Nationwide 5% cashback on supermarket spending

flaneurs_lobster

From three days ago

Hundreds face job cuts at Nationwide building society

From two days ago

Nationwide is offering 5% cashback on your supermarket shop - how to get it

Cack-handed attempt to bury bad news?

Of course it's a marketing scheme, albeit one that might benefit some people who have genuine need of an extra tenner a month. And some who don't. 

RG2015

Newbie_John said:

I spend about £100 a month, so to make most of the promo I can either buy more items like tins, pasta, flour.. and eat it over the next year or buy a gift card and use it as we go. I won't waste food that way, the deal is still heavily limited - 3 months only, up to £200 spend. We're talking £30 max. I could get £15 with normal spend so I wouldn't call that milking.

Just out of interest, how could you get £15 a month with normal spend?

elsien

Nice though it is to get cash back, I’m not so desperate for an extra tenner that I’m going to be buying gift cards. 

If I was that short of cash I wouldn’t have the 200 quid to buy gift cards with anyway. But each to their own.

Newbie_John

RG2015 said:

Newbie_John said:

I spend about £100 a month, so to make most of the promo I can either buy more items like tins, pasta, flour.. and eat it over the next year or buy a gift card and use it as we go. I won't waste food that way, the deal is still heavily limited - 3 months only, up to £200 spend. We're talking £30 max. I could get £15 with normal spend so I wouldn't call that milking.

Just out of interest, how could you get £15 a month with normal spend?

Sorry, I meant 3x £5 using this offer

surreysaver

km1500 said:

Zanderman said:

km1500 said:

Is it only me? This offer was supposed to help everyone with a Nationwide account with their food shopping in a time of National crisis. There is a limited budget from Nationwide. By all means go and buy your hundreds of pounds worth of giftcards, but that was never the purpose of this promotion.

Umm... As most of the gift card talk has been getting supermarket gift cards to spend - at a later date - in supermarkets I can't see where you're seeing a problem.  Because that's simply a method of maximising the help with food shopping. Which, following your line that this promo must help with food shopping, is exactly the correct thing isn't it?

[And even if the gift cards were used another way, their use would still saving some money - which will mean more available for food shopping.]

yes, the gift cards could be used another way eg buying petrol

I am all for milking promos for as much as I can and, like many on here, do it regularly. If it had been an.open-ended promotion I would have gone out and bought gift cards myself.

However, the difference here is the limited pot available - your £200 gift voucher purchase means somewhere down the line someone who needs it won't get their discount on their potatos as the pot of money has run out.

All promos have a limit. Switching bonuses get withdrawn. 5% accounts get withdrawn to new applicants 

wmb194

km1500 said:

Katiehound said:

Well, if you only have one NW card you won't be able to buy too many hundreds of pounds of gift cards.

I don't spend £200 per month on grocery shopping so it means that any  excess can be put on a gift card and used after the offer ends- to buy groceries later in the year. 

Sorry, how do you know "but that was never the purpose of this promotion."
 Do have inside knowledge of their marketing department?

No, but I can read press releases..


Tom Riley, Director of Retail Products at Nationwide Building Society, said: “Food costs have risen sharply and many households now think carefully about how and where they shop. We’re helping members with £10 a month cashback on supermarket spending – just one of the benefits of having a current account with the world’s biggest building society.”

But on another day the schtick would have simply been that Nationwide is, 'on your side.' Be careful not to fall for the marketing: for years now this is just how Nationwide has tried to market its 'USP.'

RG2015

The profit earned by banks is likely to be substantially higher than other business sectors. They would not think twice about setting high borrowing interest rates for example.

In the eyes of many people, this makes banks fair game. If they have offers that can be exploited within the rules to make more money then that is all part of the game.

The idea though that exploiting these offers somehow deprives poorer people, by denying them the chance to benefit from Nationwide's altruism, is a bit of a stretch. 

flaneurs_lobster

RG2015 said:

The idea though that exploiting these offers somehow deprives poorer people, by denying them the chance to benefit from Nationwide's altruism, is a bit of a stretch. 

It's not altruism, it's marketing.

Altruism would be Nationwide donating the £99 million to the Trussell Trust. Anonymously. 

GibbsRule_No3.

Since I shop in M&S and they are not on the list, it doesn’t look like I would be eligible for this offer but I was wondering if you need to spend the full £200 at just one company in the month, or if it would be a combination of stores?  Eg Tesco, Sainsbury, F&M (since they are on the list!), Aldi, Asda etc. Not impressed that M&S are not on there, assume it would be too hard to separate the food shopping from the clothes etc.  Having said that other stores on the list have clothing/homeware lines.  I am not going out of my way to buy gift cards. Spending £200 on food in M&S a month would be a natural monthly spend for me.

Zanderman

km1500 said:

Zanderman said:

km1500 said:

Is it only me? This offer was supposed to help everyone with a Nationwide account with their food shopping in a time of National crisis. There is a limited budget from Nationwide. By all means go and buy your hundreds of pounds worth of giftcards, but that was never the purpose of this promotion.

Umm... As most of the gift card talk has been getting supermarket gift cards to spend - at a later date - in supermarkets I can't see where you're seeing a problem.  Because that's simply a method of maximising the help with food shopping. Which, following your line that this promo must help with food shopping, is exactly the correct thing isn't it?

[And even if the gift cards were used another way, their use would still saving some money - which will mean more available for food shopping.]

yes, the gift cards could be used another way eg buying petrol

I am all for milking promos for as much as I can and, like many on here, do it regularly. If it had been an.open-ended promotion I would have gone out and bought gift cards myself.

However, the difference here is the limited pot available - your £200 gift voucher purchase means somewhere down the line someone who needs it won't get their discount on their potatos as the pot of money has run out.

Nationwide must know (they're not stupid) that a minority of people with multiple accounts may max out on the scheme, but they'll have taken that into account.

You, on the other hand, are suggesting that such people, trying to er. save money (the whole point of nationwide's promotion), are somehow bad and depriving other people of the chance to save money, without any evidence.

Edited to add:  And, please, let's talk about the cash in context here - the concept of the £200 gift voucher purchase equates to a contribution, from Nationwide, of just £10. Describing it as £200 suggests a much bigger Nwide input - when actually it is quite modest. No more than many existing schemes (such as perks at work etc).