is quidco worth joining?

chanz4

I used to like quidco until I got stund by their apply mac £100 deal, tracked fine then declined. I emailed pcworld executive complaints who manually authorised it but quidco wont chase it via their company they use for cashback channel.

Topcash is a lot better and they will match quidco's

renifer7

I've been with quidco for a while before joining TCB as well and so far I haven't even managed get to the 5 GBP threshold on Quidco while on TCB I'm already beyond 30 GBP and half of it already payable (thanks to the Netflix deal for which I also used the Highest Cashback guarantee- claim was approved very quickly). Obviously it doesn't only have to do with the fact which site is better and which is not... However, TCB has also tracked much better to date. So for me it's definitely TCB,..

mrcow

I've been with Quidco since 2007 and have made over £1500 to date.

mrcow

2sides2everystory wrote: »

Very good mrcow, as long as that truly was £1,500 off the cheapest available prices not just off the sometimes dodgy Quidco affiliate quoted prices that took your fancy

I can assure you that I've been a MSE member for long enough to know the difference.

frosty

I am just starting my 7th year with quidco,I have received £1,519.00 so far.I am trying to be good and stop spending money.

jackieb

When my son bought his first house I signed him up for Quidco. He wouldn't have bothered otherwise. Then he got me to arrange all his insurances, Sky, utilities, broadband and phone. I did it all through Quidco and he got around £380 back. It might take a few months but it's worth waiting for. I told him I should've got commission.

jackieb

And yes, I searched around first, and wasn't wooed by just the cashback. I'm also not as green as i'm cabbage looking!

The_Fear

I've been paid £167 since August 2011 and have another £100 or so coming within the next few months on Quidco.

I also signed up with TCB but didn't pay it much attention until they emailed about a whopping discount at The Body Shop recently. It piqued my interest because I used to love a body cream of theirs that costs £12.50; I can't financially justify that anymore because I'm paying off debt before saving for a mortgage. So, the body cream was discounted to £5.00 anyway, and through a 40% off voucher code on TCB plus a first time order percent of 15.15% (regular orders were around 12%), I managed to order 10 of them for £25 - a massive £100 saving. I can see you moneysaving experts thinking 'ah, but you aren't saving *that* much, as you haven't been using it.' That's partially true, I've been using a Superdrug one at £3.69 - so I've still saved £11.90 (and I get through these babies in a fortnight). The Body Shop cream is much richer so will probably last me twice as long too.

On further investigation I discovered that TCB seem to pay higher rates than Quidco; of my last six Quidco transactions, they topped all of them. Sometimes only by as little by 0.04%, but sometimes significantly; and anyway, that 0.04% will add up over time!

What I will say is that the Quidco Facebook page staff are extremely responsive to problems/queries. Admittedly, it's usually just people being a bit daft (myself included) and not reading the small print about how items will track and suchlike, but having looked at the TCB Facebook page a fair amount today, I don't see anything like the level of customer service and prompt responses on there. I see complaints that haven't been answered. Quidco typically respond to Facebook queries within 12 hours or so - I really can't fault them on that.

Methodology: both websites often don't track immediately. It's really important that you make a note of purchases you clicked through, dates, amounts, vendors etc. Then once a week you should make a habit of checking if the tracking is now showing against your recent purchases, and get in touch with them if they are not.

Cashback amounts and percentages: with Quidco, some of the vendors really over-complicate things (not sure about TCB as I'm a newbie there). For example, I'm waiting for approx £20 from Marriott Hotels. It's tracking with 'amount unknown' yet I'm due to be paid approx £10 from them on 01/04. This is because they initially track at 4% and the extra 3 or so percent will be added at a later date. So you really have to know how much you are expecting and by when, and what's going on with their tracking. IN SHORT - with every single offer, read the small print very carefully. With purchases of more than £5 or so I tend to email myself the terms and conditions and tracking details that appear on the website on the day I make the purchase.

Compare rates everywhere: I book travel for my boss and because I'm a moral idiot I'll get her the cheapest room even if only by a few pounds versus using the TCB or Quidco vendor offering cashback to me personally. But if I were doing so for my own travel, I'd quite often save money by looking the hotel up on tripadvisor.com and comparing rates they supply on links (note: they usually provide a handful and then underneath there are 'you can also try' links for further price comparisons). It IS worth doing though; I think I earned £24 on a £300 spend via Octopus last year.

The rates change all the time, so don't assume that one comparison you made a month ago will still be valid and click through without checking.

There is BIG money to be made/saved on things like insurance, broadband, banks, television, energy etc. It doesn't pay to be loyal these days, I am discovering. Some examples:

Contents insurance: £56 cashback for switching. It's only £108 a year for me anyway, but the AA (after three years of being with them) thought they'd try to raise my premium by a whopping 120% this year. I checked every single vendor on Quidco and got quotes and yes, it was time consuming, but essentially I'm paying £52 for this year's insurance.

Bank switch: I was furious with my bank and ready to leave anyway, I'm getting £45 for the cashback plus £100 from the new bank for switching (obviously, I wouldn't recommend doing this too often, although I fully intend to switch for the very last time when my rather large completely interest-free overdraft runs out in 11 months as this new bank are reputedly awful).

Broadband: I had no choice but to switch when I moved as o2 couldn't provide their services at my new flat, but I earned a sweet £65 from Virgin for signing up. Their broadband is terrible, but that's another matter for another switch in five months time. Sky offer big package bundles with huuuuuuuuuuge cashback rates, if Sky is your kind of thing.

Potentially slightly riskier/more time-consuming cashback: this morning I earned around £5 on TCB through filling out surveys. They took 20 minutes each, you have to read through very carefully to ensure you're not being signed up for the world to have your details (also, be very wary of giving out your mobile number as you can be charged to receive text messages), but each of them pay 70p +; that's £5 more for me as I don't work on Sundays. On TCB read the user reviews of these very carefully; some of them clearly are out-and-out scams, but others genuinely aren't. I also got a pay-day loan on TCB today - don't need or want one, but they were offering £65.65 cashback on approved loans, and (although their profit margin is in the thousands), I chose the minimum amount and will be paying them £23.20 in interest for a very short term loan, but I still profit by £42.45 - and that's money that's sitting in my bank account earning interest too.*

*If any regular users have a view on me continuing to do this over the next six months, please let me know. Most of these pay-day sites offer good cashback either for first time users or just loans in general; I'm aware that it could affect my credit rating, but I'm not intending to apply for any credit in the next year or so.

Finally, TCB give £10 cashback for referring a friend (the friend then has to use the site, and actually make a transaction) versus Quidco's £2.50.

If you have the time, it's worth it. But be warned: it will suck up lots of your time!

alisonb1965

I have been on Quidco for around 3 years and have made £1,409 so far. If you shop around for your insurances every year and change energy suppliers you can make do well with it. It's definitely worth trying.

brownbabygirl

I am in my 5th year with Quidco and have made over £1200 so far. Due to moving and mobile upgrade I am expecting another £300 this year alone. I dont like the TCB website, I find it confusing and much prefer the layout at Q.

Caution: I would not use Quidco as a way to up my income per say as you obviously do need to spend money to get some back. Sometimes it does not track or pay out and you dont want to be depending on that! It is just a nice bonus on somethings you would have spent money on anyway, otherwise it is not moneysaving, is it?!