May 23, 2012
Today is our last chance to get 15 points per dollar when shopping at Sears through the Southwest Airlines shopping portal (Rapid Rewards Shopping). In the post “Sears 15X: Leveraging the deal” I showed a number of ways to capitalize on this promotion. Today, I will do something a little bit different…
My goal today is to find items at Sears that I can buy and re-sell for minimal loss. First, I’ll buy eGift cards for 15X Southwest points, and then I’ll double-dip: I’ll use those gift cards to make my purchases. Overall, I should earn 30 points per dollar for my purchases. My overall goal is to earn enough points for a companion pass (110,000 points) for as little out of pocket loss as possible.
I will update this post multiple times today as I make progress.
UPDATE 1 (8:30 AM EST): Currently I’m researching Sears.com to find good deals. My goal is to find expensive but small and lightweight electronics that can be resold easily and for minimal loss. From past deals, I still have almost $500 worth of Sears gift cards, so I’m planning to buy $3500 worth of new gift cards and then buy at least $3850 worth of merchandise. The gift card purchases should net 52,500 Southwest points, and the merchandise purchases should net another 57,750 for a total of 110,250 points.
UPDATE 2 (9:30 AM EST): Well, BoardingArea is down so I haven’t been able to publish this post, but I’ll keep on plugging away. So far I’ve found one item that looks like a great candidate for resale. I’ll keep looking to see if I can find at least one more so that I can minimize my risk through diversification. From past experience, I know that eGift cards take about an hour to arrive and usually involve a call from Sears’ fraud department so I’ll get started on that part right now…
UPDATE 3 (10:05 AM EST): OK, I bought $3500 worth of eGift cards! Now it appears that BoardingArea is running again, so I’ll try to publish this, and then I’ll continue to research what to buy.
UPDATE 4 (12:20 PM EST): I now know what I want to buy. I only found one item that I’m sure I can resell for a reasonable price, so I’ll go with that. I have about $700 worth of personal purchases to make as well. In total I’ll buy $3200 worth of the re-sellable item and $700 worth of items to keep. The only problem? The gift cards haven’t arrived yet! I’ve never seen them take longer than an hour before. I did get an email saying that “additional processing time is needed.” I’m guessing Sears is getting a lot of gift card orders today. If mine don’t arrive soon, I’ll call them.
UPDATE 5 (12:50 PM EST): Ooh, this is interesting! I finally got a call from Sears’ fraud department (they always call to verify online gift card orders). The guy asked me if I was buying the gift cards for the Southwest points. I said yes, and I asked him if he could verify that this order qualifies for points. He said yes! Nice! I asked him if he could verify whether physical gift cards also qualify, but he didn’t know. He suggested calling customer service. If you’re thinking of buying the physical cards, consider calling customer service first and let me know how it goes!
UPDATE 6 (2:05 PM EST): I received all $3500 worth of eGift cards and I successfully made two separate orders. The first order totaled $3386 and was made up entirely of items I expect to sell. I paid this order entirely with gift cards. The second order totaled just over $800 and is made up of stuff that I’ll keep. I paid this order partly with gift cards and partly with my prepaid Amex card with which I’ll earn 5X Ultimate Rewards points (see “One card to rule them all”).
With both orders, I tried to apply the code MAXFREE4, but both times the system said that the code didn’t apply to my order. I then tried a code I had been sent via email, but that didn’t work either. I didn’t really need free shipping on these orders (although one item did cost $3 for shipping), but I did want to get 2X ShopYourWay Rewards points. Oh well. Did anyone else have success with this code?
A note about ShopYourWay Rewards: I had about $90 in rewards on my account which I was able to apply to the first order. By the time I placed my second order, I already had additional rewards available from the first order. This was a great way to save a few bucks! By default, you earn the equivalent of 1% back in rewards when you make qualifying purchases at Sears, Kmart, etc. Buying gift cards doesn’t count for these rewards, but using them does.
FINAL UPDATE? As far as I know, update 6 was the final update for today. I’ll continue to read and answer comments though. I’ll also follow-up in future posts with results from this shopping spree.
