Miles App

I’m always looking for a way to make a dollar or two with my iPhone.  Job Spotter was a really good app, earning me thousands of dollars in Amazon gift cards over a few years.  There are others, like Shopkick and ReceiptPal, which require some patience.  I’m not going to get rich, but I might be able to get some snacks once in a while or pay for a birthday gift.

When I came across Miles, it sounded great.  You get miles for any form of travel, with a multiplier based on what kind of travel it is.  Driving a car gets no multiplier, so you earn one mile for each mile you’re travelling.  The exception is if you’re carpooling, in which case you get double miles.  Walking gets the maximum multiplier of ten.  (Walking two miles earns you twenty.)

You might ask what you get for these miles.  Therein lies the problem.  Miles has all sorts of offers, like a discount at a store for new customers.  You might get two free audiobooks to download.  After a while, it becomes obvious that these are similar to the offers that a new customer would get anyway.  There’s no real benefit to redeeming your miles other than the fact that they’re basically advertising the offers.  It wouldn’t surprise me to find out that you’re redeeming miles so that they can earn a referral bonus off of you.

To be fair, I’m not above using a referral code.  You may have noticed a few in the opening paragraph.  What’s underhanded about it is making you work for it.  You have to earn miles for something that you could do anyway.

From what I’ve read, they did have gift cards for Starbucks and Amazon in the beginning.  Since I signed up, I’ve been able to get exactly one $2 Amazon gift card.  Even if Miles had something that I couldn’t get elsewhere, the offers they have are useless to me.  Some are for luxury car rentals.  Some are for discounts on snack boxes and cakes.  In each case, I have to make a purchase.  Why should I let them track my movements when I still have to pay for something?

The cost of each offer is pretty low.  It doesn’t take long to earn the requisite number of miles.  But that’s meaningless if I’m not interested in it anyway.  I’d rather just get a gift card, even if I have to wait a little longer.

Don’t bother with the app.  If you have downloaded it, the app should be the first to go if you need to clear up some space on your phone.

CheckPoints app

Many years ago, when I bought an iPod Touch, I decided to see if there were ways of making money with it.  I came across CheckPoints, a program that would allow me to check in at various stores.  You could also scan products for extra points.  Alas, my iPod Touch was the last generation of iPod Touches not to have a camera.  (Not that it mattered.  You have to have a phone to scan stuff.)  After several app updates, I found that I could no longer use CheckPoints, as it needed a more-current version of iOS.  When I recently got an iPhone, I installed CheckPoints.  I couldn’t wait to get into a store and test it out.

The idea is simple.  When you open the app, you’re given a list of nearby stores, usually grocery and drug stores.  You’ll see CVS, Walgreen’s, Kmart, and so on.  Each has a number next to it indicating the maximum number of points you can earn in each store.  Each store has a different assortment of products.  The Home Depot, for instance, is 50 right now.  There are two CLR products you can scan for 25 points each.  Kmart, for some reason, has Hasbro board games for 19 points and Doritos for 15 points.  Even though you might be able to find Doritos in other stores, it’s not necessarily listed there.

I’m not sure what determines where you can scan each product or how many points you can get.  I’d imagine it’s up to the individual stores and/or manufacturers.  (It’s also possible that they don’t want you scanning everything all at once.)  Interestingly, there are five Vick’s products, all Nyquil and Dayquil items worth five points each, that are available in all stores that would carry them.  The only problem is that I haven’t been able to scan them.  (The app says that I’ve gotten the points, but it doesn’t show as being credited.  I reported it.  Customer service was quick to respond, but it hasn’t been fixed yet.)

I’ve also seen products listed that aren’t available in the store it’s listed under.  I went into a Best Buy and found the printer paper, but they didn’t have the correct brand.  I tried scanning other brands to no avail.  It’s probably that not all stores carry all brands all the time.  It’s possible that that particular Best Buy doesn’t carry that particular brand or was simply out of it that day.  I’ve also noticed this in Publix and Winn-Dixie.  It’s possible that the brands in question are regional.

For the most part, it’s fairly easy to get points.  I find that I can get sever hundred in a day.  In addition to scanning products, which accounts for most of my points, you can watch videos and refer people.  (My code is seacow99, which has to be entered when you first sign up.)  There are also other places, like restaurants, that only give points for checking in.  I find that many don’t have any points, but a few will give you two if you can find them.  (The only way to know is by clicking on each location.)

