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Best Buy to Eliminate Rebates
plover writes "According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune 'In response to customer complaints, Best Buy, the world's largest electronics retailer, promised today to eliminate mail-in rebates within two years.' Can it be that we're finally nearing the end of one of the most hated marketing ploys of all?" Further commentary available at BusinessWeek.
I think not. They have to have thought up something better.
Only my extreme tenaciousness allowed me to get my rebate for a router. I had a photocopy of the reciept they lost TWICE, claiming I never sent it in. On the third time they tried to pull the old "no facsimilies" routine, but I kept at them and they relented and gave up the 30 bucks.
A richer man would have just given up. That is part of thier plan.
SerialEx13 is right on the money. I put in for a $50 rebate on a HDD. Bought the thing September '04. The rebate form, reciept copy, and bottom panel of the box went into the mail the same day. It's now April '05 and three calls and 1 fax to Best Buy have given me nothing but one long distance fax charge and no rebate yet.
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups. -- 0 1 My two bits
recently I started shopping at Fry's in Renton WA. I live north of seattle so it is a bit of a drive. Often one of my buddies will go with me which usually results in a bunch of stupid purchases we weren't planning on, but makes for a fun (although expensive) afternoon.
We wander around the huge store eventually losing track of each other. We are now only slightly embarrassed by having to call each others cell phones to find each other (although this took some getting used to). They have some really good deals especially considering the rebates. I started wondering if something was up a few months ago however when I bought an item, and a few days later when I went to mail the rebate in I noticed some fine print that said I should have mailed it sooner and it was no longer good.
now I have grown to hate fry's. yes I still shop there, but I am so frustrated when I have to wait 5 minutes while the cashier has to collect the stack of rebate forms for all the items I bought. Often these rebates are not even marked on a sign in the store so I am usually unaware they are even available.
I did all my christmas shopping there and was horrified at the stack of paperwork it generated. A seperate set of photo copies, forms to fill out, file folders to label and store in a "safe place" and stamped/addressed envelopes to buy, lick and stick. Some of the rebates were impossible to collect as I realized that I had given the UPC codes on some items away with the gift. The giftee's had usually thrown them away (of course) by the time I figured out which reciept went with which gift.
After cooling off for a couple months I found myself at fry's making a purchase again. Again there was a nice rebate available. This time I was absolutely determined to get my money. As I read the fine print I found another disturbing detail. On this particular rebate (and probably most) sending the required stuff to get the rebate meant that you could no longer make a warranty claim. The warranty of the item required the original UPC, and so did the rebate. So you were given the choice of $x back -OR- the warranty for the product.
what a world. my fingers are tired of typing. if you skipped the rest of my message I will sum it up for you: rebates suck, frys sucks, best buy sucks, and so do you, and everything else around us.
goodnight
Obama is a twitter sock puppet
I work for Staples. The Staples online EasyRebate system has all but eliminated mail-in rebates. Rebates can be submitted at https://www.stapleseasyrebates.com/
Customers seem to love this option.
~DF
Rebates do make it seem like you are getting a deal, but you can go to one of Best Buy's competitors and buy the same item for Best Buy's price minus the rebate.
Even better, order the item online - you might wait a few days for the item but it will be cheaper, even with shipping. No matter it's a scam because the reason they, or the manufacturer, offer a rebate is because there was a price break.
There once was a time, you might just remember, when rebates were offered after you bought your item. Like the original "Zip" drive. I paid $200 for it when it came out, the same week it came out. Then after a few months they started offering rebates but they made it retroactive. That is what a rebate should be like.
Using rebates to sucker in customers isn't always going to work. It's not that they are bad always, my current computer was a huge deal because of the rebate. Then again, it dropped in price the same amount two weeks later.
Waiting two weeks would have kept the money in my pocket and I wouldn't have had to loan the computer company $250 for 2 months.
Get your Unix fortune now!
what took me over the limit was when i bought a hardrive. They assured me the rebate would only take a couple of weeks so i put the extra money out with hopes that the $30 would be back in time to pay my car insuance.
It sure was refunded in time. only problem is that they sent it in the form of a $30 gift card and was only good at best buy. I took a copy of the add along with a copy of the reciet and warenty info that they gave me when i bought the hardrive. They said nothign could be done, either sppend the credit on the giftcard or let it expire. I guess if i had enough money, i should have taken them to small claims court or somethign.
The article is probably a joke, but nevermind.
My brother bought a stack of recordable CDs from a retailer in Vancouver close to five years ago. Of course, the advertised price at the time was a phenomenal deal and against my protestations and the angst inducing mail in rebate requirement for the "sale" price he bit and purchased the CDs, filled out the form and mailed in all the required bullshit.
Needless to say months later still no check. Down to the store he goes only to find out from the retailer that this is common problem and that most companies contract out their rebates to "fulfilment centres" where "fulfilment" is anything but.
We get into the "I told you so" conversation and I jokingly mention that he should sue. Note that by this point he'd called, mailed a letter or two and been generally frustrated. He looked into the matter and decided that he would file a small claims suit. According to him, they are incredibly easy to file in BC with only a few sticking points such as the legal name of the entity you wish to make a claim against and the type of business presence the company maintains in BC.
A few days after (and $100 later for filing costs) he sent a copy of the statement of claim to the company offices in Vancouver he received a nice phone call from the company offering to send him a check for the rebate and the cost of his filing fee (which was claimed in his statement of claim). He never got to stand before a judge, but he did get his satisfaction.
Now, why would someone go through all this for the $10 rebate on a stack of $25 CD-Rs? Well, he's the guy that decided half way through university that instead of engineering he wanted to become a dentist, so he did. He's one of those anal retentive types that keeps, files and remembers everything. Which is a good thing if you're a dentist, I suppose.
I actually work for company who processes rebates (#2 in this business). We all work incredibly hard to get people their rebates and process (many) millions of them every year.
If you have to mail your forms and the forms are received and they are valid, you will get your rebate, there is nobody intentionally holding on to your money. If there is a problem, you will be notified and you can always contact our customer support to get it resolved. I can guarantee you that we have VERY dedicated people trying to resolve such issues, and I know it since I work side by side with them every day.
If you are tired of sending mail, you can just go to shop to (for examples) Staples. You don't have to send anything by mail anymore if you shop there. Just come to their easy rebates website, submit your name and address and you will get the check and soon even direct deposit as Staples announced this week.
The reason why the rebate process takes so long is actually not technical, one of the mai reasons is policy of manufacturer and retailers. Often the retailers need to protect themself from people who try to commit fraud, buy products, apply for rebates and return them. Mostly due to this reason you have to wait to get it.
I dont buy consumer electronics at retail all that often - but anytime I've considered doing so I've prety much figured the same way - However much cash I have to bring to the store is the price of the item.
In fact, I've always thought it would be entertaining, if a store advertised (eg) "39.95 (in huge print) - after $30 and $50 rebates (in tiny print)" to go to the store, bringing exactly 39.95 (plus enough for tax, etc) and take the item to the register, and hand them that amount at the check out, and when they wanted more, pointed out (very vocally and very angrily) that the price displayed was 39.95, not the higher amount, and then after they (presumably) refused to let me out the door paying only the "advertised" price, walked out the door leaving the item there, and making lots of noise about it as I did so - the whold point being to A. force them to deal with an unhappy (lost) customer, B. have to carry the item back and put it on the shelf again, and C. call as much attention to I could (both to the store, as well as any other customers at the registers, etc) that they had lost a sale over the stupidity.