Background
I’ve done this before. In February the British Airways shopping portal briefly offered 36 points per dollar when shopping at Nordstrom. To capitalize on that deal I bought and sold $4000 worth of electronics and raked in over 140,000 BA miles. You can read about that deal in my posts “How Amazon paid me to collect miles” and “Round trip to Hawaii for $125!”
Similarly, in December, the Ultimate Rewards Mall offered Sears at 10X for one day. I happened to be doing a mileage run that day, but luckily all of my Delta flights were fully equipped with Wi-Fi. So, on that day I bought and used gift cards to increase my take to 20X and I purchased over $2000 worth of electronics that I later sold. On that day I earned close to 50,000 Ultimate Rewards points. You can read about that deal in my posts “Mileage Run Shopping: Buying 162,000 Miles for $500” and “Mileage Run Shopping Results.”
When buying and selling items as I’ve done, you should generally expect to lose money on the deal. Unless you’re lucky enough to be in a sales-tax free state, you will have to pay sales tax on each of your purchases; you may have to pay for shipping to your home; you will have to pay for shipping to the buyer; and you will have to pay seller fees if selling through EBay or Amazon. I’ve been lucky enough to keep my losses to about 20% or less in previous deals, but to be safe I think it’s a good idea to assume you will lose about 25%. Be careful, though, you could lose even more!
Why is it OK to lose 25%? The miles earned are what makes it a deal! The loss due to buying and selling can be thought of as the cost to buy those miles. With this current deal, if the double dip works, and we successfully earn 30 points per dollar, then a 25% loss will amount to buying miles for .83 cents each. Southwest points are worth much more than that, so that’s a great deal!
If you’re interested in doing this, read my post “Hunting for deals” to see how I go about finding the best items for re-sale.
Cautions and Risks
Everything written in this post carries some risks. Don’t do this unless you are prepared for the worst. Here are a few obvious risks:
- You shop through the portal, but don’t get any points. To minimize the chance of this, please see my post “How to ensure your portal points”.
- Purchases of gift cards don’t receive points. I think this is unlikely, but it is possible since I’ve never tested this portal.
- When selling merchandise, you may have trouble finding buyers.
- When selling merchandise you may find merchant fees and other costs to be higher than expected.
Related Posts and Links
- Sears 15X: Leveraging the deal
- Sears 15X: do gift cards count?
- Sears 15X: Free Southwest Companion Pass
- How to ensure your portal points
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Direct transfers from UR to SW do not count toward C-pass. The only transfers that work toward C-pass are from partners. ex. You will have to transfer to Hyatt and then to SW. (and you will lose ALOT of points) I did it as I was lucky enough to get both 50K cards and wanted to fast track my C-pass. I transfered thru Hyatt. Darius at MMS has a great write up on it.
Duh….nevermind. I was thinking it was UR portal.
Hi, do you know if I purchase an item that is a “marketplace” item meaning it is sold by another company if I can still receive points? Any anecdotal evidence to support points earning from “marketplace” sellers is appreciated. I’m hoping they count just like purchasing something from Sears directly does since the purchase is made on the Sears.com website. Good luck with this!
shawn: Thanks for adding the correction. I was confused by your first comment!
Kevin F: A few marketplace items have a link that says “go to site”. Those do not get points. If the button says “add to cart” you should be fine. I don’t have direct experience with this, but that’s my understanding based on the t&c
Why aren’t you going towards selling those gift card route?
Mark: Great question. Basically I’m gambling that I can do better this way. If I can lose as little as 15%, then I’ll have bought miles for .5 cents each.
I know you are not 100% sure you will earn the miles for buying the gift cards, but this would be an ultimate fail if that doesn’t work. What do you think the likelihood is that you can earn points by purchasing gift cards. Also, if I buy gift cards, can I return them for cash if I have a receipt to Sears (in case I do not get credited for the gift cards)? How long do miles usually take to post?
FM:I don’t understand the advantage of eGift vs Plastic GC. Can you elaborate? where would you sell eGift? Does plasticjungle take eGift? Thanks!!
