedback system does not accept any messages it seems: "Currently we are not able to register your request. Please try again later."

These always take personal attention from CS. However, the T&C's usually say for first time players, but that isn't always the case and CS has been known to "waive" it.