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Redeeming Petro-Points: Fast, Easy and Effective and I Score a New TV

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As I mentioned earlier, we had built up quite a mountain of Petro-Points. For fun (yes, I’m that kind of person) I checked out what the $ value per 1000 points was if I redeemed the points in various ways.  Then, gleefully ignoring all of the results, I went ahead of scored a new TV using the Petro-Points system for a fast, easy and effective reward.

Frankly, it’s all Squawkfox’s fault.

Getting a CAA Membership Using Petro-Points For the Best Reward

I did pay some attention to my own analysis. Using Petro-Points to buy a CAA membership, if (and this is important!) if you are going to get one anyway, is the best $ reward you can get per point.

So when I renewed our CAA memberships this year, I bought each of us the CAA Basic using Petro-Points. Then I redeemed some more points for CAA dollars. Then I phoned CAA and used the CAA dollars to upgrade our CAA memberships to the higher tier with the longer towing distance. We don’t drive to work so what we want towing for is if the car dies on one of our cross-Canada pleasure jaunts. None of those destinations is within 50 km of a gas station, must less 10 km.

The CAA reward also comes with an extra financial bonus I didn’t include in my assessment of the value of Petro-Points: At many places you can use your CAA membership to get a discount of 10% or more. For example, we’ve often saved money on hotels, entrance fees to attractions like the wonderful aquarium in Quebec City, and even eyeglasses. Considering we don’t pay cash for our CAA membership, this 10% off (or more) is like found money.

Anyway, the point is that I spent some Petro-Points on CAA memberships, but I still had a ton left. I even got my Mom a membership when hers expired. (My Dad has OnStar.) And still the mountain was so high I could have retired on it if those were dollars not points.

How Long Can a TV Last?

Unfortunately for my children, my husband and I aren’t big TV fans. So until extremely recently, our newest TV was a cathode-ray tube pseudo-flatscreen 24” RCA. I’m not sure when we got it or how, but I believe it may have involved a relative and President’s Choice points. But that’s another article.

Our older TV pre-dates RCA connectors. Don’t ask.

The problem with these TVs is that, like my Tandy 1000 TL/2, they still work just fine. It’s the world that has moved on and left them bewildered and afraid. They don’t do digital.
Being analog became a problem when the TV networks all switched to broadcasting over-the-air in digital. Actually it didn’t become a problem until we quit buying cable service. Both TVs still worked fine on cable. But neither could understand a signal from an over-the-air antenna unless we bought a digital to analog decoder box. In the USA that would cost $7. Here it would cost about $85.

And to say that neither was “Netflix ready” is a considerable understatement.

Don’t Forget Petro-Points Can be Redeemed for Best Buy e-Gift Cards

Right now, in January 2014, it’s possible to redeem Petro-Points for Best Buy e-Gift cards. These are basically an emailed voucher that can be used to buy stuff from Best Buy. They are not a plastic gift card.

These are not the best use for your Petro-Points. You can save more money by getting Fuel Savings Reward cards topped up online.

Still, they’re a reasonably good use of Petro-Points, considerably better than the value you get for redeeming them for plastic gift cards.

And there’s something strangely appealing about getting a TV for “free.”

So I redeemed most of our mountain of points for Best Buy e-Gift cards. I read the terms carefully first though.

Please note that at the time this was written on January 19, 2014

  • You can use an unlimited number of Best Buy e-Gift cards for an in store purchase but
  • You can only use up to 2 e-Gift cards per transaction if you are buying from Best Buy online. And
  • Lost or stolen e-Gift cards cannot be replaced. (!)

So there is a risk using this method of redeeming your points.

Since I’m foolish enough to take the risk and buy individual stocks on the TSX, it likely comes as no surprise to you that I was also stupid enough willing to take this risk.

How to Redeem Your Petro-Points for Best Buy e-Gift Cards

First, I strongly suggest you read all of the FAQs about Best Buy e-Gift Cards from Petro-Points. Then, read the Terms and Conditions.

