New-to-me Shopping Portal: KUDOS

 

Discovered a new savings portal called KUDOS that purports to not only give you credit for your purchases like Rakuten, but also will help you make sure you are leveraging the coupons/promotions on your credit cards too.  Anyone have any experience with it?  So far it only seems to be fetching information like what percent back I get for categories like gas on certain cards. 

What I really wish was if there was an app that would tell me what cards have deals I can add!  Like "Hey Sue, you have 10% at Moe's on your Visa this week so if you are shopping at Moe's use that one!"

Sue's Favorite Shopping Portals 2024

Yes, I long ago embraced letting portals/app track my shopping habits in return for a "rebate" of the percentage of my shopping.  A few of my favorites:

                                                  

Rakuten continues to be one of the better known options (formerly known as Ebates).  You can either use their app or shop through your web browser.  Rebates are issued as quarterly deposits via PayPal or similar cash apps.

I have done VERY well with Capital One Shopping lately.  Does the app eerily track what websites I open?  Yes.  Did it reward me with an email link to get 20% cash back shopping online with BJ's Wholesale Club.  Then after using that link, did I get another email with 11% back rather than their standard 1%?  YES.  Ka-ching!  They sent me a 20% link for Hilton earlier this week because I was looking at rooms in case I need to stay over when we pickup Little One from college for Thanksgiving.  The tricky part:  You have to buy gift cards rather than receiving cash, but the gift cards include many common vendors including Amazon.

Don't shop online?  No problem!  

Ibotta has been around for years, letting you take photos of your receipts to get credit for specific items.  Ibotta specifically includes several national liquor brands, so if you are shopping for adult beverages for holiday gifts, don't forget to check.  They have online shopping links similar to Rakuten and Capital One Shopping too!

Fetch Rewards lets you manually take photos of your receipts as well, but even gives you a small credit for receipts that do not have designated items. 

Have a favorite I don't mention?  Share it in the comments!

Note:  This post contains referral links including my Amazon Associates link.

Sue the Bargain Hunter: Return of the Bargains

Disclaimer:  Post contains referral links.

It is hard to believe it has now been 20 years since I officially got the title "Mom"!  The budget ran leaner in those early days, and thus the reason for Sue the Bargain Hunter emerged. 

Currently, while I take a break from my professional career, I find myself listening to budget/financial blogs like those from Ramsey, Suze Orman, etc.  Even if you are financially stable, it cannot hurt to pause and pause to check if you are using your resources wisely!  

My shopping habits these days?

I have spent a lot of time (and money) in BJs/Costco the last few years - I am lazy and shop in bulk, but generally try to time my purchasing so that I only buy certain items if there is a coupon.  But now that I am an "empty nester", that bulk shopping is just too much and going to waste.  So I need to go back to shopping the traditional grocery store like ShopRite and Weis.  Bloggers like Living Rich with Coupons continue to be the experts in the local shopping game, so I would continue to defer to them in all those coupon matchups.  And yes, a whole lot of Amazon (referral) continues to be very good at delivery to my house and my Amazon Associates account is still active for when I want to share items I like at Amazon with friends...

But I still continue to use a few saving apps too!

Rakuten  (referral) - Yes, I have given up my privacy to have my shopping stalked!  Just make sure you turn off notifications if they disrupt you and remember to log into the app before you start shopping on your phone!

Fetch  (referral) - Fetch processes both your paper receipts and your electronic receipts received via email, giving you credit on top of sales prices when you buy their target items.  I even recently got bigger bonuses recently after buying something from Dick's Sporting Goods since Dick's shipped via DoorDash (so I was able to combine Rakuten and Fetch!).  I just cashed in my first Amazon gift card.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn commission from qualifying purchases.