150 Clubcard points per £50 Amazon purchase with 3V (and other uses)

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The easiest way to earn a lot of Avios points or Virgin Flying Club miles in 2013 was with 3V Virtual Visa cards – as long as your local Tesco sold them.

They look like this:

3V card

…. and, as with all non-Tesco branded gift cards, you earn 150 Clubcard points for every £50-worth you buy. This meant 360 Avios or 375 Virgin Atlantic miles. Because Tesco accepts American Express, it was also an easy way to increase your spending if you needed to hit a sign-up bonus on a new Amex card.

The deal was so great because you could use 3V cards for financial transactions. Most blatantly, you could pay them into certain bank accounts so you got your entire £25 per card back immediately. The only limit to the number of free Avios you could earn via this route was the number of 3V Virtual Visa cards stocked in your local Tesco.

The wheels came off the bus in December 2013. Overnight, 3V changed their acceptance rules. The cards are now rejected if you attempt to use them for a financial services transaction.

However, Tesco is still selling 3V cards at face value.

You still earn 150 Clubcard points for every £50-worth you buy.

If you use an Amex Gold to buy them, you would also earn 100 Membership Rewards points as it is a supermarket purchase which earns double points.

Where can you still use them?

I saw my first 3V cards for at least a year whilst on holiday last week. I bought £50-worth and redeemed them for Amazon gift certificates at £25 each.

This is the easiest way, for most people, to redeem 3V cards. You can order Amazon gift certificates for yourself and pay them into your Amazon account. You then have a credit balance which you can work through for future purchases.

(If you do this, please consider using our Amazon affiliate link by clicking here or clicking the Amazon logo in the right-hand margin. We earn a small commission on each gift card purchase. You cannot earn cashback anywhere else for buying Amazon gift cards so you don’t lose anything.)

There are some other places that still take 3V cards. If you have regular monthly payments to any of these companies then it is something you should take a look at:

Sky

Vodafone

EDF, Scottish & Southern and E.ON

TV Licensing

Parent Pay

Virgin Media

Apple Store e-gift cards bought direct

You can also purchase gift vouchers via TopGiftCards, High Street Vouchers and Love2Shop.

If you have a direct debit for bill payment with any of the above, you can use a 3V card to make a partial payment onto your account. The next direct debit will then be adjusted.

Some merchants may put a £1 block on your card when you attempt to use it as a security check. The maximum you can then pay is £24. The remaining £1 will be released within 7-10 days and can be used to buy an Amazon gift voucher.

Some merchants will also restrict the number of different card numbers that a single customer can use to 2+ in a 24 hour period. Do not expect to be able to use up 10 3V cards with the same merchant on the same day.

Any updates to the above list are welcome.

How to earn Avios points from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2021)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards. Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways BA Amex American Express card

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up, no annual fee and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending ….. Read our full review

British Airways BA Premium Plus American Express Amex credit card

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable credit card perk – the 2-4-1 companion voucher Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points, such as:

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital On Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios:

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa

The most generous Avios Visa or Mastercard for a limited company Read our full review

You should also consider the British Airways Accelerating Business credit card. This is open to sole traders as well as limited companies and has a 30,000 Avios sign-up bonus:

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

(Want to earn more Avios? Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)

Category

Tesco Clubcard

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

Paul says:

11 Aug11 August 18:40

so i bought 2 cards today and went through ther procedure. Tried to buy a gift certificate for someone else and it went through but it just say scheduled………………no further information. What have I done wrong?? I then got another card cause I thought the recipient had made an error and i paid this one to myself but again it is just sitting in the account and saying pending. I am not amused! Can’t understand what I have done wrong, any help gratefully appreciated.
- Paul says:
  
  11 Aug11 August 18:42
  
  sorry, that post is probably not very clear…………….i bougght a gift cert on amazon and it went through but the recipient has not received it. When i look at open orders it just says “scheduled” but there is no other info. This is driving me nuts!
  - squills says:
    
