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If you regularly shop online for groceries, clothes, brand new second hand items, electronics or services such as car insurance, home insurance or utilities, it may be worth looking into cashback sites in order to cut the costs of what you are spending. Usually, the companies selling these services sometimes choose to be listed on cashback sites to encourage more people to buy from them.
When a customer buys something via a cashback site, they will receive cashback credit, as a little incentive, but how does it work? In this post I am going to tell you how you can make £100s a year by using them properly.
WHAT IS A CASHBACK SITE?
Unlike a loyalty program that gives you rewards after a certain number of purchases, cash back sites receive a commission from the merchant for directing you to their website, and Top Cashback gives you up to 105% of what the retailers pay them.
The extra 1-5% comes from advertising revenue and other services they provide on their website, which makes them the highest paying cashback site in the UK.
HOW DO CASHBACK SITES WORK?
If you are planning to make a purchase or sign up to a finance product, rather than going direct, use a cashback site to click to the company’s website and you will get paid for it. The amount you get paid ranges from pennies for your food shopping, to more than £100 for electronic products or mobile and broadband products. You could even save money on your holidays and trips away by booking them using a cashback site.
You’ll need to sign up to the cashback site first, which is free with Top Cashback, and if you sign up using my referral link, you’ll get £5 free! Then you’ll have to log in and search for the online retailer you want to buy from, such as ASOS or Tesco. If it’s listed on the site, click the cashback site’s link to visit that company.
Your visit to their site is then tracked, and if you buy something, an amount of money is then put into your cashback site account once the transaction has been processed. It will show as pending whilst the retailer checks your purchase is valid and you have met any terms and conditions before it releases the payment to the cashback site. As soon as this arrives into your account, you can withdraw it, however it may take a few weeks, or even months for it to hit your account.
With Top Cashback, you can request a payout via BACS or Paypal, or request an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card for any amount above 1p. The payout threshold for each type of Gift Card is displayed when you click the ‘See info’ button on the listing on your Payout page.
WHY SHOULD I USE TOP CASHBACK?
Cashback sites can be a good way to save money on your online shopping, although you should note that cashback is never 100% guaranteed, so never purchase anything based on how much cashback you will receive, over what the best deal is. It is simply just a simple way to try and cut the cost off something you are already going to buy.
You should instead work out the best deal for you without including the cashback, and see the cashback as a nice little bonus if it is successful.
Top Cashback has 2,650 retail partners, and they say that the average cashback earned is £250 per year.
WHAT SHOULD I LOOK OUT FOR?
When you search for a retailer on the site, make sure to pay attention to any terms and conditions they impose. Some retailers may restrict cashback to certain products or deal, or not pay the cashback to you until a set period of time has elapsed.
You should also clear your cookies before making a purchase via a cashback site, as cashback sites use the data called cookies to track your purchases. So if you have used a different site to search for deals before you buy, such as a comparison site or voucher codes site, the cookies might attribute the lead to that site instead, who will receive the commission instead of the cashback site.
If the cashback site doesn’t receive the commission from the purchase, you won’t receive any cashback.