Adam: I think the chance of earning points from the gift cards is very high. I don’t know if you can return gift cards. I don’t know how long it will take for points to post.
vr: This deal is only for today, so I need to buy eGift cards in order to use them today. If you’re planning to sell the gift cards then you should buy physical cards that are sent via regular mail.
Aren’t the physical gift cards “sold by kmart” though? Seems like that introduces more risk.
HikerT: Past experience has shown that you get the Sears points anyway. If your goal is to sell gift cards, you really need the physical ones. If you don’t want to take that risk, then this process of buying and selling merchandise is arguably safer.
A nugget of info,
I tried to use Amex prepaid card to make a purchase on sears.com (one of the prepaid from 5x everywhere idea) Sears.com didn’t take Amex prepaid. I have used these prepaid for daily getaway online purchases. So, I know these cards are activated for online purchases. But they don’t yet seem to work on all online sites.
From your lab, you state you can upgrade your Sears gift cards. Why wouldnt we just buy Sears gift cards and then slowly upgrade them to eBay or gas or whatever gift cards for stores you are frequenting anyways?
From your lab, I understood that Sears gift cards are almost as good as Prepaid Amex since Sears cards can be used to buy other store gift cards.
Am I missing something
Figures this isn’t sold by Sears and has the dreaded ‘go to site’ button
http://www.sears.com/hp-hewlett-packard-storageworks-d2d4312-san-hard-drive/p-SP102A17932S5924452409P?prdNo=1&blockNo=1&blockType=G1
@Al, I didn’t have any luck upgrading Sears GCs here in WA back in December. Check your local sears and kmart stores for GC selection before assuming you will be able to upgrade. Also, it’s somewhat YMMV as to whether you can buy GCs in store with sears GCs. Varies by manager and location.
Al: You can do what you said and that really could be the best way to maximize this. Why am I not planning to upgrade gift cards at Kmart and Sears? Because it is a pain in the butt. If you try to do more than about $150 or so (I don’t know the magic number), they’ll stop you. So, when I upgrade gift cards it is over a very long period of time…
Bender: Gee I should pick up one of those too
Hey There,
been reading your blog for awhile now and I love your creativity. I enjoy your blog a lot more than thepointsguy.
Anyways, Can you inform us what item you plan on buying for the double dipping? Thanks!
Steven Lu: Thanks for the complement! No, I won’t tell what I plan to buy until after this deal is done. The reason is that if I tell, it will lead a bunch of others to buy and sell the same thing and we’ll quickly have a price war and we’ll all lose. If you want to play this game, its up to you to try to find something good. Sorry!
Thanks FM, I contacted sears and they told me you cannot return a gift card even if you have a receipt unfortunately. I know you said the likelihood is “very high” but if you could give me the % that might help convince me whether or not to do this. Thanks for your hard work!
can you email it to me and I promise I wont tell anyone
nevermind, Its probably a tablet
Adam: Thanks for checking. Too bad about that! To see whether gift cards count, please see my latest update (update 5).
Steven Lu: No, I won’t email you, sorry.
And I’m sitting here waiting at the sideline waiting for those physical card.
I Should of thought of double dipping this to maximize reward.
I may jump on this and cancel the physical cards then :p
No problem! By the way thanks for the update on UPDATE 5! this gives me a lot of hope. So if I buy $1000 Egift cards through the southwest portal, I should be able to nab 31 (30 and 1 since im using southwest card) as long as I double dip and buy something. I mean I might as well buy something I plan on keeping myself.
For example if I buy $1000 Egift Cards and double dip, I should get 31k. Lets say I buy two IPAD 3′s with this. 31k gets me about 3-4 round trips via norcal and socal. Which is definitely around $500 total. So technically, I come out with $500 worth of Southwest Points + 2 Ipad 3′s?
FrequentMiler,
Can you go a bit deeper into how you determine if the electronics item will sell well? Thanks
@vr I bought a $500 egift card with prepaid amex yesterday.
IPads sound great except it looks like they are selling at a pretty high premium on sears website
I received the fraud call as well. They verify your information with public records. Seems amusing to verify your identity with public information.
