It will come as no surprise to anyone with small children that we visit McDonalds an average of once a week. Usually, it's because we are on a road trip, or we want to burn their energy so we go to one with a playroom. Sometimes there's a playdate involved or it's a reward bribe for good behavior.
In any event, we use the McDonald's App because it's easier to order Natasha's special cheeseburger (ketchup, pickle only) than to trust a drive-through window order. And in theory, there are some rewards and deals.
In Theory
As you might expect with a points system, the amount of points you need to purchase any item is high. something like 4500 for medium fries, 6000 for large. And you can only redeem one item per order. So even if you have enough points to get a sandwich and fries, tough. You have to pick one. This seems like Bullshit because I've already paid for those points, I should be able to buy as much as my points allow.
And they don't let you redeem points on the same order you are using a Deal. Also Bullshit. I only put up with it because we do it frequently enough and it's better than nothing.
Oh and the app defaults to the closest McDonald's, which is 2.2 miles away in neighboring South Haven. But the one with the playroom is 4.6 miles away in Olive Branch. [We live practically on the border of South Haven and OB]. So even though I explicitly selected the OB one today, it flipped back to the SH and I had to cancel the order (the cancel button is buried within the app) and re-order.
I have found some workarounds that I'm sure McD's Headquarters is working on fixing.
When the kids were younger, Boris wanted the chicken nugget Happy Meal and Natasha wanted the cheeseburger one (it's a burger and you have to pay for the cheese upgrade!).
When we visit to play at the playpen in person, I will place the kids' order and usually get the Happy Meal with points for one of the kids and pay for the rest. This earns me more points.
After their food comes, I will place my order. Often I have enough for a free sandwich myself. So I just get a free sandwich and pay for my fries. Now that they are older, using some of the Deals is advantageous instead of getting two Happy Meals. Especially since Boris's appetite is larger.
Case in point: today I used their $5 bundle to get the cheeseburger for Natasha -- the McDouble is essentially a double cheeseburger and I could customize it. I still got Boris his 6 PC McNugget Meal which then gives him 10 total McNuggets. Natasha got both the small fries with her order and the medium I got for the Happy Meal, so I ordered Boris a large fries. I also got to use a 20% off Deal on the meal because none of those items are Deals themselves.
Together this cost $14.45 with tax.
After their food arrived, I had to wait a few minutes to place my next order since I wanted to use a deal. I think the default is 15 minutes. They had a Deal where you can get 30% off ANY Quarter pounder. The assumption is you're gonna grab one of the cheaper ones but I opted for the Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese Deluxe. This normally sets you back $6.99 but I got it for $5.33 after tax.
I suspect this will be quietly coded such that you cannot select certain quarter-pounder options the same way my free breakfast sandwich won't show me the Steak Biscuit option anymore.
Immediately after placing it, I ordered a medium french fries using points. The girl behind the counter knew what I was doing and gave me a smile since Gaming the System is the War Cry of the working class.
Between the three orders, I got to feed two kids and myself for $19.78. Go me.
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