This is a two part post, the second is tomorrow.
Many of us want to share a great coupon. Many times they are too good to be true. I recently was sent this PDF image of coupons. Not that PDF’s are fake, many are, but many legitimate companies do publish them. So how do you spot them? We want to empower you to help yourself and all of the other couponers by spotting and not using fake coupons. Why? A fake coupon may be scanned and used in a store and they would never know it… UNTIL they submit it for reimbursement. Then it is flagged and denied. The store will lose that value of the coupon multiplied by how many it took in. If fake coupons spread like wildfire like they do, then stores will be forced to stop taking coupons all together, to avoid losing money.
Look at this image. It is the way I received it, minus the big circles that say FAKE… Can you spot all the clues just by looking at the image? Leave a post here telling all the reasons why you think it is fake. Click on the image to enlarge.
Tomorrow we will post all of the answers!
Readers Update***I work for Walgreens, and the last two days I have seen several counterfeit coupons come through that I hope you can warn couponers about. They are for a free pack of Marlboro Cigarettes and $7.50 off Pampers. If you could let everyone know that these are not legit, hopefully it will save some companies some money. Thanks!
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for me it was a feeling that things just
wernt right with the coupon. things just felt wrong with the coupon.
my walmart supercenter in alabama refused my printed coupons,even though it wasn’t for anything free, the cashier told me there was a lady that came in that store prior with these fake coupons for free tide any size,(of course you know she got the largest one she could find with a total of six, free doritos large bag totaling six, free cokes products totaling six, I was told that the only reason she was denied the use of the coupon is because the idiot came through the same line twice, and the same cashier was there. Some people have no shame, people like this make it hard for the honest people.
you NEVER get 6 coupons at a time especially for a free item and you just don’t get coupons emailed to you. If a company is going to give a free coupon they are going to be SURE to put limits on it (strict limits.) Even PDF coupons usually have something on them or on the site that tells you one print per househould (even if their site is not enforcing it, it is lieing and stealing to print more than one.) I hate PDF’s because people usually print multiple copies and ignor ethics with them. I am very sceptical when it comes to a PDF and if it is not directly from the products web-site I say its not ligit.
There isn’t a deposit on Dorito’s to pay. A free coupons would never come on a sheet with more.
yes
#1 being there’s a whole sheet for the same thing
#2 there are not three barcodes
#3 there is not that weird box a the top that looks like it’s from the matrix
#4 no serial number that makes each coupon unique
#5 don’t most free q’s have a WYB contingency? (and yes, my albie’s in Nampa almost didn’t take my free cookies WYB milk q the other night
because they are no longer accepting
“free item” coupons as well)
#6 no watermark, although I’ve seen some without
#7 all the coupons I’ve seen where the retailer writes in the value, the box is in the top right corner instead of at the bottom.
#8 don’t retailers usually tend to go through printing companies like bricks or smartsource?
#9 It also says “one per purchase” I usually see “one per customer per purchase” hmmm?
FYI… The Emmett, ID Albertsons is now refusing to accept any internet printed coupon for a free item due to coupon fraud. I tried to use the Nabisco cookies Facebook coupon (free package of cookies when you buy gallon of milk and one package of cookies) last week and was rejected. Not sure if this is an issue at other Albertsons or not.
I received this coupon by email from a friend. I knew it wasn’t legit the second I opened it. What company would give out a pdf with an exp date so far in the future for free stuff? That is basically like printing your own money. If everyone printed out as many free coupons as they wanted over that period of time, Frito-Lay would be bankrupt. Crappy for the stores that actually took these coupons.
I am not replying about that particular coupon. I work for Walgreens, and the last two days I have seen several counterfeit coupons come through that I hope you can warn couponers about. They are for a free pack of Marlboro Cigarettes and $7.50 off Pampers. If you could let everyone know that these are not legit, hopefully it will save some companies some money. Thanks!
Before I read the other comments, I’ll add what I think so if any are the same that’s good, great minds think alike.
First, I’ve never seen a PDF that was 6 to a page, but I guess the could happen, but makes me skeptical.
Then I notice that there is no SIZE listed for the bag of chips.
I’m not sure, but I don’t think manufactuer PDF’s need watermarks, but don’t they contain two sets of bar codes (only store coupons have one I think.
Free coupons are usually mailed or actually printed coupons, not from the internet, aren’t they?
I’m not seeing any others. I can’t wait to see the answers.
Just because it has a far off date doesn’t really mean anything. I have gotten coupons from legitimate sites that have had dates just as far off. I have seen hard copy coupons with dates just as far off too.
Okay, showed my 11 yo daughter and she came up with all the things mentioned and a couple I didn’t see. Normally, internet coupons say what site they came from, coupons.com, smartsource.com, etc. She also caught that there wasn’t the third bar code sort of thing that looks kind of like spots.
Where is the watermark? That was the first thing I noticed. Then I loved that expiration date! Wow!
I thought it would be obvious to me but, it’s not.
Stores WILL quit taking them if people continue being dishonest. Our Super Walmart in Illinois just quit taking the printables the other day because apparently people were photocopying them and the store was not getting the money for them. It’s everyone’s loss:(
Please have honesty and integrity!
all of the above!!!!!
I noticed the expiraton date of 12-31-10. All of the fakes I have seen have that date.And the missing extra bar code is a dead giveaway.
They are never printed 6 to a sheet. No idividual serial numbers on the coupons
at a glance i thought they looked legit too. however, the long expiration (6 months) is bit suspicious (1st red flag). and the fact that they are internet coupons for a free product didn’t seem normal either (2nd red flag). but for me the dead give away was that there were 6 on each page and being a pdf, you could print them over and over (3rd really really big bright red flag!) i received these in an email too from my sis, asking if they were for real. i called her and told her not to use them and not to forward them to anyone else. you know, if it seems too good to be true…. i didn’t catch the bar code thing, had never really paid attention that there’s usually two of them on each coupon.
Generally speaking coupons will have a serial number on them. In addition to them not coming 6 to a sheet.
….one other thing springs to mind….
…this is a coupon for ANY flavor of Doritos. Freebie coupons that I have seen are typically for NEW products that have been launched, not something that has been around forever….
The print is a bit small but wrong would be… 6 coupons per page, far off future expiration date, the words selling price; although it did look like it had a max value of 5.99 which seems to high
There’s only one bar code on it.
The expiration date is 3 years out – I’ve never seen a coupon be good for that length of time.
the bag doesn’t have a company name on it (i.e.lay’s)…
There’s no watermark in the background, but other than that it looks legit. Tricky!
I know I probably sound nieve but I honestly cannot tell what makes this fake. Then again, I am quite new to couponing.
I look forward to seeing part two of this because now you have me VERY curious!
The most obvious thing is it looks like it will print a SHEET of 6 coupons….I have never seen that before….
Also, I have never seen a legit PDF from such a large company that would regularly deal with coupons (like FritoLay)
Most PDFs are fake and the few that aren’t are typically from companies who don’t usually use coupons for their products.
FREE coupons are never (IMO) PDFs…and are rarely, if ever printable. They typcially come straight from the manufacturer.
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