Forced to Play the Rebate Game

Still waiting for a rebate on this Cornea Monitor.

Send them a snail mail letter. I did. I had a complicated case with a twice rejected rebate (the merchant's screw up.) They replied to my letter with a nice e-mail and the rebate check came 6 long weeks later.

I hate the rebate game, but I've gotten some great deals on computer equipment with them. I got a 175GB 7200RPM Western Digital drive for $99.99 a few months ago. I also got a 52/24/52 CD writer for $19.99.

Here are some other points about the "cost" of rebates:

Revolting Cat!: "ReBAIT" <-- Exactly right!

(1) They get your name and address and possibly other information and there are no guarantees regarding the privacy of that information.

(2) In some cases when you make your purchase using a check or credit card, you may be giving away other information. The company may have an agreement with the store where you made the purchase to share information. If you had to write your credit card number or driver's license number on your check, it may be matched to the other information you provide. If your receipt contains your credit card number, you are giving that away to yet another company.

(3) In some cases they may even be able to TRACK you from the information you give them. For example, I recently bought a Sony Dual DVD burner. I "complied" with their requirement to send the UPC from the package plus the receipt and rebate form, and they promptly sent me back a postcard denying the rebate "because I had not sent the serial number of the product as required." Of course there was no such requirement on the rebate form. I called them (from a large phone bank at work so they did not get my home number) and through a chain of conversations I finally cajoled them into sending the rebate (thought the check has yet to arrive and I will believe it when I see it). However, if they HAD required a serial number, many people would have provided it, and I am quite sure that a "media giant" like SONY (which is so comfy-cozy with "The Honorable" Senator Hatch and RIAA and other fascists) has made sure that their DVD burner leaves a little unique "footprint" in a hidden location on every DVD it records which identifies the serial number of the DVD Burner that recorded it. And SONY would love to keep a database of who has which serial number. This is not unlikely as it is even done with software products and compilers. Give away a copy of a DVD and it could be traced right back to your front door.

In summary, not only do rebates promote a false impression of the real cost of a product, and not only do they provide a means whereby consumers may be legally "cheated" out of anticipated savings by obfuscation: in fact they also provide a means for a further invasion of privacy and further exertion of control by the big over the little.

I believe in free markets, and of course none of us has to engage in the use of rebates; therefore there should be no legal action taken against them particularly by the Federal Government which has no legitimate authority to regulate rebates, even under the Interstate Commerce Clause which was intended only to permit the Feds to settle differences between States and not to micromanage anything that can by "6 degrees of separation" be fantasized as interstate commerce.

That said, I certainly favor a consumer movement against rebates to simply make them an unsellable product, and the best way to do that would be for some organization like Walmart to decide to actively market products in which the "rebate savings" is given immediately to the customer. I would gladly purchase products with marginally smaller savings in exchange for NOT having to submit a rebate. And I suppose I ought to just blow them off anyway, but dang, some are pretty big and it's hard to refuse money back for the cost of a few minutes and a stamp and a little more giving in to the big guys.

For the archives: I got the check from SONY for $30 today without having to provide a serial number!

W

btttttttttt

I'm a sucker for rebates and like the challange. I have been burned a few times but have been treated honestly by the following.

cendyne (more than once)
western digital (more than once)
ibm
maxtor
office max
samsung
best buy (more than once)
microsoft (optical mouse)
pny (more than once)
kbyte memory
toshiba

My favorite online computer store is NewEgg. BestBuy is my favorite bricks and mortar for computer stuff with OfficeDepot OfficeMax Wal-Mart sharing second place.

Since 1988 when Champion sparkplugs

Just cash in the coupon.

Maybe it'd be easier if he drove to the store instead of "schlepping"

Doesn't matter when you have to deal with a putz. ;-)