If you’re still willing and aren’t being influenced by this post (remember I’m not a licenced financial planner and I’ve been known to give lots of bad advice in the past, just ask my children), here’s what to do:

  1. Go to the Petro-Points website http://retail.petro-canada.ca/en/petropoints/38.aspx
  2. Click on the link to Sign In to your My Petro-Canada account.
    1. In the Email: field, type your email address
    2. In the Password: field, type your password
    3. Click on the Log In arrow.
  3. Under the heading Redeem My Points, click on the Redeem Points button.
  4. Under the Best Buy Canada section, with the graphic for the Best Buy Gift Card, click on the Redeem your points link.
  5. The My Petro-Canada Best Buy Canada e-Gift Card screen will open.
    NOTE: As they say it is *important* to check your email address is correct.
    The e-Gift card will be sent to that email address. So if you thought it was funny to register for a Petro-Canada account as, say Donald_trump@Gmail.com, you want to be careful, or the Trumpster will be out at Best Buy spending your hard-won dollars tomorrow.
    Click the next step button.
  6. On the Step 1 of 4 : Confirm your email address screen
    1. Look at the email address and make sure it’s the one you want to receive the Best Buy certificate.
    2. If it’s ok, click on the confirm button.
  7. On the Step 2 of 4: Choose your e-Gift Card demomination [sic] screen
    The choices are

    • $10 Best Buy e-Gift card for 12 000 Petro-Points
    • $25 (30 000 points)
    • $50 (60 000 points)
    • $100 (120 000 points)
    • $250 (300 000 points)
    • $500 (600 000 points)
    1. Click to select the radio button beside the amount of points you want to redeem for a specific number of Best Buy $.
      NOTE: You may have to repeat this whole process a few times if you need to get a large $$ value in gift cards. Remember you are limited as to how many e-Gift cards you can redeem in a single online purchase. Check the limit before buying!
    2. Click on the redeem button.
  8. On the Step 3 of 4: Confirm your Order screen
    Confirm the order.
    Your e-Gift card will be generated and sent to your email address.
  9. Sign out of your My Petro-Canada account.
  10. Check your email inbox for the e-Gift Card. You can print it to take to a Best Buy store, or use the code on it to enter at Best Buy online. (Remember you are limited as to how many e-Gift cards you can redeem in a single online purchase. Check the limit before buying!)Your email message will be something like the following:
    Congratulations! You have successfully redeemed 120,000, 000,000 Petro-Points™ for a $100 000 e-Gift Card for Best Darn Buy Canada.
    Please visit ExtremlyLongURL.com to access your e-Gift Card, or copy and paste it into the “Address” field of your web browser and follow the instructions to access your e-Gift Card.
    Your secret code is: SomethingReallyUnlikely
    Your selection: Best Darn Buy $100 000 e-Gift Card
    Your transaction number: extremely long number that should be in scientific notation
    Amount of certificate: 100 000
    Reference numbers: like transaction number but with bells on
    Number of points redeemed: 120,000, 000, 000
    Questions about your Best Buy e-Gift Card redemption? Give us a call at these numbers.

What Happened When I Went to Redeem my Best Buy e-Gift Cards to Score a New TV?

So, with my e-Gift cards, which are really pieces of printer paper, clutched hotly in hand, I drove off to Best Buy to get my TV.

What happened next? Did I need to call CAA? Did the FutureShop S.W.A.T. team take me down?

Hopefully I’ll get around to sharing that inglorious moment in another post soon. Suffice it to say, it may be entitled “Why I Think Best Buy Needs to Call the Geek Squad for Their Online ‘Reserve and Pick Up’ System.”

But while you’re waiting, or even if you aren’t, from the point of view of the Petro-Points redemption and the Best Buy e-Gift Card redemptions themselves, all went very well. I found both of those parts quite satisfactory.

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Do you always redeem your reward points to earn the most value per point, or do you sometimes redeem them for the slightly-wasteful-but-more-emotionally-satisfying experience of picking up something for “free”? Please share your experiences with a comment.

How Can I Best Use my Petro-Canada Petro-Points?

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The rewards offered by programs like Petro-Points change frequently. This article lists the options in January 2014 and points out which ones earn you the most $$$ equivalent for your points. We had racked up quite a pile of Petro-Points so after Christmas I decided to figure out the best way to use them especially since the points we’ve earned in other programs have de-valued suddenly.

UPDATE: You may prefer to read the new review of the best use of Petro-Points for March 2016 by clicking on this sentence.

For the Impatient Reader: If you read (or scroll) far enough, you’ll discover I’ve summarized the value in $ per 1000 points for various options in a table.

One Very Popular Reward Selected by People Who Collect Petro-Points

You can probably guess that most people use their Petro-Points to reduce the cost of the gas they’re buying. They may or may not realize they have four choices when doing so.

They can use points to buy

  • a “Fuel Savings Rewards Card” which reduces the price paid per litre by 5 cents
  • a “Fuel Savings Rewards Plus Card” which reduces the price paid per litre by 5 cents, and which you can use to earn more savings at a rate of 5 cents per litre for each dollar spent on lottery products or alcoholic beverages at participating locations
  • a “Preferred Price Card” which reduces the price paid per litre by 10 cents
  • a “Petro-Canada Gift Card” which is basically cash you can apply against your purchase

These cards are only useful when filling up at a Petro-Canada gas station not at a competitor.

