>>>>You don't want a cash back. That's you giving a free loan to the seller, which they don't return in 50-90% cases (depending on each seller's sales department; so far HP is the worst, ColdFusion (or whoever they are now), Office Depot the best).
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>>>Rebates may be like that, but a cash back credit card isn't. I pay the same price whether I use the card or cash. Once a year, my credit card company gives me a great big credit based on how much I charged in the last year.
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>>So that's unrelated to any particular purchase - it's more of a bait for the next year, no matter what they call it. As far as advertising/baiting goes, this looks the cleanest. They could have wasted that money on some worthless piece of ugliness and sent it to you as an appreciation gift, or send you a gift card to an outlet where you'd never shop.
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>>Of course, one has to think how much money did they make on you when they could afford to give this and still make a profit...
>
>They don't make much money at all on cardholders who pay the bill in full every month. They make up for it gouging those who don't.

This kind of gift is probably an incentive to spend even more... until the glitch happens, and you get behind in your payments. Then the late fees kick in (not as in "the late mr Paterson", they're quite alive and kicking in and out), bounced check fees, interest goes up... all the nice parts of the game come to play :).

I somehow doubt they'd catch Tamar.