I didn’t admit they were for Southwest points. Instead, I told them it was for money laundering with a sweet new Kenmore front load washer. They did not find it as funny. Sorry for those of you who I ruined the deal for.
Mark: When they call you to verify your gift card order just ask them if it counts for points
Steven Lu: Yes that’s right
BigRedBears: Please see my related post: http://boardingarea.com/blogs/frequentmiler/2012/02/09/hunting-for-deals/
econjon: Good to know!
Ken: That is true
Yankles: I can’t think of anything to say about that…
econjon: hmm.. I have to call Amex and find out what is going on. When I try to use Amex prepaid, the 3 digit security code is being rejected.
@vr Amex is using 4 digit code on the front of the card.
can you buy gift cards with more gift cards? hahaha
Lolz right now I have three tabs on screen
Sears, this blog, and amazon.
Going down the amazon hot selling list and search on sears….
My method to finding a deal out of this
Disclaimer: past hot sale may not be as hot in the present or future, do your buying and selling at ur own risk.
FM: confirmed, just double dipping interests me more. You turn me into a gc, point hoarder/”entrepreneur” haha
I just realized that ALL of the Ipads are sold by a third party so dont buy them people! Wont get points for those!
Does companion pass work on AirTran flights?
@Adam Companion pass is only good for Southwest-operated flights
@conway thanks that would have made this the best deal ever.
Talked to Sears customer service and they said anything purchased directly from Sears would count, I asked if this included physical gift cards and she said yes…but with a good amount of hesitation in her voice. I wouldn’t consider this a 100% confirmation but might help a little.
If I’m understanding correctly, you are going to double dip the eGiftcards. So, you’ll end up with 30x points when using them.
If so, why are you planning to buy $3500 worth of new gift cards and then buy at least $3850 worth of merchandise? $3500 worth of double dipped eGiftcards will come to 105,000 points. Why are you also buying $3850 worth of merchandise?
It seems like you would only need to buy $3,667 worth of eGift cards doubledipped at 30x to equal 110,000 points.
Let me know if my logic is correct. If so, this is a game changer since the upfront $$ is half!
Well sears just called me to confirm my purchased. Pretty painless but I was surprised at how many questions they asked. I guess I’ll be waiting on those gift cards now. Haven’t found anything that I want to purchase but I only need to double dip on $300 of the $3.5k that I bought.
Steven Lu: Nope
Mark: It sounds like you’re having fun with this!
Steven Lu: As long as they have an “add to cart” button they should count even if sold by a third party. Don’t get them if they have a “go to site” button.
Conway: Thanks for your help!
Mason: Thanks for the update!
Serion: Your logic is correct. I just wanted to use up a gift card I already owned.
can we stack topcashback?
TCB on this deal?
I thought we buying the sears card via southwest rapid reward
Great scheme! Decided to pass this one because don’t fly Southwest enough (never actually). But now can’t wait for a similar promotion from more useful FF program!
Btw, thanks for explanation how to pick items for resale.
Still waiting on my eGiftCards purchased 2 hours ago. No call from the fraud department yet either. Anyone else still waiting?
Sorry for my cluelessness but I’m still trying to nail this double-dipping down. So your e-gift card purchase earns the 15X points but you can also earn 15X points on purchasing merchandise with those same e-gift cards? (I’m assuming that would exclude the purchase of more e-gift cards.)
Sorry, I think I was confused by thinking that purchases needed to be made using your SW credit card in order to count for points in your rapid reward account. Guess it doesn’t matter how you make your purchase.
Conway use this number
1888-396-5299
Security verification department.
I was given this number, didnt use it myself cause they just called
@chris: I read it a couple of times and that’s the conclusion I came to. Didn’t even think about using Sears gift cards to buy Sears items for the points!
@Mark Thanks for the number! They just called and the guy I spoke with said he couldn’t confirm whether or not points will be earned because he works in the security verification department only. There’s no turning back now! Thanks @FrequentMiler for detailing everything.
just tried buying gas gift cards at Kmart, they wont let you buy gift cards with gift cards. What electronics did you buy to resell?