You may be wondering at this point what you can do with the points.  You can’t get cash, but you can get gift codes and products.  You can enter sweepstakes for a gift card for as low as 40 points or you can just get the gift card for a set number of points.  The conversion seems to be at around 325 points per dollar.  You can get a $1 Amazon gift code for 335 points.  A Redbox gift code goes for 420 points. (It says it’s good for $1.20 off you first day’s fee, but I haven’t used it since their recent rate increase.)

If you want to save up, a $25 Subway gift card goes for 8,675 points.  All you need for a $500 gift card Neiman Marcus or Louis Vuitton gift card is 154,500 points.  (That’s 309 points per dollar.)  The most expensive reward, point wise, is a Hermes Birkin handbag for 418,500 points.  (I did a search on Google; the cheapest I saw was $10,000.)

Back when I had the iPod Touch, I had been redeeming for Redbox codes.  It seemed like it took forever to get one code.  I’ve had an iPhone for about two weeks now and I already have enough for three.  At this rate, I should have that handbag in no time.

CheckPoints Web site

Coin Dozer review

Note:  This is a review I originally posted on Epinions.

One of the reasons I wanted an iPod Touch rather than a classic model was so that I could get apps.  Sure, I’d get something useful like the ones for the Post Office or Bank of America.  However, most of them would be games.  One of the first games I got was the free version of Coin Dozer.

It’s based on the game you may have seen at a county fair or arcade.  You’re given a set number of coins that you can drop in an area.  Those coins are pushed onto a lower platform that has a lot more coins.  To the left, right and front are pits.  Any coins that go to the left or right are lost.  You get back any that go into the front pit.  If you run out of coins, you get more coins just for waiting.

The coins regenerate faster if you leave the app open, but you can close the app and have the coins regenerate that way.  Either way, you have a limit.  If you are at or above that limit, there’s no regeneration.  If you are below the limit, coins will regenerate up to that limit.  The limit does go up as you play the game.

There are also special coins.  If you get a red coin, a giant coin drops, causing everything to bounce.  Light-blue coins give you coin walls to the left and right.  Dark-blue coins give you a shower of coins.  Silver coins give you a few extra coins in your reserve.  There are also XP coins, which help you advance to the next level.  (Each level gives you one of a rotation of prizes, like a red or blue coin.)

You also have prizes like bears and sunglasses.  Each of these prizes do something if you get a set of four different colors.  Bears make the coins regenerate faster.  Umbrellas give you more coins in the showers.  As you might expect, prizes and special coins that go over the left or right side are generally lost unless you get a set of whistles.  The first set of whistles you get allows you to keep the prizes that fall off the sides.  Subsequent tiers, up to nine, allow for a chance of getting the special coins.  (You start off with a maximum of six tiers, but you can upgrade to nine.)

I should probably also mention there are puzzle pieces that fall down.  I have no idea what these do other than give you something else to work towards.  I’ve completed one and I think I got some points or something.  I don’t remember.

As you might expect, prizes and coins aren’t really worth anything.  It’s not like you can cash out or will get anything special if you get all the toys.  It’s mostly fun as a distraction.  If I need a way to waste a few minutes, I will sometimes open the app and play.  I have to admit that it was more fun when I was below the coin limit.  It got to the point with the free version that I had over 13,000 coins.  I think the regeneration limit was 70 or something.

I had the opportunity to get the pro version for free, which is the same thing minus the ads at the bottom.  It’s not a huge difference, but it at least let me start over. I’m above 800 coins and it doesn’t look like I’ll be losing any.  It surprises me that it’s so easy to accumulate coins since you can buy coins as an in-app purchase.  You’d think there would be some sort of upper limit or something.

I can’t say I regret downloading either.  I used to play a lot when I first downloaded the free version.  Not so much anymore, though.  The only real fun is trying to get special coins in combination, which is frustrating since the coins tend to go sideways.

If you can get it for free, give it a try.  There are occasionally glitches, but the games update often and problems are taken care of almost immediately.  I’ve seen other versions, like Coin Dozer: World Tour and a Halloween version.  The only difference seems to be the types of prizes and the designs of the coins.  I had these, but I got rid of them.  It got to be too much.  Why do I need four versions of the same game?