Deal has expired, view more Office Depot deals by clicking here.
The Offer
- Office Depot/Max stores are offering a $10 instant discount when you buy $300 in Visa gift cards.
The Fine Print
- Valid 3/10 – 3/16
Our Verdict
Haven’t seen one of these in a while. I’m not seeing this in the weekly ad, but these usually show up in-store at all stores; I imagine it’s nationwide.
Buy a $200 + $200 card or one $200 and one $100 card, the $10 discount will offset most of the fees. In the past, ‘Everywhere’ cards (details on how those work here) also worked to trigger the instant discount. (The $20-$500 variable cards are cash only.) You’ll probably have to buy $300 of cards in separate transactions to multiply this. Some stores will allow multiple transactions and others won’t.
Time to pull out those INK cards. Let us know if you find any other stacks (not sure if this Wells Fargo Go Far deal is still around).
Hat tip to my friend @milesfortwo
Presumably this will count as an online purchase if you use a Bank of America Cash rewards with online purchases as your 3%/5.25% category? Did anyone try it? For those of us without Ink cards.
Is it OK to buy these gift cards to meet Chase (United Biz) signup bonus minimum spending? Any ballpark estimate on the gift card before raising alarm from Chase? For example, is it OK to buy $3K gift cards to meet part of $5K signup bonus minimum spending? Thanks.
According to the card’s terms, it doesn’t look like a problem.
went to ODOM today and got 2 x $200 vgc today… store manager said he didn’t know anything about the promotion but they had the sign above the gift card case.
Same here. I went on Monday and again on Tuesday. Each time bought the flowers variable-load cards, $200 each. Each card rang up with a $5 discount… I ended up paying $390 plus $13.90 in card fees, or $403.90.
Can you use the STYLE Everywhere VGC to reload a Blue Bird card at Walmart? I know that they work for MO…?
It’s ymmv, mine works at WM, FD, Kroger.
Slightly off topic, but what is the state of affairs for Amex spend bonuses. I know you’re not supposed to buy GC’s to hit minimum spend, but would they really shut me down for spending $400 of a $5k signup bonus on some gift cards?
Yes. If RAT were to ever look into your accounts.
It all depends on your risk tolerance if you’ll risk NOT getting the bonus buying $400 worth of VGC which is specified in their T&C not to qualify for bonus. OD/OM submits L3 data so they can tell what you bought. AFAIK, many have been denied the bonus even w/o buying VGCs and they won when they fought for it when their case was reviewed. But if one buys VGCs and did not meet the required MSR, I don’t think they’ll win.
I don’t mess with Amex ever since they took away all our points and they even knew we had previously used their own charity site to use the points to give to charity. They didn’t seem to even care that charities were being helped with the points. Haven’t touched a single Amex MR earning points card and now our businesses use anything except Amex for spending. They tore the bridge out. There’s some good people there in certain departments, but that decision by someone was unfortunate.
IME no. I did AmEX MS on my last 3 AmEx Hilton cards since Oct for min spend. I purchased 4 transactions of $400 in VGC out of the $5k or so total, and had no issues. Normal people purchase gift cards, and these are on sale. If you are doing a small amount of these, I wouldn’t think it would matter.
AmEx gets Level III data (line item details on what exact items you purchased) from OD or Staples, so it is very likely it will not count towards spend bonuses
In my experience it is fine otherwise, but I never risked it with a signup bonus.
Is this a money losing offer
Nope, read the comments.
yep
Careful with the Movies Everywhere gift cards. I have been able to buy MOs with all the Everywhere cards except the Movies one.
Only place I’ve found to use it is at movie theatres.
I don’t believe Gas Everywhere works either, and the Style Everywhere have been hit and miss. I stick with Dining Everywhere.
You can pay your cable or satellite TV bill with the Movies Everywhere.
At least with Dish you can pay whatever amount you wish. For example I paid $100 (to drain the whole card) even though the due was less. You end up with a negative balance.
So annoying that the only OM near me closed last year. Have to make due with the occasional Staples deal and overzealous managers enforcing the purchase limit.
“overzealous managers enforcing the limit.: – is that like when overzealous police officers arrest criminals. If there is supposed to be a limit of 1, then why should you be upset if the workers enforce the company limit?
The limits are wholly arbitrary, so it doesn’t really matter to the manager or any other employee how many thousands someone purchases, so long as the store just verifies the transaction properly, to ensure that no fraud is taking place.
It’s basically like when a grocery store says “limit 5” on a coupon. Well, does it really matter if a thousand separate people purchase 5 of the item, or if one person purchases 5,000? Or, some combination of both? The item will sell out at some point, regardless.
It’s not like one person can logistically carry that much; and, who cares how much someone can purchase or carry, except someone else that was late to the party? It’s up to each person how silly they want to be with their purchases. But, it should be first come, first serve, nevertheless.
If a store sells out of an item really quickly, they have a few options at their disposal. They can order more of the item, or they can raise the price, so that the item doesn’t sell out so quickly.
Sounds like you should be in corporate management at a retailer, or running operations. Perhaps you were at Borders, Toys R Us, Linens and Things or Circuit City previously? Sears could use your expertise now, if you’re not already there.
If you think selling these visa gift cards at a discount is what is keeping these stores in business, then you are probably the one who ran all those stores you just listed. The whole point of these sales is to get people into the store, but that purpose is defeated when you allow one or two people to buy up the whole stock.
I agree with you RE: the intent of these programs, and thus why they restrict quantities, but I doubt their effectiveness. They’re a last ditch effort to remain relevant. I’ve been in Staples and OD/OM numerous times (when these deals are going on) and they’re ghost towns. Employees outnumber customers 2 or 3 to 1.
what make you think this “point” work at all?
nobody will by unneeded stuff just because store have sale on gift card
Yes, it certainly matters if one person buys the entire inventory, or if 5,000 people buy one item per person. If the promotion is intended to increase foot traffic to the store, therby increasing sales of other items, the one-person scenario defeats that purpose entirely. You obviously don’t understand retail.
Honestly, they should hire you as the ODOM CEO 😉
Superb analogy. Do all of you Staples managers feel like you’re cops keeping society safe from bad guys when you deny someone who wants to buy two $200 gift cards? And did you know your subordinate sales associates don’t give a rats ass about it and let people buy 10 at a time behind your back?
Can the grocery everywhere be liquidated via serve at WM?
Yes, but Amex will shut down the Serve account fairly quickly if you start loading VGCs. Not worth the risk.
lol yeah, nobody does that…
The way it’s been in the past, $10 off is usually followed by $15 off deal a week or two later, when they realize $10 off isn’t worth anyone’s time.
either that or they get into a one-up game with Staples. (half-expecting Staples to have the fee free next week or soon thereafter — to be followed in turn by OD. Make it so)
Probably yes, it’s Black Hawk behind all these cards so they probably run a promo across the stores. Not sure why they keep it so under wraps. If it’s supposed to be a promo to get people in the store, they sure went out of their way to keep it quiet.