If there is a concern that physical gift cards will not earn points, but eCards will, why not buy the eCards, purchase items for pick up in store. Then return the items for credit on a physical gift card. By selecting pick up in store, you’re not incurring shipping cost, nor are you passing those costs to Sears.
About how long does it take for the rewards points to post to your account?
Is it too late to double dip using egift cards today? About 2.30 pm pacific time. Wondering if sears fraud prevention dept will be able to call for verification before they close today.
Kk u call them. Number is posted above
A friend was making a purchase of $2000 worth of Sears gift cards. When the anti-fraud department called her, she was asked if she bought the gift cards for Southwest points. It seems that a lot of people are doing this!
Steven Lu: ?
Mark: No, no TCB unless you’re selling a gift card
BigRedBears:
Conway: It took about 2.5 hours for me to get the call and then the ecards arrived 15 minutes later (or so).
chris: You have it right
Mark: Thanks for that number. To repeat: 1888-396-5299 Security verification department.
Conway: Good luck!
n8: It depends on the kmart and even the cashier. Usually if you add groceries and such they’ll let you buy a few gift cards with a sears gift card at kmart
Gary S: That might work, I don’t know
Alan: I don’t know
Sam: No doubt!
I’ve now bought over $10,000 of Sears Gift Cards over the last week (started with UR mall 5x Ink Bold card before this Southwest 15x promo) and purchased home appliances using them for the double dip. Here is what I found:
1. Sears.com orders cannot be modified. So if you need to change anything, it is cancel and place a new order. Even for changing delivery option from store pickup to home delivery.
2. Gift card credit will be refunded to same gift card in 5-7 business days (meaning you are out of promo window for double dip). Not tested yet.
3. If the order is canceled before security verification releases it, then Gift Card will be refunded in 24-48 hours. In my test, the GC balance was credited in about 1 hour after order cancellation by security verification dept.
4. If you are in such a bind, ask for notation on the order to be canceled to honor the same price, adjustment to be done after you place your new order after the Gift Card refund shows up. Lot of time on the phone, but it worked to get price matched to the old canceled order, even after prices changed.
5. UR mall points showed up in 3-4 days both for Gift cards and for goods purchase. All my RapidRewards shopping was done today, so results awaited.
6. While T&C say you don’t get points for Master Protection Agreement (extended warranty), delivery charges, etc. I got points for everything except tax (at UR mall).
7. ShopYourWayRewards points have been credited even earlier (as soon as order is scheduled for delivery or shipment).
Lastly, … When the security verification started asking me credit report based questions, I sternly inquired whey they have to ask every time, when I have already purchased thousands $ worth Gift cards and answered the questions a couple of days ago. The rep looked up my order list, inquired the contents of a few orders, then gave up and I was cleared! without any questions! Not only that, a 2nd order held for Security Verification was also cleared without any more words. Showing resistance to go through security verification and getting cleared is a first time for me
Kroozer : Did you get credit for kenmore appliance purchases? T & C says Kenmore not eligible. How about Kenmore Elite appliances?
I want to buy Kenmore water heater and not sure if I get points for it.
To use the MAXFREE4 code, you must “Add to Cart” your 3 month trial membership of the ShopYourWayMAX. $79 price will show up in the cart and reduce to $0.02 after applying MAXFREE4 in the promotion code box.
Here is how you find the membership item to add to cart:
Go to http://www.sears.com
Look at right, below the shopping cart icon, below the menu, below the today’s real deal banner, you will see the banner for “get 3 months free shipping with SYWMAX banner”. Click that, resulting page has Add to Cart button, then apply the promo code.
I placed this as an independent order since I wanted the 2x SYWR points for my real purchase. I dont know if they charge $0.02 on a credit card, and pay ~$0.30 for the transaction fees. I used my existing SYWR points to pay
@ayya I did not purchase Kenmore, so I don’t know.
Do you receive points for sales tax?
Thanks.
Well kids, I just spent my wad, hope this all comes through for us! Thanks again to FM for taking this idea and running with it!
guys, do they, sears, give a call for both types of gift card purchase(e-gift and plastic)?
i bought physical gift cards. Do they call for security verification on these too, or just the E-gift cards. I just made the call, so wonder if it would be too late in the day for them to call me back for security verification.