    11 Aug11 August 18:47
    
    You used a 3V card to buy an Amazon giftcard and sent it to another person, who has not yet received it?
  - Rob says:
    
    11 Aug11 August 21:14
    
    Wierd, they usually go through immediately unless they have an issue with the card. Easier to send it to yourself by the way!
sarah gorman says:

11 Aug11 August 19:28

I used to use them on Asda.com but now they are refused. When I checked with 3V they said they do not participate on the Verified by Visa scheme so any company that uses this will reject the 3V cards unfortuantely
- E14 says:
  
  11 Aug11 August 22:10
  
  Papa Johns just changed to verified by visa – argh !
Jason says:

12 Aug12 August 08:16

Does anyone know of any Tesco’s, in Nottingham, that sell these?
Craig Vassie says:

13 Aug13 August 13:04

Can’t find any. My local Tesco in High Wycombe claims not to sell them – they just have Visa gift cards that carry the £3.95 admin fee. Suggestions anyone please?
- Mark says:
  
  13 Aug13 August 14:27
  
  They say that the Visa gift card can be used anywhere that takes Visa cards!!! Reading the website it’s says that in the help section about spending it in shops and petrol stations.
  
  My wife’s work pays for her travel into London, which cost over £400 per month. So next month I am going to pay for her travel with these.
  
  Yes, it will cost us £32 on admin fees but it will get us 16p of a litre of fuel and more importantly 1,200 of Club Card points = 2,880 Avios points.
  
  This works out at 0.011 per Avios point, so this makes it worth it as we are only spending £32 ourselves and a better return on Credit Cards that give Avois points as rewards.
  
  I think that it would still be worth doing as it’s money we would have gained Avois points on unless we used Credit Cards that give Avois points as reward, but that route would only give you 400 Avios points instead of the 2,880 Club Card points.
  
  Maybe there are member out that get their works pay for company travel cost i.e. Rail fares, Oyster cards, taxi fares or even petrol and some of these give you the chance to double dip on the points front.
  
  Hope these ideas help you all
  - Brian says:
    
    13 Aug13 August 14:33
    
    How did you arrive at your Avios cost? Have you factored in the fuel? Because if not, you’re actually paying quite a lot for those Avios…
    
    It would be different if you can use £25 cards for paying for tickets etc that are less than that. That way, you avoid the admin cost.
    - mark says:
      
      13 Aug13 August 15:41
      
      Hi Brain,
      I hope my maths are correct…..
      I worked out the cost of the admin fee at roughly £32.00 so getting 1,200 Club #card points, which convert into 2,880 Avios points. I the 2,880 Avois points divided by the £32 work’s out at just over 1p per point.
      
      As we would be getting the £400 back on my wife’s expense we would not normally have gain any Avios points I think paying just over 1p a point is worth it… We do not have or want a Credit or Amex Card…
      
      N0 fuel added in to the costing as I would get the Visa Gift Cards next time I went to Tesco. My closet Tesco’s had at least 20 of these Visa Gift Cards.
      
      Yes if we used a Avios Credit or Amex Card we would get 400 Avois points for the same spend of £400 but do not have or want a Credit or Amex Card…So this is the best route for us.
      
      Can I make also make clear that the card I am talking about is the Visa Gift Card NOT the V3 Visa online pre-payment card.
      
      The Visa Gift Card comes in a £25 or £50 value and both have admin activation fees, which are added at the time of purchase, so actually costing you either a £25 card has a card issue fee of £2.95, so you pay £27.95. The £50 card has a card issue fee of £3.95, so you pay £53.95.
      
      For more info on these cards go to https://www.gospendit.co.uk/Faq/Index or http://www.tesco.com/giftcard/faq.asp#visa
      - Louie says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 17:56
        
        Your plan had me thinking…. is there a way of avoiding these charges by using 3V cards instead?
        