Why Would People Get a Petro-Canada “Save X Cents a Litre Card” worth $25 Instead of a $25 Gift Card?

At first glance, I couldn’t believe anyone would get a “Fuel Savings Rewards Card” or a “Preferred Price Card.” Why would I want to have to go the station several times to get all of my savings instead of just getting a gift card and saving all of the money immediately?

I could see why Petro-Canada would push the “cents per litre” cards, though. They want you to keep coming back. Especially since you might decide to also buy a pack of smokes or a car wash.

The answer, I discovered, is that often you save more money if you buy the “cents per litre” cards. You can save even more when they sell them at a discount which happens fairly often.

Today, January 10, 2014, here are the offers on the Petro-Points website:

Card Number of Points Saving Value Dollars of value per 1000 points
Fuel Savings Reward 12 000 to buy a card in store,
11 000 to reload a card online		 5 cents per litre for 200 L $10 $0.83 or 0.91
Fuel Savings Reward Plus 11 000 5 cents per litre for 200L $10 $0.91
Preferred Price Card 40 000 , 80 000 , 160 000 10 cents per litre for 250L $25 , $50 , $100 $0.625, 0.625, 0.625
Petro-Canada Gift Card 40 000 , 80 000 , 160 000 $25 , $50 , $100 $25, $50, $100 $0.625, 0.625, 0.625

You can see that today the Fuel Savings Reward card or the Fuel Savings Reward Plus card offer the best value per point. Those values are often even higher due to various promotions.

Another Very Popular Points Purchase: A Car Wash

Car Washes are another popular way drivers spend Petro-Points.

According to the online site, you can buy a SuperWorks Car Wash for 8 000 points. I’ll have to try to check the retail price for that wash the next time I fill up. I’m not even sure if the price is the same at all sites or not.

What’s the Best Value for Redeeming Petro-Points for Something Other than Petro-Canada Products

Unlike some rewards programs (Air Miles I’m looking at you!) the Petro-Points website is bursting with various offers to redeem your points. Here I’ll review them in the order I encounter them.

Using Petro-Points at Best Buy

You can redeem Petro-Points for Best Buy cards in two ways. One offers a much better deal than the other.

The best buy is Best Buy e-Gift Cards.

They can be used online or in store. You must redeem points for these e-Gift cards online. The “card” is emailed to you where you can print it off to take to the store (or just copy the information to use it online.) There is no real “card.”

You can get Best Buy e-Gift cards in denominations of $10, 25, 50, 100, 250, and 500.
All of the e-Gift cards yield the same value of $0.83 per 1000 Petro-Points.

The worst choice for Best Buy is the Best Buy gift card. Its dollars of value per 1000 points is only $0.50.

Using Petro-Points for CAA Membership and CAA Dollars Gives the Highest Dollar Value Per 1000 Points

You can redeem 60 000 Petro-Points to get a CAA Basic membership. In southern Ontario, a basic CAA membership costs $69. The dollar value per 1000 points is therefore 1.15. That’s the highest value offered on the site at the time this was written in January 2014.

You can also exchange 1 000 Petro Points for one CAA dollar. That means the dollar value per 1000 points is 1 dollar. That’s the second highest value offered on the site at the time this was written in January 2014.

By registering your CAA membership number online on the Petro-Points site, you also earn 20% more points on every purchase you make a Petro-Canada if you swipe your Petro-Points card or use a Petro-Points linked credit card.

Other Ways to Spend Your Petro-Points

Digital Media

You can use points to buy music, movies, TV shows, eBooks and Audiobooks, but only from a list offered on the Petro-Points website.

Examples of movies include

  • Superman, Man of Steel
  • the Hobbit, Part 1
  • the Hangover, Part 3
  • Pacific Rim

Examples of songs include

  • Roar
  • Wrecking Ball
  • What Do U Want
  • The Monster
  • Demons
  • Counting Stars

Individual songs cost 1 815 points

Music albums seem to vary considerably. Prices include   4 200; 8 385; 15 405; 16 800; 18 201; 19 605; 21 000; etc. Johnny Reid’s A Christmas Gift to You album is 16 800 Petro-Points.

TV Shows include the usual suspects. A few examples are:

  • Walking Dead
  • Homeland
  • Modern Family
  • Glee

The prices vary again. The Complete 4th season of Walking Dead is 42 060 points. The Complete 3rd Season of Glee is 50 985 points.

The eBooks I looked at were published in Adobe Epub format which is compatible with Windows, Mac and most mobile devices.

