Yes, fake and counterfeit coupons even make it to our neck of the woods! When you are out there looking at different blogs and forums and other savings sites, make sure you are careful about which coupons to print and use and which ones might not be legitimate coupons.
The idea of "try it and see" does actually hurt us in the coupon community. If a coupon is scanned or copied, many times it will still work at the register at the store, but the store will not get credit for these fake coupons. If it happens too often, the store may change their policy and stop accepting internet printable coupons. We DON'T want this, so please make sure the coupons you are printing are good ones.
How to do this?
When a coupon is in a .pdf format, you have to be VERY careful. Though some (very few anymore) businesses offer coupons in .pdf format, most do not and I don't know of any large food companies that do this. The reason being that they can not control the number of prints done on each coupon, thus they can't control the budget for the marketing campaign. Most coupons in the .pdf format are scanned in copies of coupons that someone has scanned on their computer and made available for others to download and copy or print as many times as they like. Most companies, go through an outsource such as bricks or smartsource or coupons.com so they can control the number of prints on a coupon to 2 per computer. Also, they an overall limit on the number of coupons that can be printed per campaign.
So, a few red flags to watch out for would be:
Another site to check is a not-for-profit association that is dedicated to keeping coupon fraud under control: www.cents-off.com
This site keeps a list of counterfeit coupons and will show a picture so it is easy for you to identify.
Happy couponing! Most coupons out there to print at home (ip's- internet printables) are good, true coupons that can really save you money. Sites like www.coupons.com, www.smartsource.com, www.bettycrocker.com have a great variety of coupons to print and combined with sales, really save you a lot of money!!
If you have a question about a coupon or site, reply to this post or put it under the questions and answers section and we will check it out for you!
The idea of "try it and see" does actually hurt us in the coupon community. If a coupon is scanned or copied, many times it will still work at the register at the store, but the store will not get credit for these fake coupons. If it happens too often, the store may change their policy and stop accepting internet printable coupons. We DON'T want this, so please make sure the coupons you are printing are good ones.
How to do this?
When a coupon is in a .pdf format, you have to be VERY careful. Though some (very few anymore) businesses offer coupons in .pdf format, most do not and I don't know of any large food companies that do this. The reason being that they can not control the number of prints done on each coupon, thus they can't control the budget for the marketing campaign. Most coupons in the .pdf format are scanned in copies of coupons that someone has scanned on their computer and made available for others to download and copy or print as many times as they like. Most companies, go through an outsource such as bricks or smartsource or coupons.com so they can control the number of prints on a coupon to 2 per computer. Also, they an overall limit on the number of coupons that can be printed per campaign.
So, a few red flags to watch out for would be:
- the .pdf format (only consider using this coupon if it comes directly from the companies site--meaning you can access the coupon from the company website)
- coupons offering something simply for free the can print from your computer (most **free** value coupons are on special paper or have holograms or special ink to make it very difficult to produce counterfeit copies of them)
- an internet printable coupon with no expiration date
Another site to check is a not-for-profit association that is dedicated to keeping coupon fraud under control: www.cents-off.com
This site keeps a list of counterfeit coupons and will show a picture so it is easy for you to identify.
Happy couponing! Most coupons out there to print at home (ip's- internet printables) are good, true coupons that can really save you money. Sites like www.coupons.com, www.smartsource.com, www.bettycrocker.com have a great variety of coupons to print and combined with sales, really save you a lot of money!!
If you have a question about a coupon or site, reply to this post or put it under the questions and answers section and we will check it out for you!