I think they do call for physical cards too, but it’s been a while for me so I don’t remember for certain. As long as you make the purchase while sears is 15x you’ll be ok even if they verify tomorrow. The real issue is for people buying ecards and wanting to double dip. In that case, call the number above after your purchase to try to ensure getting the ecards tonight
@Frank: They do call for both physical gift cards and e-gift cards. On the other hand, Sears Security Department told me that they close at 10pm (Pacific Time) during weekdays. There is ample time to shop for gift cards and wait for their calls.
I won’t do it..but some of would like this.
Go thru southwest shopping portal today…go buy the egift cards(7400$+ if you want) hopefully get 15×7400=111,000 soutwest points
then go find a receipt or whatever from 5/24-5/29 or go buy something to get a receipt really cheap…
use that receipt and get a coupon for 25% off your next purchase(in the form of points) from 5/30-6/2
go into store and buy the item(s) you want to resell(ipads avail?) on 5/30-6/2 using the 25% back in point and spend the 7400 in e-gift cards…hopefully get 1850$ in shop your rewards value
I’m really out of ideas what to purchase for double dip. It’s seems all price for electronic that’s not outdated is way higher then on amazon. With added CA sales tax and shipping I will lose half the value. I’d appreciate any smart ideas on what to buy at unstable (at) tut.by.
Bitachu: Great idea!
@Bitachu Where you get such a coupon? Is it on every receipt?
Found it: http://slickdeals.net/f/4628522-Sears-Kmart-Shop-You-Way-25-points-offer
Aren’t the 25% back in shop your way pesos worth more like 2.5% in dollars?
Does this end at 12pm EST or 12pm PST?
I’ll suggest the Samsung galaxy tab 2 for resale since I’m not partaking. Good luck to everyone who is.
@ HikerT When they ran similar promos before 25% meant 25% in simple sense.
I placed an order about 5:45 MDT, and still hadn’t heard anything as of 9:00 pm – called in and guy asked me a bunch of questions but now I’ve got my gift cards, 10 minutes later.
Does sears allow you to buy physical gift cards with cards?
Had the same headache with having to call fraud protection, but got my gifts cards and made my purchase. Got some box springs I needed with free shipping, 50+10% off, and free haul-away.
And piles of points
As of 12:14 EST the Rapid Rewards portal is no longer showing the 15 point bonus. It IS still showing a 12 point bonus though for those who missed out on this first round deal. Enjoy!
Yes, it took so long for me to get my gift card codes I missed out – got one of my orders in on the 15 point bonus, but one I had to settle for the 12 points/$. I figure I probably lost about 1,000 points because it took too long to get my order in. Still a good deal though.
Ahh! I went all in. Time to resell some gear. Thanks again FM.
Camera gear has pretty good resell value. If you can find a coupon or other discount such as the 25% SYWR to offset taxes and seller fees, lenses are compact enough to ship and come with a heavy price tag. Just buy 6 of the Canon 24-70 mm f/2.8L or mix them in with another Canon L series lens, and you got your double dip.
So even though the “deal” is over, SouthWest are still offering 12 points per $ as of this morning.
NOTE that using coupon codes not listed on the SouthWest portal may INVALIDATE your points order. From the T&C: Promotional codes or coupons not listed on this site are not eligible.
Matt.
So even though the “deal” is over, SouthWest are still offering 12 points per $ as of this morning.
NOTE that using coupon codes not listed on the SouthWest portal may INVALIDATE your points order. From the T&C: Promotional codes or coupons not listed on this site are not eligible.
Matt.
12X is still very good! I sent the shopping portal people a message asking how long the 12X promotion will last. If it goes beyond a day or two, it looks like I’ll have some more posts to write
So, I got an email today from Ebates saying there’s 30% off and free shipping for everything at Land’s End (today only) in addition to portal cashback (Ebates and ShopAtHome seem to be the best portals at 6%)
http://www.landsend.com/pp/OfferDetails_3257_FLAG.html
Good for merchandise purchases only (not gift cards).
For those that bought sears gift cards, if you need merchandise from Land’s End, this might be another opportunity to liquidate your gift cards.