        How about…. sign up for East Coast’s rewards scheme (see Raffles post https://headforpoints.com/2014/04/22/how-to-get-the-cheapest-price-and-maximum-rewards-when-booking-train-travel-part-2/ and https://headforpoints.com/2012/12/23/east-coast-rewards-gets-even-better/ then buy some 3V vouchers from Tescos, then use them to buy East Coast e-vouchers http://www.eastcoast.co.uk/gift-evouchers and then buy your wife’s tickets on the East Coast website?
        
        I haven’t tried it and there may be a flaw in this plan, but worth a look maybe? Would be free Avios and free money – no charges, cheaper petrol and free tickets from the East Coast rewards scheme.
      - Mark says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 20:45
        
        Unfortunately we are on the Greater Anglia train line and they donot seem to do gift vouchers unless any one else can tell me different.
        
        You cannot order a session ticket over the phone, so the need to buy it at the counter.
        
        If anyone is on the same line I have found out that you can buy a session ticket online, so you could use the V3 card but you would have to combine the cards to the value you need plus the £1.75 fee for combining each card together.
      - Trevor says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 20:28
        
        Hi Mark. I think you had a few of us confused as we thought you were talking 3V cards and you wouldn’t be able to use these on petrol. Now we understand you mean the Visa debit cards, that makes more sense, but I’m still unsure if you mean you are buying petrol for yourself (in which case the 16p discount is relevant), or for your wife for work refund in which case it’s irrelevant as the cost is returned and all you are doing is saving her company money. If her travel is by travel and public transport that you can book online, then don’t pay the fee for the Visa debit cards, but use 3V cards as much as possible to reduce your costs. Not quite understanding your scenario makes it difficult to predict your outcome – on one hand you pay the admin fee for the debit cards and save the company money on petrol, so your cost is £0.011/Avios (yes, your maths is correct, but what is further confusing is your willingness to pay such a high price per Avios when most people here would value them at less than that and hence never pay that price per point), while on the other hand you could earn the Avios, pay no admin fees if buying 3Vs to spend online on public transport, and profit from 16p/litre petrol discount – quite a variation.
      - squills says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 20:47
        
        OP means pay upfront then claim back @ 40p a mile or similar
      - louie-m says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 23:23
        
        Mark – I mentioned East Coast because you can buy tickets for any journey from them, not only EC trains, but I don’t think that extends to season tickets.
      - Brian says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 23:48
        
        To be honest, Mark, I think you need to reassess. Paying more than 1p per Avios is actually a lot, since it’s difficult to get more than 1p in value, unless you use them solely for business/first class travel. And in order to do that, you need to earn quite a lot – which is probably rather difficult without AMEX.
        
        If I were you, I would get 3V cards and use them for transactions under £25, meaning that there would be no fees. I’d also get an AMEX card of some kind!!
        
        Obviously, every person values Avios at his or her own rate, but you need to be very careful that you are not paying more than you’ll get back. Otherwise, it simply isn’t worth it. Even if you’re breaking even or making a small ‘profit’, it’s not worth the hassle.
      - Louie says:
        
        14 Aug14 August 09:57
        
        The 16p per litre fuel saving on say 50 litres would bring the cost down to 0.83p per Avios – better but not outstanding value.
  - Col A-B says:
    
    13 Aug13 August 14:48
    
    Just a heads up – the Tesco fuel save thing expires next month.
    - squills says:
      
      13 Aug13 August 14:58
      
      OP could instead explore the Morrisons route.
- squills says:
  
  13 Aug13 August 14:59
  
  You may have to look in more than one Tesco.
  - Craig Vassie says:
    
    13 Aug13 August 15:03
    
    Have tried two stores. in the gift card racks they only have standard Visa gift cards, £50 value, with a £3.95 admin fee. Customer Services had no knowledge of a Visa 3V card at either store – it wasn’t like “we’ve run out….” Cheers
    - squills says:
      
      13 Aug13 August 15:09
      
      Customer Services generally don’t have a clue about 3Vs: 3Vs are serviced by an outside stockist.
      
      I’ve often found Tesco stores with zero 3Vs on occasion but I’ve never found any Tesco stores with zero 3V cards over time.
      
