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Make Extra Money With CashCrate

Written by Nickel - 26 Comments

Back in December, I put together a list of ways to earn extra money. Embedded within that list was the suggestion to sign up with a site like CashCrate, which pays you to fill out forms, take surveys, and/or sign up for free trials. While I’ve only messed around with it a bit, I received a check for over $30 in May.

While $30 isn’t a life-changing sum, I spent very little time earning it, and it seems like it would be easy to earn considerably more. Beyond that, who wouldn’t want a bit of extra money every month to help them get out of debt, pay down their mortgage, or save for retirement?

How does Cash Crate work?

For starters, CashCrate is free to join. Once you give them your name and contact info, you’re ready to roll. Upon logging in, you’ll be presented with a list of opportunities. You can switch between cash offers, points offer, and research surveys. I’ve typically focused on the cash offers and research surveys.

Payouts vary widely, and are generally proportional to what’s expected of you. Most of the offers don’t pay a whole lot (generally $0.25 to a few dollars) but they also require very little. In some cases, it’s as simple as signing up to receive an e-mail newsletter — just be sure to use a secondary e-mail address.

Here’s a screenshot of an offer that I just completed this morning. It paid $2.25 and required nothing more than signing up to receive a newsletter.

While most of the offers are free, there are some that require an upfront payment. For example, you can get $9.00 in return for signing up for a one day trial with Driving4Dollars, which costs $5.95. Obviously, they’re hoping that you’ll stick around and become a paying customer, but you’re free to cancel and pocket the difference.

CashCrate can make these offers because companies need consumers to try/review their products or services, and are willing to pay for that sort of feedback. They pay CashCrate to find participants, and CashCrate passes along a piece of the action.

Shop online

Another way to earn money is to click through to shopping sites from Cash Crate before making a purchase. While their list of participating retailers isn’t huge, there are some big names there. For example, you can get 3% cash from Disney, and 5% from iTunes and WalMart. Note that these bonuses are in addition to any credit card rewards that you might receive.

Refer a friend

Finally, you can make a bit of additional money by referring others to CashCrate. For example, I get a $3 bonus for every person that signs up and earns $10, and I also earn 20-25% of what my referrals earn, and 10% of what their referrals earn. Note that this comes at no cost to the individual being referred — they keep everything they earn. Once you’ve signed up, you are likewise free to refer others.

Disclaimer: Discover is a paid advertiser of this site.
Reasonable efforts are made to maintain accurate information. See the Discover online credit card application for full terms and conditions on offers and rewards.

Published on June 24th, 2009 - 26 Comments
Filed under: Online

About the author: Nickel is the founder and editor-in-chief of this site. He's a thirty-something family man who has been writing about personal finance since 2005, and guess what? He's on Twitter!

26 Responses to “Make Extra Money With CashCrate”

1
Brent Says:
June 24th, 2009 at 11:41 am
I’m not a big fan of CashCrate. I gave it a try a few months back and it seemed like a lot of effort and risk for not a lot of payout. Why do I say risk? If you sign up for something and forget to cancel then that will take a huge bite out of your profits.

If you fill out surveys instead of watching TV then you do come out ahead. Watching TV earns you $0/hour while filing out surveys on CashCrate might make you $1/hour. However, I prefer to spend my time learning and educating myself on skills that will either open up other streams of income, make me a more savvy consumer, or make me better at my job. In my estimation, I will make much more money from that than filling out surveys.
2
Nickel Says:
June 24th, 2009 at 11:43 am
Brent: I’ve mostly messed around with it while watching TV — it doesn’t take much effort or concentration — and my experience has been that it pays way more that $1/hour. It still might not be worth it to you, but I did that $2.25 deal this morning in about 30 seconds.
3
Chris Says:
June 24th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
Tried this and received multiple phone calls from solicitors, within hours of completing surveys.not cool
4
Al Says:
June 24th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
I’ve also tried this out recently after rereading your post about it. and I have to tell you that i think it depends on the offer. I did an offer for .35 cents and it took me 20 minutes to fill out. Also, as a result of doing this ONE offer, i noticed a considerable increase in spam email (30+ a day) that hit my account (which of course you addressed with the comment about a second account).

