Deal: Rakuten is offering 15% – 20% cash back at a wide variety of retailers (15 – 20 Amex points/dollar)

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Today sees the return of “Big Give Week” on Rakuten, which sees the cashback site offering up to 20% back (or 20 Membership Rewards Points per dollar) at hundreds of participating stores and retailers. Better still, this promotion sees the return of some great cash back travel offers with the likes of Radisson and Viator.

Note: As an added bonus, for the next five days (through 13 May) you can still make the most of Rakuten’s excellent referral offer of $40 or 4,000 Membership Rewards Points for you and those you refer (link).

From the travel world, the more popular cash back options being offered are as follows:

• Viator – 20%
• Radisson – 15%
• Hotels.com – up to 15%
• Samsonite – 20%
• TUMI – 15%

You’ll also find deals of ‘up to 15% back’ at the likes of Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity, etc… but the best cash back appears to be available on ‘activities’ with cash back on hotel bookings coming in at 6%.

Outside of travel, there are a wide variety of other retailers that are offering 15% cash back (or better) – here are a few examples:

• Adidas
• Aesop
• Asics
• AT&T Internet (up to $105)
• Bose
• Canon
• Clarins
• Clinique
• Crocs
• CVS
• Dell Refurbished
• Dell Technologies
• DirecTV (up to $155 back)
• Dyson
• Ecco
• Finish Line (20%%)
• Ford (20%)
• GAP
• Groupon
• Hugo Boss (20%)
• Keurig (20%)
• Lego (up to 20%)
• Lenovo
• Levis
• LG
• Nautica
• New Era (20%)
• Nike (20%)
• NordVPN (100%)
• Oakley (20%)
• Office Depot/Max
• Ray-Ban (20%)
• Reebok (20%)
• Saks 5th Avenue
• Selfridges
• Staples
• Sunglass Hut (20%)
• 7 For All Mankind (20%)

Note: The retailers that are offering 15% cash back may rotate so the list may not remain the same throughout the promotion.

Related Reading: How to elect to earn Membership Rewards Points through Rakuten

There’s no trick to getting the cash back or Membership Rewards points (you just click through to the retailers using the links on Rakuten), but there are two things you should keep in mind:

Firstly, before making any purchases, make sure you check what Amex offers are available in your American Express account – a number of retailers participating in the Rakuten promotion also frequently appear among the Amex offers I’ve been seeing this year (e.g. Dell, Staples, etc…). Load your Amex card with any relevant offers and then use that card to pay when you’ve clicked through to the retailer(s) and finished your shopping.

Secondly, if you don’t have any relevant Amex offers to use, make sure you use a credit card that will reward you well. Most miles and points credit cards will only offer 1 point or mile per dollar at a lot of the participating retailers so this would be a good opportunity to use a good cash back card like the Chase Freedom Unlimited® Credit Card (1.5% cashback on all eligible spending) or the Blue Cash EveryDay® Card from American Express (3% cash back on up to $6,000 of online spending at US retailers & 1% back thereafter – terms apply) or to use a card on which you’re currently working towards a strong welcome offer – e.g. the current offer on the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card.

Most importantly, don’t forget that the 15% cash back deal is only available through 13 May so don’t leave it too long before you check to see if your preferred retailers are participating in the promotion.

Link to Rakuten.com