Square Card Reader MS?

[enharu]

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@MrCollector wrote:

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@enharu wrote:

I've shopped and dined at several places that uses square and never ran into any issues.

However, square is a bad idea for MS. It's much easier to just buy gift cards or other reloadable cards. Even loading money into a brokerage account and then withdrawing it after 90 days is a better option than square, though your brokerage will most likely shut you down if that's the only thing you're doing.

Square and paypal has a higher chance of freezing your accounts and withholding the money indefinitely. 

Also, if you are doing MS using your friend's business account, you or your friend will have to pay the 2.5-3% merchant fee, which is more expensive than buying GCs. Your friend is also supposed to report that amount as his income, and therefore may have pay taxes on it. In the end, you (or your friend) may end up paying a lot more than whatever the sign-up bonuses are worth. 

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I was under the impression that gift cards wouldn't count toward min spend. Is that not the case?

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you will have to read the T&Cs and also do some testing.

For instance, Amex's T&C is phrased in such a way where they do not award reward points for GC purchases, but in most cases people are still able to get rewards on their GC purchases.

Whenever you're buying GCs at grocery / drug stores, just buy some other stuff too, even if it's just a pack of gum. There are some theories about how some merchants flag transactions that are $504.95 or $505.95, which is the amount for a GC + its fee. To play it safe, just buy a GC for say $499.70, which you can then convert to a $499 money order at Walmart for instance. Or just buy some groceries while you're at it.

[MrCollector]

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@enharu wrote:

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@MrCollector wrote:

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@enharu wrote:

I've shopped and dined at several places that uses square and never ran into any issues.

However, square is a bad idea for MS. It's much easier to just buy gift cards or other reloadable cards. Even loading money into a brokerage account and then withdrawing it after 90 days is a better option than square, though your brokerage will most likely shut you down if that's the only thing you're doing.

Square and paypal has a higher chance of freezing your accounts and withholding the money indefinitely. 

Also, if you are doing MS using your friend's business account, you or your friend will have to pay the 2.5-3% merchant fee, which is more expensive than buying GCs. Your friend is also supposed to report that amount as his income, and therefore may have pay taxes on it. In the end, you (or your friend) may end up paying a lot more than whatever the sign-up bonuses are worth. 

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I was under the impression that gift cards wouldn't count toward min spend. Is that not the case?

---

you will have to read the T&Cs and also do some testing.

For instance, Amex's T&C is phrased in such a way where they do not award reward points for GC purchases, but in most cases people are still able to get rewards on their GC purchases.

Whenever you're buying GCs at grocery / drug stores, just buy some other stuff too, even if it's just a pack of gum. There are some theories about how some merchants flag transactions that are $504.95 or $505.95, which is the amount for a GC + its fee. To play it safe, just buy a GC for say $499.70, which you can then convert to a $499 money order at Walmart for instance. Or just buy some groceries while you're at it.

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Good to know. I figured the GC would have to be purchased with something else. At least with GCs you wont get any AA.

[enharu]

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@MrCollector wrote:

Good to know. I figured the GC would have to be purchased with something else. At least with GCs you wont get any AA.

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well you can still have adverse action taken against you from GC purchases, especially if you are buying a lot.

In most cases, most people are fine as long as they practice common sense and keep such spending within reasonable limits.

People whom get into trouble are usually those who get greedy and take things too far, such as buying their entire CL worth of GCs every few days...

[MrCollector]

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@enharu wrote:

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@MrCollector wrote:

Good to know. I figured the GC would have to be purchased with something else. At least with GCs you wont get any AA.

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well you can still have adverse action taken against you from GC purchases, especially if you are buying a lot.

In most cases, most people are fine as long as they practice common sense and keep such spending within reasonable limits.

People whom get into trouble are usually those who get greedy and take things too far, such as buying their entire CL worth of GCs every few days...

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If you take it to obscene levels, of course. But if you're purchasing a couple GC a month, there's little they can do.

[longtimelurker]

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@enharu wrote:

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@MrCollector wrote:

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@enharu wrote:

I've shopped and dined at several places that uses square and never ran into any issues.

However, square is a bad idea for MS. It's much easier to just buy gift cards or other reloadable cards. Even loading money into a brokerage account and then withdrawing it after 90 days is a better option than square, though your brokerage will most likely shut you down if that's the only thing you're doing.

Square and paypal has a higher chance of freezing your accounts and withholding the money indefinitely. 

Also, if you are doing MS using your friend's business account, you or your friend will have to pay the 2.5-3% merchant fee, which is more expensive than buying GCs. Your friend is also supposed to report that amount as his income, and therefore may have pay taxes on it. In the end, you (or your friend) may end up paying a lot more than whatever the sign-up bonuses are worth. 

---

I was under the impression that gift cards wouldn't count toward min spend. Is that not the case?

---

you will have to read the T&Cs and also do some testing.

For instance, Amex's T&C is phrased in such a way where they do not award reward points for GC purchases, but in most cases people are still able to get rewards on their GC purchases.

Whenever you're buying GCs at grocery / drug stores, just buy some other stuff too, even if it's just a pack of gum. There are some theories about how some merchants flag transactions that are $504.95 or $505.95, which is the amount for a GC + its fee. To play it safe, just buy a GC for say $499.70, which you can then convert to a $499 money order at Walmart for instance. Or just buy some groceries while you're at it.

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Right, most T&Cs these days contain language on cash equivalents, such as travelers checks and money orders (they want cash advance fees for this) and many now add prepaid and reloadable cards.  According to T&Cs, as enharu says, rewards are not given for these.  In practice, it is just a purchase at store X, and you get all the rewards.    

If issuers are flagging precise $ figures, then they need to fire their IT departments.   A simple algorithm, with parameters to tweak is simply:

IF a user buys more than $300 at a high-bonus category store, more than 4 times a month for three months, then investigate.

Basically that is all you are interested in, e.g. are they regularly spending unusual amounts at drug stores.   This overcomes enharu-style tweaking, and avoids the need to maintain lots of price points (e.g. One Vanilla and VGC at CVS costs $4.95, the seasonal VGC costs $5.95, and at Walmart it is $4.94 etc)

So I don't think it fools anyone but if it makes you feel safer!  Best to buy stuff you really would buy, otherwise you are cutting your profit.

[longtimelurker]

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@MrCollector wrote:

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Good to know. I figured the GC would have to be purchased with something else. At least with GCs you wont get any AA.

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As enharu said, not at all.  A lot of people got shut down by Citi for buying gift cards, not always those buying a lot.    It is very clear to issuers what is going on, they may just decide to ignore.   I spend $3-4K every other day at CVS, there isn't a reasonable explanation for that!