How Pay with Ibotta works: how to set up and use

What is ibotta?

Ibotta is an awesome grocery coupon app that gives you cash back on your every day purchases. Ibotta started out by giving cash back when you purchase groceries. Over time, they’ve expanded their program to give users cash back on just about anything. Going on a trip? Use the ibotta app to get cash back when you book hotels, flights, car rental and so on. Shopping online for clothes? Earn cash back using the app too! And now, you can get cash back when you buy gift cards. How this feature works is really simple. (Tip: If you don’t already have ibotta, you can try it out and get a $10 bonus (here is how). It is available to download for iPhone and Android phones.)

What is Pay with Ibotta?

Ibotta app added a feature that lets you pay for your purchase using the app called “Pay with ibotta”. At first I thought this meant that you could use your ibotta earnings to pay for your purchase. This is not the case, however. The pay with ibotta app feature refers to buying gift cards through the app. When you do, you’ll get a percentage back on the total you paid. Typically, when you buy gift cards from a retailer you don’t get cash back. Even popular shopping portals don’t offer cash back when buying gift cards. Cashback sites give you cash back shopping at a retailer that sells gift cards – ibotta is different. As far as I know, Fetch Rewards app feature “Pay with Fetch” is the only other app where you can get paid for buying gift cards.

Double Your Savings: Use these apps with Ibotta:

How to set up Pay with Ibotta:

In order to use the new pay with ibotta feature, you first need to link a credit card to the ibotta app. You can either link a debit or a credit card. I suggest using a card that has a rewards program. This way you earn cashback from two places doing one transaction. I use Chase Freedom for the extra 5% on select categories program.

Once you have linked a credit card to the ibotta app, click on the “pay with ibotta” link, and choose a merchant you want to buy a gift card from. You enter the amount you wish to buy, and submit. The app processes the gift card purchase immediately, giving you a scanning upc bar just like in a physical gift card. To view your gift card, simply go to “Account”‘ and then click on “Payments”. There you can see your transactions and edit your credit card information.

How to Pay with Ibotta

The pay with ibotta section has all the retailers where you can pay with ibotta. If you look closer, they all say “in store”. However, I’ve used the app to pay both online and in the store.

How to Pay With Ibotta at a Store:

It is super easy to use pay with ibotta at a store. Here is how: At the register, you open up the app, and click on the “pay with ibotta” feature. Then, click on the merchant you bought the gift card for, and then click on “Transaction”. You’ll see the gift cards and the amounts you have. Click on the gift card you wish to use to show the cashier the barcode to scan and pin number to enter, and that’s it. I did have one time where the scanner wasn’t able to scan the barcode. When this happened, I clicked on “reveal gift card number” to show the digits for the cashier to enter, and completed the transaction. Tip: before you buy the gift card, make sure the retailer accepts e-gift cards at the register. I bought an ibotta gift card for Jersey Mikes, and turns out my local store doesn’t accept gift cards, but others do. So, I had to request a refund from my credit card.

How to Pay with Ibotta Online:

Paying online with ibotta is easy too: I purchased a $10 gift card from Home Depot, which paid 3% cash back. Then, I clicked ‘shop online‘ in the app, then chose Home Depot and added the product I wanted to the cart. At checkout I pay with the gift card I had purchased in ibotta app, and done! Tip: Prior to shopping online, make sure you click on the “copy card icon” next to the gift card numbers. This will copy all the numbers of the gift card which are not all visible in the app.

Here is a screenshot of some of the retailers that accept Pay with Ibotta:

Why use Pay with Ibotta

1. Instant Savings

Each merchant listed offers a different amount of cash back when you buy their gift card. The best thing about this feature is that savings are instantly added to your account. No more waiting for receipts to process!

2. Bonus Tip

Ibotta bonuses: You know how at the very last minute you need to make a purchase to complete a bonus? The pay with ibotta app feature comes to the rescue! Because savings are instantly added to your account, just purchase a gift card on the app to complete a bonus. (Learn more about ibotta – The Ultimate Guide to Saving Money with Ibotta – with videos).

3. Credit card protection

For shoppers who don’t like using a credit card to pay, paying with a gift card is a way to prevent credit card theft.

How to Double Your Savings Using Pay with ibotta

[shopr_shopthepost collection=”app-deal-ibotta” title=”App Coupons” show_product_title=”yes” show_product_price=”yes”]

There are two ways you earn cash back when you purchase a gift card through the app. Apart from earning cashback for buying gift cards from select merchants, you can also earn cash back for shopping online through the ibotta app. To double your savings using pay with ibotta, all you have to do is purchase from a retailer that are in both “Pay with ibotta” and “online shopping”. Here is how:

Use the ibotta app to buy a gift card from one of the listed retailers in “pay with ibotta” – you earn cash back. Then, click “shop” in ibotta app, and choose the same retailer you have the gift card for. At checkout use the gift card you purchased to pay for your transaction, and you get cash back again!

Pay with Ibotta faq:

These are some of the questions subscribers of my YouTube channel have asked regarding transactions using Pay with Ibotta:

◘ Can you use ibotta funds to “pay with ibotta” ?

I wish it would. There is a round about way to do this however.

◘ If your gift card does not cover the full payment of your transaction, you can still add another form of payment at checkout?

You can also buy another gift card through ibotta, or use a gift card from another app (like I do with this one to get free Starbucks) to minimize your total out of pocket expense. There is no limit on how many times you can purchase a gift card on ibotta as far as I know.

◘ Does my credit card get charged immediately?

Yes. Transactions in your credit card show up as Ibotta Colorado.

◘ What happens to the balance left in ibotta gift card?

If you don’t use the full amount of the ibotta gift card, the balance stays there until you use it.

◘ How does return items purchased with Pay with ibotta work?

If you return an item you purchased with a pay with ibotta gift card, it will be treated just like any returns at that store. Any type of return follows the store’s return policy. So you may be given credit, just as you would with any other gift card. Usually, gift card payment transactions are credited with a store gift card. Money doesn’t get returned to a credit card. Of course, every store is different so refer back to the store policy.

(Got a question not answered here? post it in comments).

Tip: This video explains how pay with ibotta works:

New printable coupons

New RetailMeNot printable coupons

Pay with Ibotta retailers:

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