Don't know where you live, but in the state of California, if a gift card is under $10, the store is supposed to give you the cash back. However a couple of caveats, 1. most places don't know this and aren't very excited about pulling money FROM the till, 2. usually I have to find a manager to do this for me and pray they've heard of this law and know how to do it, 3. it doesn't work for amazon (the customer service person told me since they aren't in California, it doesn't apply.) and she wasn't interested in the fact that it's $5 in WA.
+1 for paying and prepaying utilities. I realize if you do cash back on your credit cards, you'll be missing out on the "free money" but it is nice to not have to pay a utility company every time. And just for clarification, when I say "cash back" I mean when you pay by credit card the credit card company awards you a cash back reward e.g. 1%, 2%. Not "cash back" as in "my bill is $40, so i'll put $60 on my credit card and get $20 back from the cashier."