With both the TopCashBack and the Barclay RewardsBoost portals offering generous payouts, it’s a good time to buy American Express gift cards. To sweeten the deal, American Express is waiving the $3.95 purchase fee with promo code FPMOM. The code is good through May 11, 2014, as part of a Mother’s Day promotion.
Keep in mind that if your shopping portal of choice does not list the above code, you may not be eligible for cash back if you use it anyway. The code is currently listed on the Barclay RewardsBoost page, though not on the TopCashBack page. It’s also provided by BigCrumbs, though the payout is comparatively measly at 1.25%.
Regardless of the waived fees, buying American Express gift cards at the current payout is a great way to manufacture spend and generate extra cash. Taking card fees out of the equation, the maximum $5,000 purchase would result in 30,000 miles from Barclays with the Arrival Plus card. That’s equivalent to $300 in travel credits or $150 in statement credits towards other purchases. The out of pocket is just $5.95 – $8.95 for shipping. You can eliminate this expense altogether by signing up for a free trial of the Amex Premium Shipping plan.
You would then use the card to purchase Simon Mall Visa or OneVanilla gift cards, load those onto Bluebird or cash out via Walmart money orders. This would incur fees of $2.95-$3.95 per $500, depending on the card. Walmart money orders would incur another $0.25-$0.90 cents per $1,000. You could also unload $1,000 worth of American Express gift cards free of charge via Amazon Payments. If you do buy Visa/OneVanilla gift cards, you can use some of these gift cards to pay your bills via Evolve Money.
Disclosure: TopCashBack pays out a small commission when you use my link to register and earn $10 in rewards. I appreciate your support, regardless of whether you use my links or not.
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