Fee-Free $100 Mastercard Gift Cards at Office Depot/Max

The Offer

Via Dansdeals, Office Depot and Office Max have a promotional offer on Mastercard gift cards:

  • Buy a $100 Mastercard gift card and pay no purchase fee

The Fine Print

  • Expires Tuesday, 11/8
  • Limit one per customer
  • Discount applied at register

Our Verdict

Pretty good deal to rack up INK or SimplyCash spend, but only if you have a liquidation method for these cards.
    Chuck
  • On November 6, 2016, 16:26

View Comments (26)

  • Just bought 11 at OM and 7 at OD. The store had a lot more, but I felt uneasy buying that many. Even with the 11 at OM, the cashier asked why so many and called the manager to see if there is a limit on number of GCs a customer could buy. I couldn't hear what the manager said, but I do know 11 was fine.

  • I need a time machine to go back to the days of Redbird. Now I'm sitting on 30K in gift cards AND I'M FRUGAL so won't be regular spending of them. So I'm teetering on the fine line of Opportunity and Cost.

  • Ill do this once, since OD is on my way home.....500 UR points for just walking in...not bad IMO.

  • just went and bought one at my closest OM - next to WM. BUT: i don't see PIN information anywhere on it. Also, the barcode is exposed! On ALL of them - it's the pkg design. So...maybe not worth the risk.

    i went ahead and bought one, and raced home to register it. Still no info about PIN on the website, but i'm waiting on hold to talk to someone.

    If nothing else, maybe we can liquidate thru CirclePay, after registering?

    • whoops, my bad. You don't need to know an existing PIN before "changing" the PIN. You just choose/set it thru the automated system.

      The card says "electronic use only" but i assume that *doesn't* mean "online only".

        • well, the previous US Bank MC GC's had the PIN in the pkg. When i didn't see it here, and i called in...it just said "do you want to Change your PIN". Not "choose your PIN".

  • I may just do something different. I am considering getting out my sock drawer cards for a walk on this offer. While not a money maker, it knocks off the dust at 1% reward which more than covers 49 cents for the $500.00 money order at the grocery. Who knows, I may just get a no fee Subway or Burger King or something to insure an odd amount.
    It just so happens, that I will be running a route tomorrow anyway that gets me very close to OD/OMs nearby.

    • I was able to purchase as many as I like on one purchase / one credit card transaction. I bought five at one location on a Fidelity 2% Visa,
      then at a different location separately dusted off two more sock drawer cards at two $100.00 MCGCs of these per sock drawer card.

      These MCGCs are US Bank issued - I had to call into the IVR (automated phone) one card at at time to change the PIN. Once I had the PIN issue resolved. I got $500 max amount per Western Union MO for 49 cents each at the grocery.

  • Is this national wide promotion? I was just in OD. I don't see the promotion sign. This is in Houston motro.

    • FYI Jim that I am in New Orleans area and just bought four of these at an OD that likewise had no promo sign. Plus the cashiers had not heard of it but were willing to ring one up for fun to see if the fee was charged. Per the promo there was no fee. Seemed it was in their national system just no store awareness or signs.

      Thinking I may go back tomorrow and get a few more since it's the last day of the promo. I don't do the WM liquidation route but have a low-key money order option that will work. It would be more work than worth it if I didn't have a need for a little boost on card signup spending.

  • ugh, geez. i don't know if this is worth it. 500 UR per (for free, but still). you can't split tender with these at WM, b/c the pin-terminal won't let you do the "change payment type" trick between each swipe. So, unless you still have a Serve card (or GoBank) - you're doing several individual $100 MO's.

    and the 1-per customer limit is kinda...frustrating. So, i'm lucky in that i have 3 OM's near me, so i can do 3 per day, for 3 days. 4500 UR. Is it worth the hassle/driving/gas?

    I might feel differently if i hadn't gotten so many UR from the previous deals the last few months. Or if these were VGCs, and easier to liquidate.

    • You actually CAN do split-tender with these at WM. It's true that when doing split-tender, the "cancel" button doesn't show up and so it defaults to credit and voids out. But, if you ask to swipe again, the second time the cancel button DOES show up. It's true that you have to repeat this with all 4 cards, (for 8 swipes total,) but it does work- I've gotten plenty of $799.30 MOs this way.

      The truth is, though, that with these $100 cards, WM probably isn't even the cheapest place to get MOs, since you will only be able to get a $400 MO (since WM only lets you split across 4 total cards.) And it will be the same 70 cents. Plenty of grocery stores all over charge less than that for MOs- anywhere from 45-60 cents- just they only go to $500 max, while WM goes to $1,000, making it usually cheaper. But in this case, with $100 cards, you can't get a MO greater than $400 anyway, so WM provides no advantage, especially with the hassle of the cancel/change payment trick.

      I'd check your area for other places that sell MOs, but if you can't find one, try WM with the procedure I just describes, it works.

      Also, the limit of 1 isn't being enforced on these. You can ring up multiple, even in one transaction, and there are no purchase fees. This is a great opportunity to get even more UR from OfficeMax.

      • Do these come with a default PIN (eggs last four digits) or do you need to call and set it?

    • how many is "so many UR from the previous deals"?
      i dropped 11k on $200 VGCS at OD last month.. im still liquidating

      • yeah, let's see....

        the first round of VGC/MCGC deals, i think i got 40K UR, and the second month i got 60K. Definitely worried for a sec about getting the Chase Shutdown, but they didn't seem to care (neither did GoBank)

    • Why not liquidate via normal spend? $100 restaurant spend for example? Consider it 5x restaurant spend rather than 3x via CSR. Or pay your insurance? Or at Target/Walmart. There are so many categories of unbonused spend you can use these on.

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