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It’s a shame it can’t be featured on this site, but I currently generate more points from my Revolut Ultra than any other card via their ‘Shops’ feature – for those that don’t know, basically cashback but with excellent rates (up to 20%) that pay out within 24 hours. Combined with their occasional bonuses, it has been a great card so far, the additional benefits are pretty good and (nearly) worth the fee by themselves if you use them.
When it works it is great. However, I’m finding some things with Shops rather frustrating and frankly if they don’t improve I will consider cancelling, as it is all become a bit of a hassle.
1) Earning rates jumping (or even disappearing) in the middle of the day, these seems to happen quite randomly, including 10 seconds before I checked out at Tesco, and even when I was eating at one of the restaurants that they partner with. You have to enable the offer (bit of a hassle by itself) *and* checkout within 30 mins. This does not lock in the rate though so completely useless for a restaurant!
2) The offers that I have used the most Amazon, Argos, Ebay, Tesco, disappearing completely or reducing to a 2x rate after a few uses. Not sure if this is just bad luck or if the offers are bespoke and they reign in big spending on a single brand. Or perhaps the product will just degrade with time…
3) If for some reason the merchant splits your payment into multiple transactions (e.g. ebay), the points are reversed and Revolut will insist that the transaction was refunded. Again an issue because of their weird 30 minute to checkout in a single transaction thing
I’ve challenged a few of these, with mixed results. Their insistence on using AI as customer service has resulted in some completely bizarre explanations/excuses/hallucinations, and when ‘esclating’ to a human, they’ve agreed to pay out but only after quite a lot of back and forth. I’ve had to escalate 2 of the queries to ‘management’.
How are other people finding the product?
I don’t use revpoints but in an earlier incarnation of Shops I did notice the rates changing for ebay. It was typically 1% but once I noticed it was 3%, however by the time I loaded money into revolut it had dropped back to 1%.
I kept checking over the next few days and it went back up to 2%, so I decided to take it. I always buy ebay items in individual transactions anyway as I previously had TCB negate a big load of cashback when one item out of several in the transaction was lost in the post. If a seller takes longer than 30 minutes to give a combined postage discount just click through again, it worked for me anyway.
Regarding AI customer service, I bought an item of wooden furniture online for £400 which arrived with minor damage, not affecting the appearance as it was at the back. It took me 5 minutes to repair (using a saw and wood glue). Before starting the repair I emailed the company.
They offered a full refund or replacement, which I tried to explain was not necessary since the damage was inconsequential. Their failure to understand this, or the concept of a partial refund, led me to realise I was talking to an AI. I then noticed they didn’t actually advertise a phone number and it seemed impossible to get a human response via email or chat.
So I accepted the £400 refund when I would have been happy with £20 or so. What I actually wanted was to see if they could replace the panel with the defect, but evidently the company was not interested in employing staff to discuss things like that.
Yeah, I won’t make that mistake with eBay again. Generally speaking, after going to (human) customer service, they do generally pay out (which is better than can be said for Amex), but I just think they are making things difficult for themselves by the way they have implemented the Shops cashback service. I get that the cashback needs to change so people don’t start ‘relying’ on the cashback, but change the rate at midnight, not in the middle of the day, for goodness sake. And the 30 min validity is just there to trip up customers…
It’s Revolut. All this sounds like what you would expect.
dupe removed
It’s Revolut. All this sounds like what you would expect.
But arguably Amex has similar issues (I value their offers at zero if I’m not prepared to spend 30 mins + chasing it with Brighton).
Revolut once you speak to a human have generally sorted everything out without a fuss or argument.
Still trying to figure out their shops algo though…
There’s an amazing though niche redemption available for Primavera Sound VIP tickets at the beginning of June on Revolut.
20k revpoints for vip tickets which if they were not sold out would be 549 euros.
If I had the leave I’d be all over this.
And now a 50% bonus on transfers to Turkish Airlines. Though redemptions look expensive even with that rate.
And now a 50% bonus on transfers to Turkish Airlines. Though redemptions look expensive even with that rate.
Turkish is the Radisson of airlines loyalty. Wouldnt touch it with a barge pole.