      The dinky little city-centre ones being the major exception – but they don’t have the space.
      - TimS says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 15:52
        
        One store near me has every other gift card except 3v and no free spaces (every visit) but another one a couple of miles away always has dozens!
        
        I think store A genuinely d
      - TimS says:
        
        13 Aug13 August 15:53
        
        One store near me has every other gift card except 3v and no free spaces (every visit) but another one a couple of miles away always has dozens!
        
        I think store A genuinely doesn’t stock them anymore but store B gets extra!
    - Louie says:
      
      13 Aug13 August 17:58
      
      There’s plenty of non-Express stores round my way which definitely do not stock 3Vs. Fortunately there are a couple of larger stores that usually do though…..
Waffles1 says:

13 Aug13 August 15:02

The Tesco Fuel Save has been extended into 2015
- mark says:
  
  13 Aug13 August 15:44
  
  Waffles, that great news, thanks for the info
- Waffles1 says:
  
  13 Aug13 August 16:06
  
  Trust me. We’ll hear about in the next couple of weeks.
  - Mark says:
    
    13 Aug13 August 16:09
    
    Waffles, I am guessing that’s a bit of insider trading / knowledge….
    
    We shall not ask any question then 😉
- Col A-B says:
  
  13 Aug13 August 17:51
  
  I just tweeted Tesco & they confirmed it has been extended until end of Feb 2015
  - Trevor says:
    
    13 Aug13 August 20:17
    
    I’ve heard the rumours and glad to know it does appear to be true. Though that said, I was benefitting a lot when I was still buying 3V a lot, but now not so much since seldom shop much at Tesco – certainly nowhere close to the £500 required to get max discount. Yet previously I was earning this twice a month.
    - ComeFlyWithMe123 says:
      
      14 Aug14 August 11:45
      
      You can actually benefit from more than the 20p per litre discount. That limit applies to per transaction. So if you fill up the car more than once per month you will reap the rewards 🙂
      
      I’ve had over 60p showing on my receipt from 3v buying and pass my c/c to family n friends to benefit before they expire.
Mark says:

13 Aug13 August 19:30

Talktalk seems to accept 3V (will find out later if the transaction is reversed). Paying within 24 hours of being emailled the bill gives a 25% discount (I think this has to be paid in one transaction so those with larger bills may have to make a prepayment to reduce the amount required.

Talktalk (and EDF) let customers choose how much to pay (I don’t know what the minimum is) so could be useful for dumping part used cards as an alternative to Amazon.
- squills says:
  
  13 Aug13 August 20:50
  
  15%
  
  What is the Speedy Payment discount?
  
  The speedy payment discount is a reward for customers who pay their bill early. Simply pay your bill within 24 hours of receiving your bill notification email and receive a 15% discount.
Steve says:

13 Aug13 August 20:58

Hi, also posted on PTS earlier but had problems early in Tesco trying to buy 4 3V cards, once scanned the till kept deducted them, I was told that they now only allow one per transaction. Has anyone purchased any today who can confirm this is not the case?
- Waffles1 says:
  
  13 Aug13 August 21:00
  
  There isn’t a policy limiting the number you can purchase. If the till keeps deducting the card from the bill it’s because it can’t activate the card, so it doesn’t want to charge you for it. More likely that the checkout had a problem connecting with the server to activate the card.
  - Steve says:
    
    13 Aug13 August 21:13
    
    Thanks for the quick response, will try again tomorrow, the cashier did say they had been having other problems with giftcards but was then told it was a restriction.
    - louie-m says:
      
      13 Aug13 August 23:12
      
      I bought four in one transaction at about 8pm this evening without any issues.
Oh! Matron! says:

15 Aug15 August 08:50

I don’t know if anyone is following this thread, but do DVLA accept 3V? My road tax is coming up….
- Trevor says:
  
  15 Aug15 August 10:14
  
  I renewed mine last month and looked into it briefly, unsuccessfully. But just seen a comment on PTS forum that confirms it’s no longer an option.
  - Oh! Matron! says:
    
    15 Aug15 August 10:28
    
    Cheers Trevor.