Examples of eBooks include

  • The Bone Season
  • The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger
  • The Things They Carried
  • William Shakespeare’s Star Wars

The prices vary. Star Wars is 19 065 points. The Box is 24 165 points.

I find it humorous that the permissions state: “reading aloud not allowed.” Does it count if just your lips move?

They also have Audiobooks which presumably you can read aloud. The ones I checked were in OverDriver MP3 format, compatible with iTunes, Android and Windows Media Player.

Examples include

  • The Road
  • Steve Jobs
  • Catching Fire
  • Executive Power
  • The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge

The prices vary. The Great Bridge is 63 735 points. Catching Fire is 35 655 points.

Itravel2000.com Rewards

You can earn Petro-Points if you book a trip on itravel2000.com. You would earn 10 points for every $1 you spend on travel. You could double the points if you book the trip using the CIBC Petro-Points MasterCard.

You can also use Petro-Points to pay for travel.

10 000 points pays for $10 at iTravel2000.com. That’s a dollar value per 1000 points of $1.

That ties it for second best value with the CAA dollar offer. Read all of the terms and conditions closely though! They aren’t simple and they might not be acceptable.

Gift Cards

As you can see in the following examples, all of the gift cards are sold at a dollar value per 1000 points of $0.50. This makes them the worst choice from a dollar value viewpoint.

For 20 000 points you can get a $10 card for

  • A&W

For 30 000 points you can get a $15 card for

  • iTunes
  • Subway

For 40 000 points you can get a $20 card for

  • XBox
  • Sony
  • Sir Corp Restaurants

For 50 000 points you can get a $25 card for

  • iTunes
  • Cineplex
  • Chapters Indigo
  • XBox
  • Future Shop
  • Best Buy
  • Empire Theatres
  • Cinemas Guzzo
  • HMV
  • Sony
  • Home Depot
  • Hudson’s Bay
  • RONA
  • Sears
  • La Senza
  • Mark’s Work Wearhouse
  • Toys R Us
  • Shoppers Drug Mart
  • Bass Pro Shops
  • Forzani SportChek
  • the Keg Steakhouse & Bar
  • Cara Foods
  • Boston Pizza
  • Red Lobster
  • East Side Mario’s
  • Earl’s
  • Subway
  • A&W
  • White Spot
  • Pizza Pizza
  • Brewsters
  • St. Hubert

For 80 000 points you can get a $40 gift card for

  • XBox

For 100 000 points you can get a $50 gift card for

  • Bass Pro Shops
  • Golf Town
  • Forzani SportChek
  • Home Depot
  • Hudson’s Bay
  • RONA
  • Sears
  • La Senza
  • Mark’s Work Wearhouse
  • Shoppers Drug Mart
  • iTunes
  • Cineplex
  • Chapters Indigo
  • Future Shop
  • Best Buy
  • Cinemas Guzzo
  • Sony
  • the Keg Steakhouse & Bar
  • Cara Foods
  • Boston Pizza
  • Sir Corp Restaurants
  • East Side Mario’s
  • Earl’s
  • Moxies
  • White Spot
  • Brewsters
  • St. Hubert

For 200 000 points you can get a $100 gift card for

  • Future Shop
  • Best Buy
  • Home Depot
  • Sears
  • the Keg Steakhouse & Bar

What Is the Best Way to Use My Petro-Points to Maximize Their Dollar Value?

As promised, here’s a summary table of your choices, as of January 2014, for redeeming Petro-Points. Your mileage may vary. (That’s a little “Retail” quip for you non-pump-jockeys out there.)

Reward $ value per 1000 points, in $
CAA Basic Membership 1.15
CAA Dollars 1.00
itravel2000.com Dollars
(read terms and details carefully!)		 1.00
Fuel Savings Reward Card redeemed online 0.91
Fuel Savings Reward Plus Card redeemed online 0.91
Fuel Savings Reward Card at the station 0.83
Fuel Savings Reward Plus Card at the station 0.83
Best Buy eGift Cards 0.83
Single SuperWorks Car Wash Pass
(Costs 8000 points)		 ???
Preferred Price Card
(save 10 cents per litre)		 0.625
Petro-Canada Gift Card 0.625
Gift Cards for a Wide Variety of Stores, Services and Restaurants 0.50
Digital Media
(Varies by selection and by what “regular retail price” you use per selection)		 ???

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Do you buy gas at Petro-Canada and collect Petro-Points? Or are you still furious with Trudeau, er, Pierre Elliott Trudeau? Have you redeemed any Petro-Points and if so, for what? Please share your views with a comment.