OVER 17 million Brits have a Nectar card but thousands of shoppers are missing out on exclusive discounts, deals and freebies.
There are also secret ways to boost your points and even earn them without spending a penny – and in turn you could save £100s in Sainsbury’s and other retail favourites.
Over 17 million people in the UK have a Nectar card – but it’s not just for bagging savings in Sainsbury’s[/caption]
As well as unlocking lower grocery prices in your favourite supermarket, you can also spend your Nectar points in Argos, JD Sports, Debenhams and on eBay – plus many more.
And, you can also use your Nectar card to get treats, such as free British Airways flights and cappuccinos.
Nectar recently introduced a new safety feature for customers to help protect points from being stolen after a spate of thefts.
Here, Sun Savers editor Lana Clements shares her ultimate guide to help Sun readers get the most bang for their buck.
How the Nectar scheme works
You get Nectar points when you swipe your card at qualifying retailers, most notably Sainsbury’s, but others too including Domino’s, New Look, The Range and Nike.
You can spend your points at tons of places including Esso and Cafe Nero or use them to buy British Airways’ Avios points.
You’ll get one point for every £1 spent in store or online at Sainsbury’s. You can also get one point for every litre of fuel bought from Sainsbury’s petrol stations.
Nectar prices
Nectar prices are lower prices on thousands of items at Sainsbury’s. You get them if you scan your card at the checkout or add it to your online shop.
Customers also get personalised prices based on items you regularly buy.
You can view them on your Nectar account or in your linked Sainsbury’s online shopping account.
But there are easy ways to boost your points, as I explain below…
BOOST YOUR POINTS
Get the app
The Nectar app is an easy way to bag extra money off and boost your points total. And more points means more discounts.
- Sainsbury’s offers
Through the app you can also add special Sainsbury’s offers to your account.
These offers typically give extra bonus points for buying particular items.
Or you can multiply points if you spend, for example, £60 online.
The offers refresh each week usually on a Friday and you need to manually add or you will lose out.
- Nectar challenges
Sainsbury’s offers various challenges through Nectar throughout the year.
For example, the fruit and veg challenge gives shoppers the chance to earn extra points when they buy qualifying items.
You could expect to earn an extra 1,000 bonus points through the challenges.
However, make sure you’re only buying items that you were intending to purchase or plan to use, otherwise you’ll be wasting cash.
- Games
When logging on to the app, users are occasionally offered the chance to rub the screen to reveal extra points that are added to their account.
This can be as little as five points – but every extra point counts.
You’ll need to opt in each time to win so keep your eyes peeled when logging on to the app.
- Partner offers
You can also get special offers to collect bonus points at Nectar partners through the app.
For example, you may be offered an extra 200 points for filling your car at Esso.
You will usually need to ‘load’ these offers to your account or you won’t collect the bonus points.
Where to collect points
Sainsbury’s isn’t the only place where you can earn Nectar points – a number of other retailers are on the scheme.
These deals change regularly but you can currently get up to 7 points per £1 spent on Deliveroo and 9 points per £1 spend on JD Sports.
Where can you earn points?
HERE’S A LIST OF CURRENT PARTNER OFFERS
Tui – 4 points per £1
Deliveroo – 7 points per £1
B&Q – 4 points per £1
Debenhams – 5 points per £1
eBay – 2 points per £1
Hilton – 6 points per £1
JD Sports – 9 points per £1
Dreams – 5 points per £1
National Express – 4 points per £1
The Range – 5 points per £1
New Look – 7 points per £1
Nike – 5 points per £1
Avios
You can link your Nectar to an Avios account transferring points in either direction to boost balances.
Collect Avios points when making booking through British Airways, Uber, when buying train tickets or hiring a car through Avios.
As with Nectar, you can also earn bonus points when shopping through partners.
If you want to convert your Nectar points, you’ll get 250 Avios for every 400 Nectar points. Or 400 Avios points will convert to 400 Nectar points.
Collecting Avios points on top of Nectar means that you can periodically use your Avios points to top up your Nectar.
Credit card
If you have a good credit score you can take out an American Express Nectar Credit Card.
The main advantage of the card is that when you use it, you’ll get more Nectar points than if you were just using cash or another credit or debit card.
