Consumerist reader Jason was cruising the aisle of his local grocery store when he spotted a deal sure to win over anyone sporting lady parts — free chocolate, just for purchasing feminine hygiene products. [More]
coupons
My Health Insurer’s Idea Of ‘Healthy’ Food Is Mayonnaise And Ice Cream
By 5.15.13
Should our health insurers try to nudge us toward the healthiest habits possible, like eating fresh, healthy food and exercising regularly? Or should they just give up, accept Americans’ crappy habits and hope that we do less healthy versions of unhealthy things, like eating giant plates of whole-wheat pasta? Reader Scott wonders whether that’s what his health insurance company, Anthem Blue Cross/Blue Shield, is up to with a package of coupons that they sent recently. [More]
Kmart Gives Me BP Coupon For 30 Cents Off Gas. Excluded Items: Fuel
By 5.13.13
When Scott checked out at Kmart, a pretty sweet coupon printed out. What was it for? Thirty cents off per gallon (limit 20 gallons) at his local BP gas station! That’s actually a pretty good deal, and a nice Kmart/BP cross-promotion. Then he noticed the exclusions. Good coupons almost always have a lot of exclusions, so it’s smart to check them before heading for the newest BP. Scott didn’t expect the coupon to just cancel itself out, though. [More]
JCPenney Coupon Code Results In Rush On “Free” Towels And Washcloths
By 5.10.13
In what is either a mistake that will probably result in angry customers and canceled orders or a deliberate effort to rid its warehouses of towels and washcloths, JCPenney issued a coupon code earlier today for $10 off purchases of $10 or more. [More]
LivingSocial Won’t Give Me Refund Or Credit After Incompetent House Cleaners Don’t Even Show Up
By 4.29.13
Greg bought some vouchers from LivingSocial for a cleaning company that appears to have gone out of business. It’s not 100% clear that they’re out of business, but it is clear that they were terrible. He can’t get through to the company on the phone, and has $150 worth of vouchers left. [More]
Pizza Hut Tapes Note To Box Begging For Perfect Survey Scores
By 4.23.13
Filling out customer service surveys is scary. If some managers are to be believed, giving any score but an 11 out of 10 is effectively stealing food out of the mouths of employees’ families. Getting impossibly perfect stores is so important for some stores that they’ve resorted to bribing customers with coupons or freebies. That’s the case with Jared’s local Pizza Hut, which taped a note begging for perfect scores to his pizza box. [More]
Chat Transcript Reveals That Guitar Center Coupon May Be More Flexible Than It Appears
By 3.29.13
Yesterday, we told you about the Guitar Center “Easter Savings Event” that somehow managed to exclude more than 300 brands from the sale, indicating that virtually nothing in the store would actually be included in the promotion. But further investigation by Consumerist readers found some cracks in the fine print. [More]
This Guitar Center Coupon Is Great, Unless You Actually Want To Buy Anything
By 3.28.13
Guitar Center is having an “Easter Savings Event” offering up to $150 off purchases of $750 or more. Which might sound like a good deal to anyone looking to buy a new instrument or some gear, except for the fact that the deal excludes just about everything in the store. [More]
Hotels.com Sends Coupon, Forgets To Mention It Means I Can’t Use Accrued Rewards
By 3.13.13
I like to filter all of the coupons and sale announcements I get from retailers into a folder, which I peek through when I’m about to buy something to see whether any of them apply to that thing I’m about to buy. That’s what Andrew did when he was about to book his last trip’s lodging through Hotels.com, when it was finally time for him to earn his free hotel stay through that site. When his anticipated reward never came, he learned something terrible. Simply using that coupon in his mailbox had disqualified him from earning any rewards on that hotel stay. Then his rewards expired. It won’t surprise you when you learn that he’s not going back to Hotels.com to earn any more. [More]
When Your Coupon Gets Rejected, Don’t Pull A Gun On Walmart Staff
By 3.6.13
We know that some people like coupons and take their use very seriously, but don’t take things to extremes. For example, there’s the Florida woman who was so enraged that her local Walmart wouldn’t take a coupon that she printed out online that she rammed a manager with a cart, then retrieved her handgun from her car and threatened employees with it. [More]
