FROM the supermarket shop to booking summer holidays, you can earn money back on almost everything.
Cashback websites, apps and cards can net you hundreds or even thousands of pounds. TopCashback, for instance, reckons its average user makes £345 a year.
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Laura Whateley reveals how to make the most of all the schemes out there . . . to supercharge your earnings.
CLICK TO EARN
FREE-TO-JOIN cashback websites like Quidco and TopCashback are the first place to start.
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Just log in and check whether the shop you are planning to buy from is offering cashback. Then click through from the link on the cashback website and fill your basket as normal. Shops pay a percentage that can be anything between one and 40 per cent of what you spend or a fixed amount. For example, TopCashback is offering £36 if you get car insurance quotes from GoCompare and then buy a policy.
It normally takes a few weeks for the cashback to be paid into your digital wallet on the sites. You can then transfer the money to your bank or PayPal account. Or you could convert your earnings into vouchers for a range of shops, to get a slightly higher amount. Another site, Kidstart, lets you top up your children’s savings by earning cashback when you shop with over 2,500 brands.
Only use cashback sites when shopping for items that you would be buying anyway. If one shop is offering a good cashback rate but another has the item you want at a lower price, go for the latter.
LAYER UP
MAKE cashback pay more by layering where possible. Use a cashback website, then pay with a cashback credit card and use loyalty cards like Nectar or Boots Advantage to collect points as usual.
REFER PALS
BOOST your earnings by referring friends . . . and they will thank you once their own cashback starts rolling in.
KidStart and Airtime Rewards pay up to £5 for a referral, while TopCashback pays up to £30.
Other companies you might use, such as BT and Virgin Media, offer £50 giftcards.
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PAY-NOW-BUY-LATER WITH GIFTCARDS
YOU can get extra-generous cashback rates if you buy gift cards or credit for places where you know you will shop.
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This trick is great if you are certain of going to Asda for your groceries, for example, or if you are about to buy a new washing machine at Currys.
The JamDoughnut app lets you buy credit with more than 100 well-known brands and earn cashback in the form of points.
A point is worth 1p and you can take your payout once you have racked up £10.
On TopCashback’s TopGiftCards section, you can buy cards for loads of shops and restaurants. Only do this if you plan to buy something specific in the near future. Otherwise, you risk not using your card before its expiry date. Plus, if the company goes bust it could be worthless.
Right now the app is paying six per cent cashback when you buy credit at TK Maxx, to spend in-store or online. So buy £20 and you would get 120 points worth £1.20.
RECEIPTS = VOUCHERS
EARN cashback on your weekly shop by snapping your receipt with apps like HuYu and Shoppix.
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They sell the information to companies that want to understand customers’ buying habits.
Huyu gives you points worth 5p when you scan a paper receipt from any of the major supermarkets, or 10p if you forward an email receipt. You get a £5 voucher for every 500 points you earn, which you can spend in lots of places including Amazon, Argos, Asda and more.
With Shoppix you earn tokens for every receipt you snap from any shop, apart from travel companies. When you have 3,200 tokens in your online account you can withdraw £5 via PayPal or take a voucher for Amazon or iTunes.
Snap up to 30 receipts a week and you’ll usually get 30 tokens for each one.
PAY PHONE BILL WITH PASTIES
FANCY being paid for eating sausage rolls? The Airtime Rewards app lets you link debit cards, including through Apple Pay, to its site.
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You get money off your phone bill any time you spend at Greggs, Boots, Tesco, Argos and more.
Typically you get back £1 per purchase and the app said users tend to do this three or four times a month. Once you have earned £10, you can use it towards your next phone bill from O2, Three, EE, Giffgaff or Vodafone, if you pay monthly – or get a pay-as-you-go voucher.
Got an account with digital banks Monzo or Starling? Sign up to Flux to earn cashback when you shop at lots of places, including ordering food from Just Eat and KFC.
BANK A BONUS
LOTS of banks will pay you cashback to switch your account to them and pay in a certain amount. HSBC offers £170 on its Advance account, First Direct pays £150 on its 1st Account, the Club Lloyds account pays £125 and Nationwide’s FlexDirect pays up to £125.
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You could also earn cashback on the bills you pay by direct debit with Santander’s 123 Lite account, but it has a £2 a month fee. It pays three per cent on water bills, two per cent on energy, and one per cent on council tax, mobile phone, broadband, TV and any Santander mortgage.
Cashback is capped at £5 a month for each tier so the maximum you could earn is £15 and your bills would have to be extremely high to get that.
Digital bank Chase offers one per cent cashback on debit card purchases for the first year, but there’s currently a five-week wait to open an account.
BE CARD SMART
CASHBACK credit cards let you earn every time you shop, but you’ll need a good credit score to qualify. Repay your balance in full each month, otherwise the interest cancels out the benefits.
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Best of the bunch is the American Express Platinum Cashback Everyday card, which pays five per cent on your first three months’ spending, up to a maximum of £100 cashback. After that it pays 0.5 per cent on spending up to £10,000 a year and you’ll need to spend a minimum of £3,000 a year to earn anything at all. It pays one per cent on any spending over £10,000 in a year.
Amex usually runs several “Shop Small” promotions each year where cardholders typically earn £5 back on a £15 spend at selected local stores for a set period – the next is from June 13-26. Before applying for any credit card, use an eligibility checker such as the one on MoneySavingExpert.com to see if you’re likely to be accepted.
‘STEAK BAKES AND GIFT CARDS PAY OFF’
CASHBACK king and Thrifty Chap blogger Joseph Seager, 36, has made more than £4,000 over the past ten years via Quidco, TopCashback, Shopmium and other apps.
The dad of three from Leyland, Lancs, used Airtime Rewards for a year and earned £30, which covered three months of his EE mobile contract.
He says: “Yes, you really can help pay your phone bill by eating a steak bake!”
Joseph also earns cashback buying Asda giftcards on the JamDoughnut app before doing his weekly shop, accumulating £200 in a year.
He adds: “I’m not usually a huge fan of gift cards because of the risks (if a store goes bust) but if you use them straight away, they can be great.”
At the supermarket he uses apps Shopmium and CheckoutSmart to get cashback on individual products such as ice cream or wine – and sometimes picks up freebies too.
‘DOLLARS FOR HOLS GIVE EXTRA BOOST’
SINCE signing up to TopCashback in June 2021, savvy shopper Sandy Drew has earned a handy £1,300.
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Now the 54-year-old operations director from Cockfield, Co Durham, says she is hooked.
Sandy has used it for everything from servicing her car at KwikFit to ordering pizza from Domino’s and booking flights on Opodo.
She also bought Christmas presents for her husband. Sandy says: “I’ll often go to a shopping centre to see what I want to buy and then go back home to find out where I can get the best cashback.
“I’m also saving up for a cruise to Orlando in September.
“I’ll use the money in my TopCashback wallet to buy dollars for the trip from Post Office Money, with an extra cashback boost on top.”
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