I’m curious to know how many offers you had to fill out to get $30.00. i’ll have to take a look at it again, but based on my first try, i didn’t think it was worth the .35 cents that i earned.
5
Stu Says:
June 24th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
I signed up, looked around and quickly deleted my account, my internal warning alarm was high.

good thing I use google apps and can delete/create email addresses at will on my domain.

be interesting to see if my phone spam goes up now…

A lot of the offers just read ’scam’ all over the place. “Sign up for X, agree to Y AND Z and mark 5 offers you’d like and choose 3 rewards!” hmmm

“Free laptop!” uh suuuuure.

I’m glad you got your check, me I’m gonna steer clear, I’d rather deliver local newspapers for 3 hours a week to earn $50 instead.
6
Ryan Says:
June 24th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
I’ve used Cashcrate. Had a pretty good experience with them. Got my check for 22 dollars last month.

The free offers are 100% free. They don’t require any payment ever, they don’t even collect your credit card number.

The â€œSign up for X, agree to Y AND Z and mark 5 offers youâ€™d like and choose 3 rewards!” are complete optional and Cashcrate will pay you the 25 cents or $2.25 whether you do that part or not.

Checking out the forum is helpful too. Lots of tips and people willing to assist.
7
Bradley Jones Says:
June 24th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
I’ve used CashCrate for a few months now. I average over $100 a month. At first I started doing a few offers, but now I just refer others and reap the benefits.

When I was completing offers I did only a few. Mainly the free trials. I cancelled before the deadline and was paid for my time. It’s easy money.

For those of you getting spam out the behind, I suggest you do as I and many others do when using programs like this, set up a seperate email specifically for use with these programs. It saves the hassle. Also, as far as phone numbers, if you Google “free online phone number” you will find a site that offers phone numbers that you can use for such programs. That way you don’t get annoyed all day with calls.

Just a bit of advice for those who are skeptical. You can make a good bit of money from “get paid to” and “paid to click” programs. I make quite a load from them.
8
Jo Says:
June 25th, 2009 at 10:15 am
As far as using CashCrate to make online purchases to reap the rebates, no thanks. I’d rather do all my online shopping at BreadCrumbs.com, Mr. Rebates, and Cashbaq.com…..These three websites offer far more online stores to shop at. My favorite is drugstore.com, which offers a 10% rebate on all purchases. If I buy enough to save on shipping, then that becomes a bigger bang for my buck.

Yesterday, GNC from Mr. Rebates, was offering 20% (I am a Gold Card member)on all items. In addition to that offer, I received free shipping for ordering $100 worth of merchandise. Lastly, I will be receiving that 10% rebate. When all is said and done, I will have saved $41.13.

This is not something I do on a whim. I have been a GNC customer for a number of years. I prefer to stock up when all these incentives are simultaneously in place. Oh, and by shopping online, I also paid a paltry $1.04 in sales tax, versus the 7.25% I would have paid at the local mall, plus no 20% Gold Card discount available (available only the first week of each month) and no 10% rebate.

I’d have to say that I won this round by quite a bit with very little effort and time.
9
The Truth Says:
June 25th, 2009 at 11:15 pm
CashCrate is crap. I certainly hope you didn’t give any of your fake sign-ups a real e-mail address. If you did, you’ll soon have 88 junk e-mails a day.

I also doubt that most people bother to report the income, which is taxable.

Anyhoo…
10
theactualtruth Says:
June 26th, 2009 at 12:36 am
Cashcrate requires a 1099 or W2 or whatever it is once a member makes over 600 a year, just like any company has to do.
11
Dan Says:
June 27th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
What a scammy site….. tried it out and all of the surveys I tried to take were falsely labeled. They said I didn’t have to sign up for offers at the end and I always had to.

Deleted that account in a hurry…
12
Ryan Says:
June 27th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
None of the surveys are falsely labeled. You DID NOT have to sign up for the offers.
13
MikeS Says:
June 29th, 2009 at 12:54 pm
I’ve signed up when this post came out, just trying to earn a little extra spending money. So far, I’ve earned about $10, without very much effort.

