Avid shoppers that are savvy at couponing in order to get the best deals won’t be overlooking rebates entirely. Rebates may be the old fashioned, “snail mail” way of getting a partial but generous refund for a product, but as for going out of style, there yet is no end in sight. That’s why you’ll value having your own home rebate center to instantly turn to so for the purpose of better managing new coupons, and checking on those already filed.
Make rebate forms accessible
There’s no reason to collect only mailed rebates when you can collect rebate forms as well. Some places of business are known to keep large pegboards full of rebate offers to scan and scour. Check around, especially at office supply stores and big discount warehouses such as Costco or Sam’s Club. Peel any of these off and take them home with you whether an item fits your budget or not.
Sometimes you can find the right sale that will make an item affordable when otherwise it would be a blow to your budget due to exorbitant cost. Keep in mind, sometimes sales like Black Friday or Cyber Monday can creep up on unsuspecting ‘budgeters’ for better or for worse.
Rebates are also be gathered up online. These are either stored in a virtual queue for printing at will, or are printed out immediately and collected. Printer paper and ink may be expensive, but if you choose the right coupons, you’ll be recouping its relatively minor cost with each coupon or rebate used.
Rebate houses are not always the most sympathetic of places for consumers. According to Outsourcing Rebate Processing, an enterprise that does rebate processing work for clients such as Chevron, Dow, FedEx, R.R. Donnelley, Xerox and The University of Chicago, more than half of rebates never get redeemed due to errors such as failure to provide the rebate form or filling in the info incorrectly. Other rebate processing companies do not always do a thorough job.
For reasons such as these, you don’t want to leave the risk of getting ripped off to piles of forlorn, un-filed papers. Rebate planning can be incorporated into your coupon savings routine. You can be easily prepared to follow up in any case that your savings are not delivered as promised by a ”reasonable 30 days” often represented by legal authority for business to have acted.
What to use
A simple way to go is to use a three-ring binder and special sheet protectors for photo, coupon, or currency dimensions – depending upon your ambitions. These make for an easy prospect of inserting the basic photocopy of the rebate form, UPC, proof of purchase, and receipt that so commonly meet the official terms for receiving your rebate. Individual sheets can be removed and emptied in a hurry; that means everything can be easy and fast to get to. This in turn may be worthy of its own bookshelf space where the three-ring binder fits for instant access. The pseudo-laminates can also be interspersed for varying purposes, using dividers.
Another simple setup is to take a stack of photocopies stapled as need be, and place them in a lock box. If rebates are not many, consider stapling them to your calendar. Be sure to keep the old year’s calendar on file, whether in a stand-up filing cabinet or a modest, portable plastic unit. Another simple method of organization is to keep all of your rebates in a shallow tray placed in a desk drawer, generally cutting out individual documents from the photocopy and stapling these together.
It is also worth pointing out, an all-in-one multifunction printer can be most useful for laying required documents on the scanner and then producing an instant copy.
The handiness of having your own home rebate center can be summed up in terms of accessibility and organizational precision. You’ll have a place to store rebates both in the virtual sense and for the record. This will ensure that taking the time to collect rebates and implement the savings will be as easy as possible. Finally, you’ll not only be in the best situation possible to use them on any given day, but you’ll also be poised to take advantage of rebate offers as you please both at online and in brick and mortar stores.