PING!
I got a free gift cert from them through a happenings book I bought. Just so happens the place with my favorite stuffed pizza (a 14” pizza weighs in at 5lbs) is on the list! 25 dollar cert for 10 bucks. You have to spend 35 but thats not hard to do when the pizza is that good :)
The problems are minor but noticeable:
Most certificates provide for a 18% gratuity. If you are like me and generally tip 10% that is 8% lost in vaue.
Many carry holiday and other days of the week restrictions.
Most don’t cover alcoholic beverages.
Sometimes you end up spending more than you normally would because you need to spend the minimum before the certificate has any value. This can be $35 or more you need to spend (excluding the tip) to get $25 off. So you would need to spend $41.30 to get $25 off. Sometimes the minimum is larger with $50 being pretty regular.
Restaurants come and go on the web site, but the preponderance of the certificates appear to be for average to less than average restaurants.
I have used these certificates for years. If you don’t get them for free or almost free as a result of some promotion, they aren’t worth it when you get right down to all the little twists of being able to use them and use them economically, not just wastefully on your own budget.
My opinions anyway.
please add me to your pinglist, thanks
btt
When one of restaurant.com’s 80% off coupon codes comes out, we think ahead and buy a certificate to a nice place and just hold onto it for a special occasion. When you’re only spending $4 or $6 for a $50 or $75 certificate, it’s worth buying ahead of time.
Most of the restaurants on their list don’t interest me, but there are a few select ones that do and we’ve had some really nice meals at higher-end establishments and restaurant.com brought the price down to a really manageable level.
I’ve never had a certificate that placed limits on when the it could be used. I’ve never had one that wouldn’t allow it to be used on alcohol, although I have seen some that do. I’ve seen that restriction on certificates at the $25 level, but when you buy in the $50 or $75 range, that restriction usually isn’t there.
Also, when I buy from restaurant.com, I go through ebates.com, which gives me another 15% discount on the cost of the certificate. So a $50 certificate that normally goes for $20, but drops to $4 after an 80% off promo code, ends up at $3.40 after the ebates rebate. Hey, every little bit helps!
There was a new, trendy, rather expensive sushi place in town that had just opened a few weeks prior and I bought a gift certificate from R.com for this place because the food critic from the newspaper rated it highly and we were eager to try it out.
We got there, presented our gift certificate and the manager stated that they don't participate with R.com. He said the salesperson had come in when they first opened to try to get them to sign up with them and he told them no. Apparently this guy signed them up anyway w/o the owners permission.
He ended up giving us a measly 15% discount just because he felt sorry for us but I was mad, not at him, it wasn't his fault. I called R.com and gave them a piece of my mind and they refunded my $ but I've never gone back. Just do your homework first.
BTW, the restaurant was outstanding, they have a killer bento box. We've been back several times and they are always busy but it needs to be a special occasion to visit this place cause it's pricey.
In my area, no restaurant worth eating at is on the list. In my town, 3 of the 5 listed restaurants are out of business, yet restaurants.com continues to sell their coupons.
The only one in Manchester I might consider is out of coupons and has been for as long as I’ve been checking.
It appears that restaurants.com is the place for desperate restaurateurs who have no customers and are about to go out of business or new ones who are looking to build a customer base.
I would advise before buying a coupon from restaurant.com look up the restaurant in question on the web first. Sometimes the places are so cheap to start with it’s difficult for 2 and nearly impossible for 1 to get the sized bill necessary. So know your math first, if you’re in Tucson and it’s a minimum $35 check at Marisco’s Chihuahua it’s good to know that you can feed 2 to the point of obesity for $20 at Marisco’s so either plan on bringing friends or skip the coupon.
How do I find out which restaurants here in Honolulu this applies to? Thank you.
I won a couple of $10 GC to restaurant.com and have to remember to check it out to see if I can use them.
Found a coupon today for Free Pepsi Max 2 Liter with a Doritos purchase if anyone’s interested. I don’t like either LOL
http://coupons2.smartsource.com/smartsource/index.jsp?Link=YRMK5ZAV4DIXE
They did for me. I had two for a local Bar-B-Q joint that burned down. They gave me a code so I could exchange them.
There are places like http://www.mypoints.com where you can earn gift cards/certificates for free. I usually go for the bookstore gift cards, but restaurant.com is an option, too.
Actually found an Arnicare Gel and one last Diabetes mag this morning.
Not crazy about this weeks Wags, but next week looks interesting.