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Those gift card for cash machines from Coinstar

R

RTrain

Bluelighter
Joined
Mar 4, 2012
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So I was thinking of a way to maybe get some cash if in a bind. Take a store credit card, anyone will do, as long as it is accepted at those Coinstar operated machines that give you a cash voucher for a gift card. So you use credit, preferably a store credit which gives you low or no APR on initial large purchases.

Next, buy something expensive with the credit card, possibly get a gift receipt. I guess I'd go like an extra 30-35% of the money you need in terms of hte price of the item. Then return it, with the gift receipt (not sure if you can get those outside of the holiday season? But if so it would prevent them possibly just taking the charge off the card). Even if you cant get a gift receipt, I figure they still will give you a gift card in place of the item if you ask for that. Make sure you initially buy an item not on sale or going on sale, because they will only give you a store card for the lowest amount it is on sale for.

Next, just take that gift card to the Coinstar machine, cash it in and you have your money. Seems possible to me. Anyone else try this or have a reason as to why it would not work? Anyway I might give it a go in the coming days, so I will report if no one has any info on the matter.

Mods: not sure if this is right sub forum for this, so move it if you like. And don't delete it, I can't imagine its anything that'd be considered illegal, you are most certainly losing some money on the deal and the store shouldn't be losing out in the long run, they already have your money at that point. As a matter of fact, I'd imagine they prefer giving out gift cards for returned items, since they can be lost and often people don't use the full balance.
 
So, is this method a way of getting a cash advance from a store credit card? If so, I don't think it would be worth it because those cards already have a high interest rate and then the coinstar machine - I imagine - would also charge you a high rate (a high rate for borrowing money) for cashing in the gift card. You'd still owe the money to the store for the original purchase, right?

Even with a store card with a low initial APR, there are tricks they often use, such as if you miss a single payment the 0% rate reverts to an extremely high rate from day 1 of the purchase and you now owe all that money. That's a big risk so you have to be certain you can make all the payments.

It does seem like it would work, though.
 
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^to simplify it, yes it would be a round-about way to get a cash advance on a store credit card. Just with a higher fee than your typical cash advance(Considering typical cash advances are like 5% I think, I am sure the compensation for a gift card at one of those kiosks is well lower than 95% the actual value of the card, prob in the 75-80% range), but if its a first time purchase or you do it during a promotional period for your store card, you could catch a decent amount of time without an interest accruing. And they usually have low minumum payments, like buy a $500 dollar computer, return it, get $500 gift card and hopefully get around $400 for the card at the kiosk. With no APR its basically like a $400 cash advance with a 20% APR.

Believe me I've done enough incredibly stupid things to dig myself a huge credit debt, so this is just adding to the pile of shit I have amassed. I know its idiotic but what do you want from me? I still make my minimum payments on time for all my credit/loans, so I actualy have a decent rating, just tons of debt and an unholy amount of interest accruing, so I am half paying off just interest. But, when I hopefully get my shit together, it won't take much mroe than a year to clean up the debt(if I work my ass off or am just really frugal) and I might still be able to get a mortgage. You can have a small amount of debt, like say just a thousand off 1 card, but if you just neglect to pay it, you'll crush your credit score much worse than building a shit load of debt and just making min. payments.

Now back to this "idea"...I just wonder, with places being able to record sales and they also will possibly ID you upon returning an item, so the can find out if you pulled the old steal it and return it for store credit, saying you lost the receipt. So if they ID you they might have you pop up in the system as being having purchased the item with the card, they will say the only option is to take off the charge from the card. BUT, that is where getting a gift receipt comes into play. If you are returning with just a gift receipt, they have really only 1 option for an return like that which was purchased with credit... to give store credit. Thats where I wonder about gift receipts? Can you gget those year round or is that just a thing stores offer during the X mas season because there is so many returns of items and people don't want to give the actually receipt for whatever reason (i.e. - it has the price, it shows personal info, etc.)?
 
you're basically talking about getting a cash advance from a credit card, except paying fees to a middle man for absolutely no reason. makes no sense to me. if you have the credit card, just get the cash advance.

alasdair
 
Would be with store card, though, no cash advance on those. Like Johny1 wrote, its basically a more complex way of using a store credit card to get a cash advance. IDK the deals at those card exchange kiosks that Coinstar offers, so its hard to say if its a good deal or not. Believe me I don't need a lesson in credit car d rates and how they kill you with interest, or anything regarding taking a cash advance off a card.

This is not an idea I am contemplating because I have a credit card that I can use to take a cash advance out with at this moment, but I do have a store card with plenty of credit on it. I suppose I could just buy an expensive item and flip it on craigslist, thats no gurantee that I am getting money quick(which is in fact the goal here).

IT ALL BASICALLY COMES DOWN TO 3 QUESTIONS(well they are sort of multiple part quesstions, so more like 3 issues that concern me):

1. If I buy something with a store credit card and return it, then return it without a receipt, will they look up my ID and see I bought the item with my store card and refuse to refund in any means except refund to the store credit card?

2. Can I get gift receipt at this time of year? Lets just say I am planning to do this at a store with 2 names and they both being with B (not limiting it to that, but just as an example). So will that store give me a gift receipt?