If you are careful about what you are doing, it does not seem that complicated or take too much time. You’re not going to retire on the money you make (unless you can refer a bunch of people), but it seems a convenient way to make a little extra cash.
14
Petunia Says:
June 30th, 2009 at 2:07 am
I signed up too, but have already deleted my account. I particularly dislike the junk e-mails asking me if I want to have a fling with a lonely housewife, or if I am interested in a Russian bride. Why send these to women?

Glad it works for you, but it just doesn’t appeal to me!
15
V Says:
July 1st, 2009 at 9:47 am
Sounds like a MLM offer…
16
Nickel Says:
July 1st, 2009 at 10:27 am
V: The referral system is structured as an MLM program, but there is no cost to you, so there is no risk. If it doesn’t work out, you just quit doing it. No harm, no foul.
17
Bradley Jones Says:
July 6th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
As I mentioned before, make a separate email account specifically for using programs like CashCrate. Saves the hassle of overloading your inbox.

For those of you saying its deceptive saying that you don’t have to sign up for offers when you do, you obviously just don’t know what you’re doing.

There is not one offer that you have you to sign up for something unless you’re doing a trial, in which case its obvious you do. Other than that, on the surveys and such there is no need to sign up for anything.

Youtube how to complete CashCrate offers or Google it. You will find tutorials that explain the whole process.
18
Petunia Says:
July 7th, 2009 at 11:32 pm
Bradley Jones @ #17 –

It’s not that I can’t comprehend how to accomplish participating in CashCrate. It’s that the “ick” factor of receiving sleezy ads from associates of CashCrate is very high. Therefore, I’m just not enthusiastic about continuing any sort of association myself. Does that make sense?

Petunia
19
John Says:
August 6th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
CashCrate is a wonderful way to make extra money online! Great post, keep it up!

Cheers
John
20
Does Cashcrate work Says:
August 26th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
You have made it a long way! It takes hard work and dedication in order to make that much money per month! Awesome job! You must have been working hard on getting backlinks etc. in order to get your site on google. It has an amazing SERP for the keyword CashCrate. Awesome job man!
21
Chance Weekly Says:
December 15th, 2009 at 4:14 am
So have you continued using Cashcrate since then? If so, how much are you making now?

I’d really like to know so I can get a better idea of what I can expect to happen in the future lol. expecting my first check next week
22
MikeS Says:
January 5th, 2010 at 1:12 pm
Just thought I’d give an update. I’ve been using the site for about 6 months and have made a total of $183.92. Again, I’m not going to retire on this money, but it gives me extra spending money. Thanks again Nickel!!
23
Nickel Says:
January 5th, 2010 at 1:52 pm
MikeS: That’s great to hear! Thanks for the update.
24
Get Paid Online Taking Surveys With CashCrate Says:
June 29th, 2010 at 1:06 pm
Ive been using CashCrate for over a year now and have been paid right around $1500 since I joined. Like some people have said, it may not be a whole lot, but it is $1500 more than I would have earned otherwise. Im a teenager and with school and sports I dont have time for a regular job, so CashCrate is perfect for me.
25
Special Says:
February 14th, 2011 at 1:11 pm
i signed up for cashcrate 1 week ago, ive been working a lil on it everyday and it is extremely hard to earn 30 cents, ive earned 5 dollars in 1 week, thats a sucky profit, oh did i fail to mention im 15. they said it was going to be easy, well it is, but you have to sit there staring at the computer doing “offers & “surveys” to earn you a good dollar. which isnt worth it at all. oh and if i did have a credit card i would do some offers that need a credit card but you buy something for 100$ and you get 12$ back which is bullshit. ive wasted one week out of my life and it sucks. thanks cashcrate. -.-
26
Dan O'Brien Says:
July 6th, 2012 at 7:25 pm
i just signed up today, and it is ligit. I made $6 today! Thats pretty good for not doing anything really!!

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