A FEW years ago, one of the only ways of bagging a proper good bargain involved waking up at the crack of dawn on Boxing Day and queuing up outside your favourite shops for hours.
These days, we’re pretty well-versed with shopping the sales online – but it turns out there’s a few money-saving tips that have been under our noses all this time.
Speaking to Latest Deals, savvy shoppers have revealed how they’ve saved HUNDREDS on their shopping thanks to loyalty cards.
And trust us when we say you’ll never want to leave home again without them.
If you’re signed up to store loyalty cards, you can earn points by participating in quick surveys – and they take hardly any time at all.
Commenting in the money-saving community’s forum, one shopper wrote: “Are you signed up to Tesco Shopper Thoughts?
“You get points for completing quick surveys. It’s in the ‘other ways to collect points’ section.”
Meanwhile, Hannah Lou Carney added: “Nectar Canvass is great. I save £15 off my shopping weekly just from that.”
A third wrote: “Try Tescoviews and give them feedback and each month you earn 25 Clubcard points.
“For Nectar I do quite a lot of surveys and I earn a lot of Nectar points doing that.”
One way to boost your Clubcard points is to tell Tesco about your most recent visit at the store.
You need to keep hold of your receipt and use a code on there to take part at Tesco Views. The amount of points you can collect is capped at 25 points per month.
Here’s our full guide on how to boost your Tesco points.
You can also sign up the Nectar Canvass here.
Another bonus of being signed up for a loyalty card is that certain in-store discounts are reserved for regular customers.
Sarah Hannah Loveday said: “Tesco has a lot of offers on at the moment if you have a Clubcard! For example the cheese I buy is £4.50 without a Clubcard but £2 with! Also the orange juice my fiancé loves is £3 without a Clubcard and £1 with!”
Jeanette Burill added: “I got a set of Yankee Candles from Tesco priced at £50.00 and reduced to £25.00 if you use Clubcard!”
Instead of using their points little and often, other shoppers save them up all year for a big blow-out treat.
Robin Knight revealed: “What I do is save all my points, then when we go on a week’s holiday we use our vouchers for food.”
Joanne Dalgarno added: “I use Tesco Clubcard points for the summer holidays and then book days out, attractions and meals out at very little cost.”
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“Just booked a night away in a hotel paid for by Tesco Rewards,” Wendy Roberts wrote.
“I save Clubcard points. We don’t do anything special, just our weekly shopping, but I only ever use them on the offers to triple the value,” Sara Clayton wrote. “Mainly cinema vouchers – it means 4 of us can go to the cinema for £8 in vouchers. I also use them for a restaurant treat beforehand, it works out as a cheap family night out.”
Alternatively, others prefer to cash in their points at Christmas to lessen the financial load of the festive season.
Cheryl Jones added: “I save points for Christmas, it’s even better if you have Tesco Mobile and use their fuel. It soon adds up and you should have about £100 by Christmas.”
Janet Toon uses this tactic in Sainsburys too and wrote: “I use Nectar points at Xmas, I do the double-up and buy the Xmas wine. For £50 of Nectar points you get £100 worth of wine from Sainsbury’s premium range.”
“I never use the vouchers in the shop,” Jacqueline Docherty wrote. “Go online and you can triple the value for days out, restaurants.”
Taking a similar approach, mum Tracey Jones added: “‘I always use my points to take my son’s to Zizzi or Ask Italian as it triples the points.
“Because all my shopping was through Tesco last year, I currently have over £90 in points (£270 converted). We’ve already had our first meal out.”
If that wasn’t enough, shoppers also recommend downloading the loyalty card apps to get even more savings.
Hannah Carney wrote: “I am currently getting 300 points (£1.50 value) for every item I sell on eBay this month (and I have sold 5 things so far) with the Nectar app. Also, Esso sometimes has great bonuses for points if you fill up with them.’
Sarah Crook added: “‘You can use your Clubcard points for rewards. Download the app to see how many points you have and use the vouchers for money off your shopping.
“Alternatively, exchange them for rewards. For example 50p of Clubcard vouchers gives you £1.50 to spend at Longleat.”
You can sign up for a Clubcard online for free on Tesco’s website.
Once you’ve received it, each time you spend £1 in store and online you get one point when you scan your card or app.
You also get one point for every £2 spent on fuel.
One point equals 1p, so 150 points gets you £1.50, for example.
You cans sign up to Nectar here.
Usually you’ll get one point per pound spent but sometimes partners will offer better deals where you can collect even more.
The points can then be redeemed, either to be spent in Sainsbury’s or to be exchanged for vouchers or rewards to spend elsewhere.
For more tips and tricks, this savvy mum makes epic lunch box station to make mornings easier & kids can help pack their own too.
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