Cashback on Gift Cards?

JohnSwift10

I have a Santander Edge Current Account and get 1% cashback at supermarkets.

I give my daughter £100 cash a week to help her pay her bills which she spends mainly in Asda.

If I bought a £100 gift card along with milk and bread in Asda, would I get 1% cashback for the Asda shop of £102.85 or just on £2.85?

WillPS

JohnSwift10 said:

I have a Santander Edge Current Account and get 1% cashback at supermarkets.

I give my daughter £100 cash a week to help her pay her bills which she spends mainly in Asda.

If I bought a £100 gift card along with milk and bread in Asda, would I get 1% cashback for the Asda shop of £102.85 or just on £2.85?

Yes, all Santander see is that you made a purchase at Asda, they don't see what you purchased.

There are more lucrative ways of purchasing Asda gift vouchers - notably Airtime Rewards will give you 4% back on them (redeemable against most major mobile bills, but excluding some MVNOs).

35har1old

WillPS said:

JohnSwift10 said:

I have a Santander Edge Current Account and get 1% cashback at supermarkets.

I give my daughter £100 cash a week to help her pay her bills which she spends mainly in Asda.

If I bought a £100 gift card along with milk and bread in Asda, would I get 1% cashback for the Asda shop of £102.85 or just on £2.85?

Yes, all Santander see is that you made a purchase at Asda, they don't see what you purchased.

There are more lucrative ways of purchasing Asda gift vouchers - notably Airtime Rewards will give you 4% back on them (redeemable against most major mobile bills, but excluding some MVNOs).

Merchant code may catch you out on that transaction possibly a Quasi-cash payment 

WillPS

35har1old said:

WillPS said:

JohnSwift10 said:

I have a Santander Edge Current Account and get 1% cashback at supermarkets.

I give my daughter £100 cash a week to help her pay her bills which she spends mainly in Asda.

If I bought a £100 gift card along with milk and bread in Asda, would I get 1% cashback for the Asda shop of £102.85 or just on £2.85?

Yes, all Santander see is that you made a purchase at Asda, they don't see what you purchased.

There are more lucrative ways of purchasing Asda gift vouchers - notably Airtime Rewards will give you 4% back on them (redeemable against most major mobile bills, but excluding some MVNOs).

Merchant code may catch you out on that transaction 

Presuming you mean Airtime Rewards - I'm not suggesting that the OP will be able to get the 1% Santander supermarket cashback aswell as the 4% from Airtime; they'll get none from Santander but 4% is better than 1%. There's no cash advance charge to worry about on a debit card.

pochisoldi

Suck it and see - spend a tenner on food, and a tenner on a gift card, and see what gets paid.
Then if it works, do the transaction you really want to do.

As an aside, at this time of year, you want to put the money on a Christmas Savings card (which can still be spent now) so you can get the bonus payment on the balance as of 5pm on Sunday 10th November 2024. (The cutoff is always Sunday around the same date each year).

That way, you get 1% cashback (if it works), and your daughter gets a bonus of up to 5.3%.(£15 on balance of £280)

See: https://www.asdagiftcards.com/christmas-savings

NameWithheld

I get cashback on my Santander Edge credit card on discounted supermarket gift cards purchased through an employee benefit scheme. But I didn't get cashback when I brought them using a Chase debit card. IIRC, Chase categorised it as Professional Services (Other)

pochisoldi

I've just spotted this one when trawling MS Money for spending pattern information - When Nationwide had a 5% cashback on supermarket spend promotion, I did a "goods+gift card" transaction at a checkout and a "gift card only" transaction at the kiosk at Sainsburys. The goods+gift card got cashback, the gift card only transaction didn't.

WillPS

pochisoldi said:

I've just spotted this one when trawling MS Money for spending pattern information - When Nationwide had a 5% cashback on supermarket spend promotion, I did a "goods+gift card" transaction at a checkout and a "gift card only" transaction at the kiosk at Sainsburys. The goods+gift card got cashback, the gift card only transaction didn't.

Suspect there's some other reason you didn't get cashback. Had you maxed out the benefit? Do you have any way of seeing the MCC used?

It'd be the first I've heard of a supermarket processing gift cards under a separate MCC if that's what it is.

crumpet_man

What is a kiosk in Sainsbury's?  Self-service checkout?

TheBanker

crumpet_man said:

What is a kiosk in Sainsbury's?  Self-service checkout?

Tobacco/Lottery counter I think.

WillPS said:

pochisoldi said:

I've just spotted this one when trawling MS Money for spending pattern information - When Nationwide had a 5% cashback on supermarket spend promotion, I did a "goods+gift card" transaction at a checkout and a "gift card only" transaction at the kiosk at Sainsburys. The goods+gift card got cashback, the gift card only transaction didn't.

Suspect there's some other reason you didn't get cashback. Had you maxed out the benefit? Do you have any way of seeing the MCC used?

It'd be the first I've heard of a supermarket processing gift cards under a separate MCC if that's what it is.

Agree - if they put it through their normal cash register there would be no way for the card issuer to distinguish between a gift card purchase and any other purchase. This is why you can get credit card cashback on cigarettes, lottery tickets and other things that don't normally qualify for discounts. The only reason I think you wouldn't get cashback, is if the cashier processed the payment as cashback, then used the cash to pay for the gift card, which would be an odd way to do things. 

TheBanker

NameWithheld said:

I get cashback on my Santander Edge credit card on discounted supermarket gift cards purchased through an employee benefit scheme. But I didn't get cashback when I brought them using a Chase debit card. IIRC, Chase categorised it as Professional Services (Other)

Same here - the employee benefit scheme provides a discount of typically 4% (varies by retailer) then the Edge credit card gives me 2% cashback. The Edge Credit Card seems to have far fewer restrictions than the Chase card in terms of cashback.