Also, the more Oneworld partners are finding common ground (through Avios or syncing programs), the more the star alliance are drifting apart blocking redemptions on partners etc.The RevPoints earning rate via the partner shops seems to have dropped like a rock. Apple used to be 10x (and previously even 20x) RevPoints per GBP 1 spent. Now it is 10 RevPoints per GBP 10 spent, so 1:1. Talk about a benefit devaluation…
Admittedly, Revolut must have been losing money on the offer with every single transaction.The RevPoints earning rate via the partner shops seems to have dropped like a rock. Apple used to be 10x (and previously even 20x) RevPoints per GBP 1 spent. Now it is 10 RevPoints per GBP 10 spent, so 1:1. Talk about a benefit devaluation…
Admittedly, Revolut must have been losing money on the offer with every single transaction.I dont feel like there has been devaluation accross the board. Earn rates change all the time. It seems like they set per-merchant budgets and are altering rates dependent on when/if commission is paid to them reliably.
Apple has been 1x in the past and it was surprising to see them sustain the high rates for so long. As a retailer they notoriously don’t provide commission on newer devices. Revolut either had some special agreement with them or were absorbing a huge cost.
Still some gems in there at the moment. Particularly Morrisons which is back to 20x and Lastminute.com at 20x.
Yeah – I always did assume they are losing a decent amount of money on Apple purchases given Apple’s policy on paying commission on new products (JL spells out the rules quite clearly on that in their T&Cs).
Am I right in thinking Morrisons is only available online and not in store? Have you tried using the card in store? Any luck?
Still some gems in there at the moment. Particularly Morrisons which is back to 20x and Lastminute.com at 20x.
Skyscanner at 5x is interesting. You can book an awful lot of airlines directly via Skyscanner.
Yeah – I always did assume they are losing a decent amount of money on Apple purchases given Apple’s policy on paying commission on new products (JL spells out the rules quite clearly on that in their T&Cs).
Am I right in thinking Morrisons is only available online and not in store? Have you tried using the card in store? Any luck?
Morrisons only tracks on online orders, but it does stack with complete savings/nx rewards 10% if you’re a member (even on repeat orders.. despite the t&c’s saying otherwise).
Eurostar at 20x for me.
The RevPoints earning rate via the partner shops seems to have dropped like a rock. Apple used to be 10x (and previously even 20x) RevPoints per GBP 1 spent. Now it is 10 RevPoints per GBP 10 spent, so 1:1. Talk about a benefit devaluation…
Admittedly, Revolut must have been losing money on the offer with every single transaction.It’s showing 10 per £1 for me. But I am on ultra.
@dshunter
Is the earnings rate higher for an Ultra plan vs standard? I used to have Ultra last year but don’t remember whether the earnings rates were different.Weirdly have a friend who has Ultra who sees 2 RevPoints per GBP this morning…
@dshunter
Is the earnings rate higher for an Ultra plan vs standard? I used to have Ultra last year but don’t remember whether the earnings rates were different.Ultra gets higher rates
Weirdly have a friend who has Ultra who sees 2 RevPoints per GBP this morning…
It’s dynamic on some retailers.
Amazon appears until you have a couple of transactions then disappears (forever?). Tesco similar. Bit cheeky as I thought I’d be getting 10 points on amazon for at least a while.
Weirdly have a friend who has Ultra who sees 2 RevPoints per GBP this morning…
It’s dynamic on some retailers.
Amazon appears until you have a couple of transactions then disappears (forever?). Tesco similar. Bit cheeky as I thought I’d be getting 10 points on amazon for at least a while.
Morrisons (20x) and Virgin Atlantic (10x) have both stuck around for me despite using them recently.
Weirdly have a friend who has Ultra who sees 2 RevPoints per GBP this morning…
It’s dynamic on some retailers.
Amazon appears until you have a couple of transactions then disappears (forever?). Tesco similar. Bit cheeky as I thought I’d be getting 10 points on amazon for at least a while.
Morrisons (20x) and Virgin Atlantic (10x) have both stuck around for me despite using them recently.
Yeah it varies. I use argos a lot and it has stuck around. Ebay seems to drop if you use it a lot.
Etihad added as partner. Really wish they’d add Virgin.
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