So I had a chance to test this deal this morning, and boy did it just work PERFECT! AS I mentioned a few days ago in the Weekly Albertsons post, There was a Gift Card Promotion, starting today, where you spend $100 in select Gift Cards, and you get a $20 OYNP Albertsons Catalina coupon. Also this deal WORKS with Amazon.com $100 cards!!!!
Some people will be interested in Buying Kohls Gift Cards, and perhaps Amazon.com gift cards. But I focused in on the $100 Mastercard Gift Cards. The beauty of the Mastercard is we can use it ANYWHERE mastercard is accepted. So once you do this deal, you’ll have a $100 Mastercard to pay your Cable or Electric Bill(etc), so your really not out any money.
When purchasing the $100 Mastercard, we need to pay a $5.95 activation charge. This makes the card “active” to the credit card machines of the world. When we buy a $100 Mastercard, we can pay for it using a credit card/Debit card, so the total will be $105.95 total, $100 +$5.95 activation fee. We then get a $20 OYNP Coupon we can use on anything(almost anything) at Albertsons for the next 7 days!
I was the first transaction of the day, and the catalina machine wasn’t working quite right, so they gave me a $20 Gift Card. 🙂 I would have had 4 of those $20 OYNP coupons.
We then can buy, in a different transaction, another $100 Mastercard Gift Card, for a total of $105.95. We use the previous $100 Gift card(ask them to make the register accept just $100 first), which will leave us a balance of $5.95. You can use cash or your debit card again, to pay that amount. You will then have another $100 Mastercard Gift Card and another $20 OYNP Catalina. Each time we “roll” this deal we will get a $20 OYNP Catalina, which ultimately costs us the $5.95 activation, which is how we get to a $14.05 Money Maker, EACH time we roll.
So I did this 4 times. I payed on my credit card/debit card $100 for the initial transaction, and then $5.95 each “roll”. So i payed $128.30 on my credit/debit card, and have a $100 Mastercard in my possession and 4 x $20 OYNP coupons. NET=$28.30 for 4 x $20 OYNP Catalinas. So I essentially payed $28.30 for $80 worth of groceries at Albertsons.
The coupon does say one $20 OYNP coupon per transaction per day, but many stores will allow you to use all at once on the same day, BUT that’s up to the stores discretion, so very much a YMMV.
This kind of deal only happens once or twice a year, and I am going to spend most of the money on Meat & Veggies, things that usually do not have coupons for them. This $28.30 to $80 ratio is like having 70% off. A discount that is just awesome. Especially if this next week is a large value item shopping week! 🙂
ADVANCED Tips and thoughts:
This kind of promotion sometimes brings out the weirdest cashiers out of the woodwork. They say silly things like, you can’t pay for that Gift card with a debit/credit card. (yes you can) You can’t pay for another Gift card with a Gift Card. That is technically correct, except when you buy one of the American express/Visa/Mastercard. That $5.95 activation fee you are paying for is an agreement with the issuing Bank, not Albertsons and not Giftcardmall. So if I get some cashier that says that, I just smile, and ask for a manager. Explain the above, and its usually not an issue. Would they prefer you do this rolling of MasterCards? Probably not, but its truly not much different than buying 4 x $100 Kohls Gift cards in separate transaction with a credit card to get your 4 x $20 OYNP coupons. Just smile be nice and patient, and you shouldn’t have any problems. 🙂
Thanks for the update. I am going to go do this deal before I go to work this morning! Excited! I’m going to try to stock up on items with a long expiration date. Last time they did a deal like this my Albertsons didn’t say anything about us doing multiple transactions the same day with the $20 coupon.
Thanks for the confirmation. I know you did quite a bit of work in OR to get the credit card acceptance for MC/Visa recognized. Is there something in writing I can point to. With some cashiers and managers you can talk but they still can’t let go of the old mindset.
yeh, there is not unfortunately. But it should be 99.9% winable with corporate CS now, so IF you ran into a prob, you should be taken care of.
Thanks so much for checking on amazon!
But…when you purchase one of those American express/Visa/Mastercard cards, they say “gift card” right on them so the store can’t let you roll.
you can look up the details on line, but basically there is a technical difference between Gift Cards and Prepaid cards. Giftcards have federal rules, whereas prepaid dont really. MC/Visa/Amex are prepaid cards,(although they say giftcard) and the others are giftcards. a basic “rule” is that prepaid cards are refillable. Giftcards in general are not.
i cant say i am a super expert on this,:-) , but if you have ever tried to buy a kohls GC with an amazon GC at albertsons, it wont work. But if you try to buy a Kohls GC with a Visa GC, it works perfect. there is a difference even to them for this.
Not to nitpick, but this deal is even better than you’ve outlined: You actually paid $23.80 for $80.00 in oyno cats, not $28.30. You got the numbers reversed. A 70.25% savings! Thanks! I just might do this deal a few times, then pay my power bill!
I tried this.. the cashier would NOT let me use my debit OR credit card to purchase it. She made me go to an atm. I ended up paying an additional $3 fee for that 🙁 and then when I tried to buy a 2nd she said NO and would not let me even try. She said it’s wrong for me to be getting all that money for free. seriously.. wtf.
like i mentioned the wierdo comes out during this kind of promo. If you live in the portland area, feel free to email me the store you went to, and Ill call them and get that straightened out for you. 🙂
I’ve had multiple success at three different Albies. The fourth Albie’s registers though, rejected my prepaid Visa card. I tried three times at three separate registers. The cashiers told me the screen just grays out and they can’t input anything. Weird. A guy ahead of me in line bought a Visa gc with a regular credit card though. Manager could not explain it and told me to call the front line manager in the morning. I was bummed because this Albertsons is one of the best in terms of customer service.
anyone have success at the Hillsboro Cornelius pass location?
10 times over 😉
Nice to know! I’ll be going guns a blazin. And this goes till 12/3??
This cash only BS has spread to Seattle. At a store where it wasn’t a problem before, now has the Store director telling employees that gift cards are cash only–“corporate policy.” If I were Gift Card Mall, I’d be livid.
I have been doing this deal all week so far. I think I have gotten around 15 of the catalinas by now, but the 2 stores I have been going to are starting to shut things down. They are now saying I can only pay for all gift cards with an actual credit card… ugh..
At least they’re letting you use a credit card. Cash only here.
are you in the portland metro? Im going to make a call tomorrow, to try to fix it here.
Unfortunately, I’m in Seattle. I spoke to a store director today and he agreed I should be able to use a debit card. He reiterated what we all know; that reloadable cards are cash only. Cashiers are always confusing the two types and that is where the problem lies. Anyways, I tried to pay partly with cash and the Rush card with pin but the card was rejected by the register.