How I Saved over $600 (so far) on Purchases + Tips & Tricks

You guys may have heard me talk about Ebates before, but I haven't posted about it in a while and there are some new features that you may not know about. I would also like to say that this is not a sponsored post or anything like that...Ebates has no idea I'm posting this, I just really love the site and use it every single day!

First, here's an account update so you can get an idea of how much I've saved using Ebates:

You can see here that I've earned back $602.42 from my online purchases so far. I'll be getting my next check of $38.51 in November (sent via PayPal). On the right, you can see my last three purchases (all beauty-related of course, haha!).

How Does it Work?

If you're not familiar with Ebates, it's an online rebate site and it's totally free to sign up, When you're ready to shop online, head over to Ebates.com first and find the store you want to shop at. 

Click through to that store from the Ebates website and they'll track how much you spend and give you a percentage of that amount back in cash. The percentage you get back is different with every store and sometimes they have days when you can earn more! 

For example, this Columbus Day weekend, you can get double the cash back at these stores: 

So if you spend $100 at Sephora today, you'll get $8 deposited right into your Ebates account. You can see how this will add up if you do it every time you shop online! 

New! In-Store Cash

Ebates has now added cash back when you shop in person! I'm really excited about this because even though I do shop online sometimes, I still do more in-store shopping. 

Here's how it works: 

On the Ebates website, go to the In-Store Cash Back tab at the top and find stores you're likely to shop in...they have stores like Macys, Bed, Bath & Beyond, Charming Charlie, Bye Bye Baby, Gap, Old Navy, Ann Taylor, etc. 

Add the credit card you're most likely to use in these stores and then link it to each store you're going to be shopping in. I've tried this recently and it's amazing...I totally forgot I had signed up and a few weeks ago we were in Bed, Bath & Beyond buying new sheets and mattress covers (which added up to quite a bit) and later I got an email saying that I got cash back. I love it because you don't have to even think about it...you just get money back on every purchase! 

Ebates Button

For those of you who are already using Ebates, I don't know if you use the Ebates Button, but if not, you might be missing out on a LOT of savings!

First of all, if you're not familiar with it, the Ebates button is a little widget that you drag into your toolbar on top of your web browser. When you go to a site that offers cash back, a little box pops down to let you know. This is an amazing thing because I can't tell you how many times I've purchased things at Sephora or Ulta and didn't remember to use Ebates until after the transaction went through...it was such a bummer!

Here's how you find it...it took me a while to figure out where it was. When you go to Ebates.com, scroll all the way to the bottom of the page and look for where it says APPS,TOOLS, & SERVICES and then "Ebates Button" (see below screenshot), then follow the instructions to install it on your toolbar. I use Google Chrome and it was as simple as just dragging it up to the toolbar and dropping it there. You can see it in the screenshot below... it's in the upper right-side of the page...it's a little yellow E.

Then, when you go to a site that supports Ebates, a little box will pop down to remind you to get your cash back...see this screenshot here. It's pretty hard to ignore, so this ensures you won't miss out on your cashback.

But that's not ALL it does! Ebates also scans the internet for coupon codes while you're at checkout. Here's an example...I was on the Old Navy site because I wanted to buy a dress I saw in store yesterday but my local store didn't have my size. The Ebates button popped up like always and I went to the checkout screen.

Then all of a sudden, the Ebates button said it was checking for different coupon codes, and not only does it check for them, it tries them for you until it finds one that works! This means you don't even have to type them into the box...it's all automatic.

In this screenshot below, see how the little box at the top says that Ebates found 2 coupons? I didn't press anything, it just did this automatically when I got to the checkout screen.

Then it tried both of the coupon codes for me and automatically filled in the one that saved me the most money...it happened to be a 40% off coupon which saved me $10!

Here, you can see that my dress was on sale for $25 and then the coupon brought it down to $15.

Even if you don't care about getting cash back or don't shop online enough to make it worth your while, this little tool is invaluable because it saves you from having to go searching for coupon codes on sites like Retail Me Not or Coupons.com. I just thought it was so cool and I wanted to share it with you guys! :)

If you're not on Ebates yet, you can sign up for free here.

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