Upside: Get Cash Back on Fuel 4+

Poor Customer Service

There were 2 offers at the same station. However, the LOWER offer (4 cents) was visible ONLY if I zoomed in on the map while the HIGHER offer (8 cents) was visible in a plain search. This is a deceptive practice. I only realized this because when I saw the payout it was much lower than the offer. So I went back to the app to make sure and the 8 cent offer was still there. However, there was also a hidden offer at the same station only visible if you zoomed in as far as possible on the map. If that’s not clear then imagine if I put up a large sign that says “8 cents back on every gallon!” Then you fill your tank only to realize the next day that you only received 4 cents back. You come back to check the sign and indeed it says 8 cents. However, when you closely inspect it you see a tiny little sign that says 4 cents back—two offers at the same station, one plainly visible and another hidden from view. This is EXACTLY what happened with the app and it’s deceptive. However, I wasn’t even paid 4 cents, it was 3 cents. This is extremely deceptive. When I contacted customer service about it they blew me off and told me that the payment (of 3 cents) was made and if I had additional questions go to the FAQ page. Nice.

Developer Response ,

Hi, Thank you for letting us know. We're sorry for the trouble here. We'd like to take a look into this one more time, can you send us another email with ATTN as the subject line, so we can take a look at this personally? Thanks for your patience! 💌

Save a lot at first, then….sometimes…

As someone who’s claimed a little over $250 in the past few years since this program’s inception and uses Upside every time for gas, it could and should have been more. Seems about 10% of my offers get the “issues found” remark or go “expired” and no cash back is given and no reason given that’s easily available for me to find. Please tell me what the issues are so that I might not make the same mistake over and over…if it’s in fact my fault or within my control…..and also give the opportunity to fix the issues to receive the offered offer. Sometimes you are required to upload a picture of the receipt immediately, and other times it just says “you’re done”. Please give the option to upload the receipt every time so that it’s not possible for upside to not be able to find the transaction and deny the offed offer. If you pick the wrong card from your wallet you won’t get it either as you must select which card you will use before you pump. Why not associate all of my cards so you can’t miss it? You’ve already got them all stored anyway. There is also fine print that reduces anything upside says they will give in cash back if you have a loyalty card with a business that provides any discount….sometimes to zero cash back from upside. I’ve been happy with it for a few years, but it’s beginning to slide into the “more trouble and disappointment than it’s worth” category…for me anyway!

Legit but can be buggy

This app is great with a few caveats. There have been a couple of times that my receipt didn’t have all of the info required, which makes me kind of mad at the retailer. I mean, they know they have this offer on this app. And then they make it so that you can’t claim it? I also don’t like that once I’ve claimed an app I can’t unclaim it. Today I claimed an offer at Popeyes. I only ever use restaurant apps to order fast food. Well, the Popeyes app had a problem, and I couldn’t use it. I would have liked to have been able to unclaim the offer so that I could claim it at a later time. And you can’t check to see if stuff will work beforehand, because you have to claim the offer before you make the purchase, which is irritating. Also, I use air pay for everything. Got a receipt back today, and since I use air pay, it didn’t have the last four digits of my card on the receipt. I chose to upload a receipt instead of using the linked card option because I have had a problem once before with that option.

So, you know, it’s a good app. The percentages of cash back that they give you are generally higher than other apps of this type as far as I can see. But the process is still a little buggy here and there. As many times as I have gotten frustrated, trying to use it, I’d give it 3 1/2 stars if half stars were a thing. Since they aren’t, I’ll give it four.