Since the credit crunch began a year or so ago, consumers have been increasingly trying to save money. One method they can use is to employ “cashback sites” (such as quidco.com, topcashback.co.uk and greasypalm.com) to obtain money back whenever they buy anything online.

In the last year, use of these sites has grown exponentially, and the proliferation of new sites means it’s difficult for many consumers to know whether they have obtained the most cash back they could have done.

Today (7^th July 2008) sees the launch of a new website that aims to reduce this confusion. Smart Cashback (http://www.smartcashback.co.uk) is a cashback site aggregator that allows consumers to compare over 25 cashback sites with one simple search.

Lead developer and manager of the company behind the website, Adam Radford said “Although there are a number of other sites that try to achieve the same results as Smart Cashback, none of the others have the same breadth of coverage, or the quality of information that’s available on our new site”.

“Smart Cashback was developed because we (as consumers) were using cashback sites, and found ourselves searching a number of them before we bought anything online – We tried a few other cashback comparison sites and found the results were pretty poor”.

When using cashback sites, there are a few things that people should bear in mind:

• Always treat the cashback as though it is a “nice to have” rather than relying on it. Although cashback is usually paid (although over 95% of cashback “tracks” correctly), sometimes it doesn’t.
• Don’t just buy something because of a large amount of cashback – Make sure you’re getting a good deal first.
• Try not to spread cashback earnings thinly between too many different cashback sites – Most of them only pay out when a certain amount of cashback is earned, and it’s no use having a lot of accounts with different sites, each with only a few pounds in them.
• Always look at cashback sites when buying financial products such as insurance, credit cards or when joining gambling websites – The amount of cashback payable can be very large (e.g. On the 7^th July 2008, it was possible to obtain £120 cashback when buying Lloyds TSB Home Insurance via the cashback site topcashback.co.uk).

Media Contact: Adam Radford – +44 7773 801884