I received an amazing offer from Capital One Shopping this morning: 25% back from gift cards.com. I was reminded to buy Mastercard gift cards on the last day. If you use a browser that you use for price shopping, you should use this code.

The Capital One Shopping browser is one of the reasons I like it.

Why I usually avoid browser extensions

The problem is that they steal the clicks.

For those with one or more Business Platinum cards, an offer like that is available.

I installed the browser extension so that I could get in on the 30% back party.

Before I found this email from hello@capitaloneshopping.com, I was not sure how long it had been since I received it.

It was a score. After installing the extension, I looked at the frying pan, but now I have the chance to get 30% back at the store.

I received this ho-hum offer eight days after.

Two days after the email, I received an excellent offer for I hg hotels.

You can find the best rewards at any given time with the help of Cashback Monitor.

In the past 15 months, my 18% IHG offer was better than any public portal offer, but we only saw 15% once.

Capital One has a current public offer of 5%.

How I avoid click-through thievery

The reason is that in the process of looking for deals, I might click on a site to reveal a coupon code and that click could invalidate any shopping portal click- through that I

I installed the extension in my browser to solve the browser extension problem.

Results so far

Only my Macy's purchase has been paid out so far.

Here is some information about each item.

  • Macys: Well before installing the Capital One Shopping extension, I used Capital One Shopping, without the extension, for a purchase at Macys.com because they were offering the best rewards rate at that time.
  • Uber Eats: Most portals don’t offer rewards only for customers who are new to Uber Eats.  But Capital One Shopping offers $1 each time existing Uber Eats customers place a new order.  It’s not much but it’s better than the nothingburger I usually get!
  • CVS: I normally shop CVS through the JetBlue portal in order to earn 3 points per dollar.  In this case, the purchase was so small that it was easier to use the browser extension and collect 3% back.  I made this purchase before receiving an offer for 5% back for CVS.
  • Saks Fifth Avenue: In my family, we currently have four Platinum cards that offer $50 back at Saks every six months (Jan through June, and July through December).  When I received the amazing 30% back offer from Capital One Shopping, I still had 3 of these $50 credits available.  So, I made three separate purchases through the portal in one day in order to earn 30% back for each order (plus $50 back from Amex on each order).  With one order I received the wrong item and returned it.  That explains why one of the three shopping trips shows a blank purchase amount.
  • IHG: I already had a cash booking at an IHG property, but when I received this targeted offer for 18% back I cancelled the old booking and booked it again through Capital One Shopping.  In this case, the actual amount I expect to pay will be far less than what was tracked so it will be interesting to see if they accurately adjust the shopping rewards downwards.  This is all part of an experiment I’m doing.  I hope to publish details and results in the next week or two.

Portal Downsides

Rewards earned through Capital One Shopping can be redeemed for the gift cards shown above.

Amazon.com gift cards are not an option because Capital One Shopping only redeems gift cards.

More about Capital One Shopping

Capital One offers and Capital One shopping are not the same thing.

If you want to learn more about Capital One Shopping and the associated browser extension, you can read this post by Stephen Pepper.