Steve: Thanks!
Glad to report my points are already showing up pending. Total of 64k-ish split between the gift card purchase and the double dip item purchase. Companion pass here I come!
@phil That’s good news! This is showing up in the shopping portal under the “My Shopping Account” link?
@conway: yes that is correct. stuff i bought has not even arrived yet!
I’ve also had some points start showing up under my recent transactions under my shopping account. I did double dipping because I don’t have $7,000 to spend
All of the points have posted correctly for the e-cards, but I am missing some value on my purchases. For instance, I bought kitchen stools for $102 (personal, not reselling haha), but Southwest is showing my purchase as $70.35 and I need every point that I can get!
Phil and Nikki how long ago did you do your purchases. How long from purchase till you see the points showing up? I just did my purchases last night not nothing showing yet.
In comments from the post “Sears 15x: Free Companion Pass”, Steve commented:
“I just got off the phone with Southwest and they told me 100% that the “partner bonus” miles (i.e. the x15 with Sears) do NOT count towards companion pass status. BEWARE!!!!”
Has anyone else verified this as true/untrue?
Thanks
Matt.
Ken, The purchases that I made yesterday morning have showed up, but I made some last night that have not shown up yet. Matt, I hope that’s not true!!
@ matt ward, that contradicts their published T&C on the Southwest websitehttp://www.southwest.com/html/customer-service/faqs.html?topic=rapid_rewards_program_terms_and_conditions
that says:
“Companion Pass Qualifying Points are earned from revenue flights, points issued on Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Credit Cards, and points earned from Rapid Rewards Partners. ”
and if you click the partners link, rapid rewards shopping is listed as a partner.
man, this is scary
@Steve – thanks!
@phil: Glad to know that your points are pending! When did you make the purchase? May 21?
Im going to bet the bonus do count for cp. I’m not stressing that
My order was done Tuesday afternoon
Appears to be back to 3x
I see it as back to 3x also, but Brookstone is now up to 16x.
On Brookstone: Not eligible for purchases on Deal of the Day items, Tempur-Pedic, Bose, Sony, Celestron, SkyScout, Panasonic & Braun, Canon, Cinemin, Optima, Panasonic, Power Plate, Sonos, Tempur-Pedic and TomTom products, gift cards or gift wrapping.
Got an email this morning my order of 2 cameras from last night are out of stock. What should I do now?
Deal is dead for me, too.
Bulls get rich, bears get rich, hogs get slaughtered. Exactly why I keep my very best techniques to myself.
dvh: can you afford to hold onto your gift cards until the next great Sears offer comes along?
toomanybooks: This wasn’t an example of a deal getting killed because of too many people doing it. It was always scheduled to end yesterday. I think the 12X this morning was an error.
wouldnt keeping your best techniques to yourself be considered a “hog”? Just saying
Can somebody explain to me why I even bother to read other FF blogs? This site is pure genius.
Now, if only Virgin America would open up the spigots…
Just want to report that my 90000 points for the purchase in the morning of 22 May are posted as pending in my account.
Another friend did a purchase on 23 May. His points are not yet seen.
@Sam Thanks for the update!
Here’s my update:
1 – plasticjungle cancelled all but one (two others are in “processing”) of my sears card orders.
2 – I bought tech from sears to sell with the remaining cards that weren’t cancelled by pj
It’s looking like I may come out under a little bit on this one, especially since pj was only giving 80% on the gift cards.
Has anyone who purchased the physical gift cards have their points post as pending yet? I didn’t buy the E-Gift Cards…and a bit worried physical cards won’t count
anybody had any luck buying something by double dipping and then returning it and still getting the points
@Yankles: How many did you sell?
@Frank, dont worry. I got points shown in my account in pending status. I bought physical gift cards on 5/22.
Uh oh. All my Sears orders were out of stock, but they didn’t tell me until today. Now I’m sitting on $4,000 of electronic Sears giftcards. Does anyone know about any other big Sears points promotions coming up? I would rather wait for a Sears promotion, than try to sell to Plastic Jungle after possibly converting them to physical cards. Ideally, Sears will have another Rapids Rewards promo, since I am now short by almost half of the points needed for a companion pass, since my double-dip became a single-dip.
