I am always on the lookout for side hustles that give you money for little work. With Coinout, ReceiptPal, or Fetch Rewards, you won’t be able to quit your job, but they all take little effort.
If you are wondering which app is better out of Coinout, ReceiptPal, or Fetch Rewards, I can tell you how it has worked for me. I have used the three of them for over three months now and have a pretty good idea of what you can expect.
Why Do Companies Pay for Your Receipts?
When it comes to personal finance, I like to be efficient and love simplicity. When stores ask me, Do you want your receipt? I’d say No, thanks. Unless it is a significant item, and I think I may need it for a potential return.
You may also think that your receipts have no value, but companies like Coinout, ReceiptPal, or Fetch Rewards love your receipts enough to pay you for a copy of them.
Why do they want your receipts?
They have technology that analyzes your receipts together with many other consumers. This analysis helps brands understand consumer buying habits without having to request data from retailers.
How much money do they make?
They will pay you pennies for your receipts, but the companies behind these apps are making very good money. But we have to give them credit; not everyone can do that. They have serious technology and competent employees to turn those receipts into valuable data.
The NPD Group, Inc, the company behind ReceiptPal has estimated revenues of $100-$500 million a year.
Fetch Rewards Inc has raised nearly $50 million in venture capital.
What These Apps Have in Common
With all these apps you most definitely won’t get rich, but you can generate some extra cash by spending very little time.
There are all available for iPhone and Android devices. With the three of them you will be using the app on your smartphone to scan and submit receipts. They all will give you various rewards after you submit the receipts.
Typically, you can get from 1cent to 10 cents per receipt depending on what you have purchased and which app you are using.
Based on my experience and research, the three apps belong to companies that are legit with years of history and pay the money you earn.
I gave the three of them a 2-star out of 5-star rating because although they are simple to use and take very little time, you won’t make significant money.
Let’s go over each app individually.
Coinout (★★)
What is Coinout
In February 2018, Co-founder and CEO, Jeffrey Witten became famous after appearing in Shark Tank. He showed Kevin O’Leary his place and made a deal with Robert Herjavec.
Initially the app was supposed to be a digital change wallet, but that feature never materialized and it has become another “receipt app”.
App Store Ratings and Reviews
The App Store rating is 4.7 out of 53.7K ratings. This is a high rating for an app. These are some of the reviews shown on the App Store. You can see all the reviews here.
My Experience with Coinout
I have submitted 128 receipts from many different stores and I have earned $4.94. That means I have made 3.9 cents per receipt.
This is little money, but let’s see how much I really make per hour. Since it doesn’t take me more than 20 seconds on average to scan a receipt, I make about $12 an hour.
The only thing you have to do is to use the app to scan each receipt, submit it and see how much you made with that particular receipt. According to the company, you receive a random amount of cents per receipt. The most typical amount I have seen is 2 cents, but you see the occasional 8 or 9 cents.
I noticed that every now and then the app shows a warning message saying that “your phone number is invalid” and asked you to reenter it. This is annoying but it takes a few seconds.
Coinout is the only app of the three that pays you through Paypal but the amount must be greater or equal to $10 before you can transfer your money. Since I haven’t reached $10 yet, I haven’t been able to cash out.
You can read my full Coinout review here.
ReceiptPal (★★)
What is ReceiptPal
Similar to the other two apps reviewed here, ReceiptPal is an app you can use with your smartphone. Every time you buy something, you can upload the receipt and get rewards for it. ReceiptPal was created by The NPD Group, Inc.
App Store Ratings and Reviews
The App Store rating is 4.6 out of 15.3K ratings. Almost identical rating as the Coinout app. These are some of the reviews shown on the App Store. You can see all the reviews here.
My Experience with ReceiptPal
I have submitted 135 receipts from many different stores, and I have earned $12.32. That means I have made 9 cents per receipt, which is more than double what I make with Coinout.
Like with Coinout this is little money, but let’s see how much I make per hour. Since it doesn’t take me more than 20 seconds on average to scan a receipt, I make about $16.20 an hour.
It has been very easy to use ReceiptPal and I have no had any issues with it. Unfortunately, ReceiptPal doesn’t pay cash like Coinout, but at least in my experience, you can make twice as much per receipt.
You can read my ReceiptPal full review here.
Fetch Rewards (★★)
What is Fetch Rewards
Fetch Rewards is a mobile shopping platform that gives rewards for scanning receipts.
Unlike the two other apps, it has a selection of special offers that allows you to earn bonus points on top of the regular points you earn with participating brands. Other than that, it works very similar to Coinout and ReceiptPal.
App Store Ratings and Reviews
The App Store rating is 4.8 out of 818.8K ratings. This is the best rating out of the three. These are some of the reviews shown on the App Store. You can see all the reviews here.
My Experience with Fetch Rewards
I have submitted 86 receipts from different stores, and I have earned $7.11. That means I have made 8.3 cents per receipt, which is double what I made with Coinout and about the same as what I made with ReceiptPal.
Like with the other two apps, this is not a lot of money, but let’s see how much I make per hour. Since it doesn’t take me more than 20 seconds on average to scan a receipt, I make about $14.90 an hour.
I have fewer receipts for Fetch Rewards than Coinout and ReceiptPal because Fetch Rewards didn’t accept receipts that were not from grocery type stores. This has changed recently, and they now accept all types of receipts, although you typically make more money from the grocery type stores.
You could purposely search for those special offers and purchase them to earn the extra points. You can also shop as usual, and the app will reward you extra points for the special offers if you happened to purchase them. I’m not particularly eager to buy items to get extra points. So the way I do it is by shopping what I want, and if I get extra points, that’s great.
You can read my Fetch Rewards full review here.
Summary Table
I have created the table below to summarize my experience with these apps numerically. Realize that most of the time, I used the same receipt for the three apps. So, I would expect to accumulate about $100 in a year if I consistently use the three apps.
My assumption to calculate the $ per hour column is that it takes me 20 seconds to submit each app’s receipt, which I think is pretty accurate.
I think a clear conclusion here is that while you make little money, you don’t waste much time. If you can set this as a routine and it doesn’t bother you, you’ll make more than the minimum US federal minimum wage ($7.25) for a very simple task.
| Receipt App | # of receipts | $ earned | Cents per receipt | $ per hour |
| Coinout | 128 | $4.94 | 3.9 cents | $12.00 |
| ReceiptPal | 135 | $12.32 | 9.0 cents | $16.20 |
| Fetch Rewards | 86 | $7.11 | 8.3 cents | $14.90 |
| Total | 349 | $24.37 | 7.0 cents | $12.56 |
Video Summary
Let’s wrap up with a quick summary video I have created. If you like this video, consider subscribing to the Finance Notebook Youtube Channel.
Final Thoughts
It is only after I tested these three apps that I was able to conclude that you could make around $10 a month with little effort. This may or may not be interesting to you.
Ultimately my goal is to identify all gigs and other entrepreneurial activities that are worth trying and write about them in this blog.
Unlike many other blogs out there, I test every money-making opportunity I write about. It is one thing to write about these topics based on other people’s opinion and another thing, very different, to write based on your own experience and sweat.
Thank you for your visit 🙂
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