If You Want To Use This Target Mobile Coupon, Plan Ahead
By 3.4.13
Mobile coupons are a great idea: they save paper and mean that retailers might be able to text deals and future coupons to their customers once they nab the coupon and opt in. William was pretty annoyed at Target’s mobile coupon this week in practice, though. He waited to text Target for their $10 off $40 deal until he found something that cost more than $40 that he wanted. Why waste a text message and waste his time, right? [More]
Petco Really Wants Me To Visit My Brand New Local Store… 850 Miles Away
By 2.8.13
At first, Consumerist reader Steven was pleasantly surprised to get a 10% coupon from the folks at Petco to celebrate the opening of a new store. Then when he saw the address of that particular store he just had to laugh. [More]
The Sears Coupon That’s So Restrictive, It’s Convinced Me To Shop Elsewhere
By 2.6.13
Consumerist reader Cliff recently received this coupon for $5 off any purchase of $25 or more from Sears. Seemed generous enough of the retailer. That is, until he looked at the manifold restrictions put on the offer. [More]
Best Buy Posts 50% Off Coupon On Internet, Forgets How Internet Works
By 1.22.13 — Updated: 7.15.15
It’s happened over and over again, and retailers never learn their lesson. A big-box store e-mails a coupon to their customers, then freaks out and backpedals when customers actually show up at the cash register and try to use it, withdrawing the coupon and accusing customers of trying to scam the store. This time, the retailer was Best Buy, which offered a coupon for $50 off a purchase of $100 or more as long as the customer used a Mastercard. The coupon excluded most of the items you’d expect it to exclude: prepaid cell phones, iPods, certain brands of TVs and cameras. One very key thing that it didn’t exclude: gift cards. [More]
Target Sends Out Poorly Worded Coupon, Raises False Hopes
By 12.21.12
Dani got what seemed like a great coupon in the mail with her Target credit card statement. “50% off Nook HD or Nook HD+ Accessory” it promised. Half off one of Barnes & Noble’s pricey e-readers? Clearly this must be too good to be true! And it was. The coupon was good for half off a variety of accessories for the e-reader, not the device itself. [More]
Couponing, Interrupted: Front-Line Employees Speak Out About Kroger Spider-Man Promotion
By 11.15.12
Earlier this week, we shared Sarah’s story about her failed attempt to get a free bag of Pirate’s Booty from a coupon provided at Safeway. The top half of this sheet advertised the DVD of the new “Spider-Man” reboot; the bottom had two separate coupons. One coupon (for batteries) specified that the customer had to buy the DVD in large letters. The other (for Pirate’s Booty snack food) didn’t. Sarah says that she tore off this coupon and went to claim her four ounces of cheesy goodness. That’s when things went horribly wrong, The cashier refused to take the coupon, acted like Sarah was trying to run a scam, and–worst of all–mocked Sarah when the cashier thought that she had left the store. She hadn’t. She was standing right nearby. [More]
My Extreme Couponing Career Was Short-Lived And Embarrassing Thanks To Kroger
By 11.13.12
Hell hath no fury like a grocery store cashier who thinks you’re trying to rip off the store. Sarah was terribly embarrassed when she was accused of doing just that at Kroger. Right in the store, she saw a coupon, part of a display hawking the DVD of the latest reboot of the Spiderman movie franchise. The coupon for a free 4-ounce bag of the delicious snack Pirate’s Booty didn’t say that a purchase was required, like the other “free stuff if you buy this DVD” promotions. So she tore one off and tried to get the free snack. This was, of course, the Crime of the Century as far as Kroger was concerned. Now she doesn’t really want to use coupons anymore at all. [More]
Pizza Hut Manager Has Good Sense Of Humor, Honors 20-Year-Old Coupon
By 10.30.12
What starts as a silly prank to see what happens when a grown man in American flag pants walks into a Pizza Hut with a sealed VHS copy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles containing a $20 coupon booklet for the eatery quickly turns into a good deal for the pranksters. [More]
