Archive for the 'Deals & Offers' Category
Thursday, January 3rd, 2013
Updated. Here’s another $2 in free Amazon MP3 credit up for grabs. Visit this link for the details – you’ll need a Facebook account for this one (real or spam account, you decide).
It should increase your gift card balance for music purchases only. Limit one promotional credit per customer, so my wife and I both jump on these to fill up the iPod. We download the files manually and combine them onto a shared iTunes library. Must be redeemed by 11:59 p.m. PST on January 10, 2013.
Posted in Deals & Offers | 27 Comments »
Wednesday, December 26th, 2012
Google has finally confirmed on their Official Gmail Blog that Google Voice and Gmail will continue to offer free calls to anywhere within the U.S. and to Canada through the end of 2013. Google continued its tradition of making their announcements very late in the year, although many people expect an advanced notice if they do decide to end this free service in the future (or risk some surprised and angry users). This handy service has been free since late 2010.
This should make the owners of the Obi100 (~$40) and Obi110 VoIP Telephone Adapters (~$50) very happy, as it allows you plug in any standard landline telephone and use Google Voice to make free phone calls. The more expensive model allows you to bridge a traditional POTS landline with your new VoIP gadgetry. The Obihai box has been around since January 2011.
If you don’t have one yet, this means that for under $40 you can get at the very least one full year of free phone service including long distance, with no computer required (broadband internet access is required). There is a one-time $20 fee to port your existing number over to Google Voice. Reader experiences have been overall very positive, with easy installation and the monthly savings can be very significant.
Free Google Voice calls also makes it possible to use your cell phone data plan to make voice calls, including the T-Mobile $30 a month Unlimited Plan.
Posted in Deals & Offers, Frugal Living | 7 Comments »
Thursday, December 20th, 2012
Google has just announced on their Google Play page that you can now upload your music library to Google Play, and they will scan them and keep a copy in the cloud for free and let you stream to your devices as needed. This “digital music locker” is currently limited to 20,000 songs and US users. Microsoft and Apple offer similar services, but charge $25 every year. Tech site AllThingsD suggests that the other companies charge money as this effectively “launders” pirated music into officially paid-for music, and Google probably just paid a big flat fee to make this happen for everyone.
Our new music matching feature gets your songs into your online music library on Google Play much faster. We’ll scan your collection and quickly rebuild it in the cloud – all for free. And we’ll stream your music back to you at up to 320 kbps.
I simply interpret this as a free way to back up all my music files online and not have to worry about a hard drive crash. I was able to upload all my songs overnight – sucked straight from iTUnes – and I can now see and stream them to my phone or computer (or download them). Pretty neat.
Posted in Deals & Offers | 5 Comments »
Thursday, December 20th, 2012
It may not work in time for Christmas anymore, but here’s another offer for a free 1-year Shoprunner membership. Enter offer code RUNNER. No credit card required, it is optional, just asks for an e-mail address. Shoprunner is similar to Amazon Prime in that it offers unlimited free 2-day shipping with no minimum order amount from a variety of online merchants. Via staff of FW.
After you get your free year, you can also get another free 90-day extension by going back to the home page and signing up for Shoprunner Central. This service scrapes your Gmail or Yahoo e-mail account to help keep track of receipts. You need to allow them access your personal information, which I was not cool with, so I just used my seldom-used @yahoo.com e-mail.
Posted in Deals & Offers | 10 Comments »
Monday, December 17th, 2012
You may be familiar with Credit Sesame from my popular free credit scores with no trials post, as they offer you a free credit score based on your Experian credit report, updated once a month. They make money by presenting you with credit-related offers like mortgage refinances or auto loans. I’ve been happily getting my updates for years now… I don’t worry about the absolute number as much as the relative change each month to see if anything new has either hurt or boosted my creditworthiness significantly.
Per this press release, Credit Sesame is now offering free daily credit monitoring as well. No tricks, no trials, no credit card required. If you’re already a member, just log in and opt into the new feature. You can also get push alerts via their Android and iPhone apps. Here’s a screenshot with nothing exciting since it’s only been 5 minutes:
As opposed to the free monthly score, monitoring checks your Experian credit report daily and sends you an email alert if any activities have occurred – for example, if there was a credit pull by a lender or a new address added. This can provide early warning of attempted identity theft, reporting errors, or simply am overzealous lender checking your credit without permission. Many providers charge $10-$20 a month for similar monitoring, and while it’s potentially useful I’ve never recommended paying a hundred bucks a year for it. But hey, Credit Sesame already has my info, so I’ll definitely sign up for free.
(Note: You can get also free credit scores and similar monitoring alerts based on your TransUnion credit data at CreditKarma.com.)
From their FAQ, here’s a sample of events on your Experian credit report that may trigger an alert:
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Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 11 Comments »
Monday, December 17th, 2012
Even though I know you can get cheap, basic cell service for under $10, I do find value in having a smartphone with mobile data, for business reasons and mobile hotspot use if nothing else. My current contract is coming to an end, so I’ve been looking for the best current value in smartphone plans.
I kept hearing about a T-Mobile $30 a month prepaid plan that with a little “hacking”, you could turn into an unlimited minutes, text, and data plan for $30 a month with no contracts! Too good to be true? After many hours of research and tinkering around, I finally have it all set up and have been using it for a little over a week. Here’s a summary of what I discovered (ended up being a bit long):
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Posted in Deals & Offers, Frugal Living | 38 Comments »
Wednesday, December 12th, 2012
Back again… Target has a “Friends and Fans” promotion offering a $10 Target Gift card with $50+ purchase. Expires Saturday, 12/15/12. See all Target coupons here. If you are having trouble getting to print, the bar codes appear to be the same for everyone and Fatwallet member happysave shared a PDF version here.