On average, card members collect 19 times more points compared to a regular Nectar collector.
That works out as £154 more in Nectar points a year.
Are your loyalty points at risk?
AFTER a rise in loyalty point thefts Nectar has recently introduced new rules to help customers stop points from being stolen.
Customers can now choose to have an option to freeze points in the app until they are ready to spend them.
Retiree Lois Dawkins was saving up her points for her Christmas shop. But just a few weeks before December 25, the 68-year-old from Exeter had her points stolen.
Within two hours, £330 worth of points had been drained from her account, leaving her nothing to fund her Christmas shop with.
“It was so sickening to see it happening before my eyes and there was nothing I could do about it,” she said.
“Thankfully, Sainsbury’s finally refunded my money around the 18th of December because I was so persistent, but I think it’s disgusting that it was so easy for these thieves to steal my points.”
How to protect your points
To protect your loyalty accounts, treat them like you would any other bank account.
For example, when making a new account, give it a strong password and set up two factor authentication to make it harder to hack in the first place.
It’s a good idea to set a different password for each account too, as reusing the same password means hackers can gain access to all your accounts more easily.
Keep all your passwords in one secure place, like a password-locked file, in case you forget any.
Then, make sure to regularly check your balance and contact your provider immediately if you notice any transactions that you didn’t make.
In the first instance, you’ll get a whopping 20,000 points if you qualify and spend £2,000 in the first three months of membership.
You’ll also collect at least three point per £1 when you shop at a Nectar partner.
And you’ll also get two points for every £1 spent on your credit card elsewhere.
If you recommend a friend for credit card and they are approved, you can bag 5,000 bonus points.
However, before taking out a credit card, it’s important to work out if it’s right for your circumstances.
You can use a comparison site such as moneysupermarket.com to compare different reward credit cards including the American Express Nectar card.
By answering a few questions through the site, you can also see if you’re likely to be approved for a card before submitting a full application.
If you do an application and are rejected for credit, it can harm your credit history making it more difficult to get accepted for borrowing in the future.
Finally, it’s really important that you pay off the balance each month or the interest earned on your spending will quickly outweigh any extra Nectar points collected.
Earn Nectar points without spending
You can earn Nectar points without spending cash, we explain how.
Answer survey questions
You can earn up to 120 points per survey. You can request to be emailed when there is a new survey to complete.
Check your account
Your account regularly gets updated with offers, so it’s worth checking if there are any bonus opportunities.
Some do require a spend, for example, 100 points when you next shop at Sainsbury’s.
But every now and then there are offers without any spend for you to claim.
Choose how to spend your points
CHOOSING how to spend your Nectar points could help you unlock extra savings.
The Sun’s Head of Consumer Tara Evans shares her top tips:
I always save up my Nectar points to give us a free shop at Christmas.
This year we had pocketed £120 worth of points and it’s a nice little boost during the festive period when you are often spending money on presents.
My family also uses the hack to getting 5p a litre off fuel too, as this can really make a difference at the pumps.
There are LOADS of ways to earn points but you are a bit more restricted when it comes to spending them, so it really pays to do your research before you do it.
How to spend your points
One Nectar point is worth 0.5p, meaning 100 points are worth 50p and 200 points are worth £1 at Sainsbury’s.
Some people save their points throughout the year and then use them to pay for a big Christmas shop.
However, there are lots of other ways to maximise your points and spend them elsewhere.
You can use them to bag discounts on petrol, free flights using Avios or free coffees.
We have rounded up some of the best offers below. You’ll find more online on Nectar.com.
Get 5p a litre off petrol
Cut the cost of filling up at the pump. If you want to cash in 300 points you can get 5p off a litre at Esso.
This offer is best when you are filling up a full tank as you’ll save the most cash.
Free flights with Avios and British Airways
You can convert your points into Avios points to use towards free flights. Every 400 points is converted into 250 Avios.
Depending on the amount of points you have, you can use points to reduce the cost of British Airways plane tickets and holidays.
You can also use points to upgrade your flight.
Free coffee
You can get any sized hot drink for 400 points at Cafe Nero.
Cheaper paint
You can transfer 4,000 points into £20 off at Dulux decorator centres.
