Today I had to make the decision of Cash or Card. I am not talking about how to pay for something since I always use a card so that I can get the cash back. I also use my card exclusively in case I need to dispute the payment or cannot find a paper receipt.

My cash or card decision was about how to redeem my points. Because I use my credit cards (and immediately pay them off) for EVERY purchase..including rent, you can imagine I am getting quite a few cashback points.

I have one card where I have accumulated 5091 points and my cash or card options are as follows:

-$25.46 statement credit

-$25.46 check mailed to me

-$50 worth of gift cards…with a 91 point remainder.

Now I normally like to get cash as my reward because I then use it to pay off the credit card so that I can free up the available balance to make more purchases.

Because I use swagbucks and the extra cash back is on the amount charged to your card, any gift card use will reduce the amount of swagbucks that I actually get. For this reason I prefer to not get gift cards for the places I normally get my swagbucks shopping done.

img from dailyfinance.com

img from dailyfinance.com

In this case however I opted for the gift cards because the value is so much more. I can get DOUBLE the amount if I opt for the gift card instead of getting the statement credit or the check mailed to me.

How do you normally redeem your points?