Heavy Target shopper? Did you know that the Target REDcard debit card gives you 5% back on all Target purchases and sucks money directly out of your existing checking account?
Also: If you do cheap prepaid phone service, you can buy cards from many services at Target and lower your effective monthly rate.
Posted in Deals & Offers | 14 Comments »
Sunday, December 9th, 2012
There’s a new 2% flat cash back card in town …although it’s somewhat hidden under some Priceline co-branding and William Shatner doing martial arts.
Here’s how it works. The Priceline Rewards Visa® Card earns 2 points per $1 spent on all purchases, with no limit, no cap, no category restrictions. 100 points = $1 in statement credit, so in other words that’s 2% flat cash back on everything.
Redemption involves “zapping” one of your existing purchases with your points. So let’s say you have 5,000 points ($50 worth). You’ll need to choose a purchase on your card within the last 90 days that’s between $25 and $50 to “zap”. Let’s say you spend $43.33 at the grocery store, and you pick that to zap. You’ll get a $43.33 statement credit and redeem 4,333 points. The remaining 667 points will be saved for the next time. Make sense? Not as nice as 2% back, but it’s not that bad once you understand the system. You can redeem online, there’s no need to call in.
You may redeem your points toward statement credits for any purchase(s) on your Account statement that are $25 or greater.
New cardholders also get a $50 bonus after first purchase (5,000 bonus points after your first purchase). No annual fee.
If you do use Priceline.com, you can redeem your points towards previous “Name Your Own Price” Priceline purchases at a higher rate. Depending on the size of the purchase, you can effectively get between 2.2% to 3% cash back on those purchases. Combine with a 4% or so rebate from a cashback shopping portal for hotels and care rentals, and that’s not a bad total discount.
For those interested, there is also a 0% balance transfer offer that isn’t the best, but definitely above-average. You get 0% introductory APR for the first fifteen billing cycles after the account is opened. The balance transfer fee is either $10 or 3% of each transfer, whichever is greater, during those first fifteen billing cycles. See terms and conditions for details.
In summary, this is a rewards card where you can get a baseline 2% cash back on all your purchases. I recommend combining this with a nice category-specific card like the 5% cash back rotating cards or the 6% back on groceries / 3% back on gas American Express. This card is issued by Barclays Bank which is a relatively new issuer in the US and thus won’t affect your existing Citi/Chase/AmEx relationships if you have other rewards cards.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 13 Comments »
Thursday, December 6th, 2012
Social media something-or-other site Bckstgr.com is offering new users up to 1,000 United MileagePlus miles for registering and linking your Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare accounts. 400 miles for sign-up, 200 miles for each link. You have to provide your United frequent flier number and PIN, but as you can see on this United.com page, the partnership is legit. Came in handy for me, as United miles expire after 18 months of inactivity. Screenshot below:
Posted in Deals & Offers | 8 Comments »
Wednesday, December 5th, 2012
New, similar offer. If you “Like” them on Facebook and fill out a 1-page survey, you can get 500 free American Airlines miles. This will also reset your miles expiration date, which is 18 months from most recent activity.
We’d like to offer you Miles for your Thoughts! Earn 500 AAdvantage® bonus miles just for sharing your thoughts with American Airlines. First, like both the American Airlines and AAdvantage Facebook pages – then answer a few questions!
Posted in Deals & Offers | 7 Comments »
Wednesday, December 5th, 2012
Back again, quantities limited . Amazon is running a Facebook promotion with a $5 off $25 purchase credit if you connect a Facebook account and share about it (can just share with yourself and/or delete link afterward). You must spend $25 in one transaction, and the promotional expires 11:59 PM PST on Sunday 11/9/12. The promotional credit may only be applied to products “Ships and sold by Amazon.com” and may not be applied to digital downloads or gift card purchases.
Looking for a self-gifting idea? Consider the OBi110 VoIP bridge which lets you replace your monthly landline bill with Google Voice and NO monthly bills, which is now only $40.99 with free shipping = Under $36 with this coupon.
Posted in Deals & Offers | 3 Comments »
Monday, December 3rd, 2012
Here’s a great credit card offer that I took advantage of previously for those interested in some free travel either within the US or internationally. The British Airways Visa Signature® Card is offering up to 50,000 bonus Avios after you make $1,000 in purchases within the first 3 months of account opening.
The card does have an annual fee of $95, which is not waived the first year. The card always earns 1.25 BA Avios points per dollar spent on all purchases (double that on British Airways purchases). Another perk is no foreign transaction fees, handy when traveling and saving you up to 3% off everything compared to cards that have the fee. It also has smart chip ID technology that is sometimes required in Europe.
The Avios reward chart is now based on how far you want to travel in terms of miles. So what can you do with all those points?
Redeem awards domestically on partner American Airlines. Within the US, it’s usually easiest to find flights on partner American Airlines. For example, I can get from Los Angeles to Honolulu, Hawaii using only 25,000 Avios points roundtrip. I ran a quote in Fall and it cost $659 broken down to $621 fare and only $38 in taxes. So in this case you could save $621 in exchange for 25,000 points, which is 2.5 cents per point. Shorter-distance flights can be a good deal as well. Roundtrip from Chicago to New York City is only 15,000 Avios points + about $30 in taxes. More details below:
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Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 94 Comments »