@Frank: I bought physical gift cards at around 1pm EDT 22 May as well. Points have been listed as pending in my Southwest account. No worry if your purchase is later than mine.
@Chris: All out of stock? What a joke!
@Chris Do the products you ordered currently show that they are out-of-stock on the website?
@Conway I just checked the Sears website, and the products I ordered are still not listed as “Sold Out”. Interestingly, a few very similar items on the same page, actually ARE listed as “Sold Out” in red letters at the bottom of the item, and the “Add to Cart” button has been removed from those items. Seems like the person, or program, responsible for showing “Sold Out” could use a little help.
And so could the fraud department guy. He aaid he was swamped last night, and seriously overwhelmed. And I think he was solo on the night shift. Nice guy though.
@Chris Did you buy Marketplace items or Sears.com items? I was thinking if it was Marketplace items, I could see how a third party vendor would not be able to update their inventory. Did you make your purchases on Tue or Wed?
@sam: 1 card was officially sold with 2 sitting as pending with all of the others cancelled.
@Yankles Did they provide a reason for cancelling?
@Conway: None. I haven’t heard a response from support either. I presume some sort of automated fraud prevention.
@Yankles: How much are the gift cards? How long did it take from your submission of gift card information to the cancellation?
@sam: $500 each. It took about 15 minutes for the cancellation.
@Yankles
$500? Did you have physical cards? They wouldn’t take electronic exchange for my $500 card, but I had $100 ones that I was able to bundle up to $300 to still do electronic.
@Alan: Yeah, they are physical cards.
Just an update. Ordered 5/23 and received the email that my item shipped last night (5/24) and pending points were not in my shopping account at that time. Checked the account this morning and the points were showing up. Hopefully this is consistent for everyone else! Like @Nikki O my full purchase price was not used for point calculation.
@Conway It was a Sears item, not a marketplace item. It sounds like most people did not have this issue though.
On a separate note, I have also had some Sears $500 eGiftcard sales to Plastic Jungle canceled by them, without them giving a reason. Once that happens, the Plastic Jungle system will prevent you from trying to sell that same eGiftcard to them again, even though the first sale was canceled, and the card still has $500 on it.
Order shipped pretty quickly and all points are pending!
Well after getting off to a good start, this is turning into another $hit show but this time at the hands of Sears rather than Cartera.
I ordered 3 Nikon D5100s. At the time they were selling for $675 when Amazon had then for $700 and they were selling on ebay for $675 too. So in theory flip them on ebay, pay ebay costs, and I am out at a good price. So as soon as I get the notice the order has shipped I list the 3 on ebay. One of the three sells for $675. Happy days.
Then the delivery arrives. Box looks kind of small for 3 cameras. Open it up, only one camera delivered. But of course the packing slip says THREE. I can feel my heart sinking at this point. Sears customer service is the only one that is on a par with Cartera. After calling their stereo-typical-couldn’t-care-less-but-have-a-nice-day-i-hope-i-served-your-needs call center India and being bounced around I am eventually told they will open a research item to see what happened. I am now being told that it will be next week (some two weeks after ordering) that they will get back to me. The one smoking gun I have is the UPS tracking showed the shipping weight as 5lbs, which is the shipping weight of one camera. But I expect it to be a while before I get the other 2 cameras
Meanwhile, Amazon dropped their price to $650 and then Sears go and match, plus a 10% one day special, putting it to $582. I put in for price protection – but get this in the meantime the camera sells out!!! Customer service say they can’t verify price because it is no longer available. WTF! Surely they can check their own pricing history? Fortunately I took a screen print but I am not sure it’s going to work.
So now I *know* they don’t have any more of the camera in stock, and they still owe me 2 of them, and the price is dropping faster than a proverbial whores drawers! I cannot see a happy ending to this
I know these deals are not without risk, but this one has been another abject frustration and I am counting myself out of future Sears buy and sell deals because of the difficulties when things go wrong with either Sears or Cartera. Caveat Emptor!!!
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