3. If so, when I return the "gift", I would usually get store credit, but will it be different in this case because I used a store card? Also might they ID me and see in their CPU system that I had recently purchased that exact item with my store card and only offer a refund on the card?
 
I don't think you should add anymore debt as it will ultimately kill you, how hard and how long have you been looking for a job?

With that said, you are probably better off using your cards to try to start some sort of business that will at least give you a return on your investment. Retail arbitrage etc

Get rich quick with debt is a dream that will end in a heart attack, at least try to dig yourself out.
 
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^^^^Ummm....lets see here....there is no Get Rich Quick scheme in mind and I have a pretty decent paying job. I am what they call an "addict" of a certain class of oppressively drugs. I want to fund my habit for a short while until I get a big check later next week. I need some cash, like within a day. I am not looking for a massive amount, we are talking like 3 or 4 hundred to last me a few days. I am going on Subs soon anyway but I am not ready and don't have the 3 or 4 days to get stabilized at this time (and don't tell me anything about using Subs and how they should eliminate w/d right away and yadda yadda, 1. they don't work well with what I use compared to other meds in the class of drugs 2. there is no way around suffering for a few days once your tolerance reaches a certain point)

I think I already made it clear that I have a lot of debt, a few hundred on top of it isn't going to make a huge difference at this point. I could clear this debt up in a year, tops a year and a half, if I focused on it and kicked my habit for good (or for the duration of that time I needed to clear up the debt). I also have a decent credit score, even though I have all the debt because I never miss payments. So I can still get cards with reasonably high available credit . I still get offers from cards that offer balance transfers with 0% APR for 6, 12 or even as much as 18 months. Meaning I could open other cards, float my debt to those cards, cancel the cards I racked up the debt on, and then I am no longer getting hosed with a ridiculous interest rate. Long story short...the debt is not as bad as it might seem, what is bad is my addiction and actually stopping for good. But thats not my current concern, my concern is getting $$$ now.
 
RTrain said:
^^^^Ummm....lets see here....there is no Get Rich Quick scheme in mind and I have a pretty decent paying job. I am what they call an "addict" of a certain class of oppressively drugs. I want to fund my habit for a short while until I get a big check later next week. I need some cash, like within a day. I am not looking for a massive amount, we are talking like 3 or 4 hundred to last me a few days. I am going on Subs soon anyway but I am not ready and don't have the 3 or 4 days to get stabilized at this time (and don't tell me anything about using Subs and how they should eliminate w/d right away and yadda yadda, 1. they don't work well with what I use compared to other meds in the class of drugs 2. there is no way around suffering for a few days once your tolerance reaches a certain point)

I think I already made it clear that I have a lot of debt, a few hundred on top of it isn't going to make a huge difference at this point. I could clear this debt up in a year, tops a year and a half, if I focused on it and kicked my habit for good (or for the duration of that time I needed to clear up the debt). I also have a decent credit score, even though I have all the debt because I never miss payments. So I can still get cards with reasonably high available credit . I still get offers from cards that offer balance transfers with 0% APR for 6, 12 or even as much as 18 months. Meaning I could open other cards, float my debt to those cards, cancel the cards I racked up the debt on, and then I am no longer getting hosed with a ridiculous interest rate. Long story short...the debt is not as bad as it might seem, what is bad is my addiction and actually stopping for good. But thats not my current concern, my concern is getting $$$ now.
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Based on your original post, you made it sound like you were in a dire situation and didn't work. Since you are working and do have access to money, i'll let you figure it out on your own.

Good luck!
 
LuGoJ said:
Based on your original post, you made it sound like you were in a dire situation and didn't work. Since you are working and do have access to money, i'll let you figure it out on your own.

Good luck!
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I work, all the money goes to H. That is the case with the vast majority of heroin (or other opiate) addicts. As much as the media loves to say heroin is cheap, HA!, not so much. It is no where near "cheap". I could probably afford smoking 5 packs of cigs a day, I cannot afford the habit I have. But yeah its dire, less so than yesterday because I bought a couple 2 dollar scratch tix and hit 100, so I guess I did have some good luck today.

As for this whole post, its almost a null and void situation. Because, alas, Best Buy allows you to buy gift cards with credit, even with credit cards that are not the store ones. So after findign this out from BB, I called coinstar, they tell me I can get 165 or 170 off a 200 gift card (most Best Buy sells at a time on a gift card), which I can live with. I go to the store, buy it, option to get $5 worth of rewards or 6 months no interest (i take the option of no interest, got enough credit debt racking up interest so made more sense). Go to the coinstar exchange thing and they offer me $132. So apparently if you call asking how much the exchange rate is for any gift card, the will just say whatever is around 85% of the card value (which on their website is what they claim 'you can get up to...'). I guess its more like 66%. I don't know what situation would get you 85% of the value of the gift card, but don't expect to get near that if you decide to cash in one of those things. Have to say, poor customer service, just be honest or say you can't be sure but it'll be something between 50 and 85%, don't lie, thats the worst customer service type of customer service, makes the representative look lazy and makes the company seem to be luring you into a worse deal than they are truly offering.
 
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