If you’ve ever applied for a manufacturer’s rebate you know it’s not all fun and games. Filling out an Ivy League application feels less challenging than some of the requirements you must satisfy to claim the rightful cash that attracted you to the product in the first place.
Your sales receipt is usually required. Together with your blood type, last four digits of your social security number, mom’s maiden name as well as those of your favorite pet, first car and any old girlfriends with whom you’re still in touch. If I’m exaggerating it’s only slightly.
But in the unlikely chance that you succeed in meeting all the manufacturer’s requirements and your shiny new rebate debit card arrives in the mail it’s still too early to declare victory. Unlike a bank credit or debit card that sometimes remains valid so long that you’re tempted to wonder whether it will outlive you, cash rebate cards often kick the bucket within months.
But that’s not my issue with them. I’m a great believer in buyer beware. Whether it’s the freshness date on a carton of milk or an unexplained jump in the cost of your Netflix subscription it’s your responsibility to be an educated consumer. Trust but verify, Ronald Reagan’s admonition regarding nuclear arms negotiations with the Soviets, seems to apply.
I’d go so far as to say that I’m in a permanent state of war with corporate America. It’s not that I don’t appreciate their contributions to society, the services they provide, or the cool products they make. It’s just that, no matter how much their call center customer service representatives claim, typically reading from a script, that they feel your pain, they don’t really. You’re on your own.
As a matter of simple housekeeping and self-preservation I now contact each of my service providers once a year or so — phone, cable, electricity, health care — typically after an unexplained spike in my bill to hang out in the hope that together we can find some way to reduce it. Often they can.
But that’s also not quite what I’m here to discuss. What I’ve noticed with rebate cards is that it’s unlikely that you’re going to spend every last cent available to you. Let’s say it’s a hundred dollar card and you spend ninety-seven bucks. Are you really going to have the presence of mind to find something that costs three dollars and just three dollars before the card expires? Because if you don’t that money often goes back into the manufacturer’s pocket. And in my belief system that’s malfeasance on the part of the consumer.
That’s also what motivated me to make a trip to OK Pantry, an artfully curated home goods story and coffee shop in Kinderhook, NY last week. I was armed with my $75 Cooper Tires award card. I’d already spent most of the money on the card over the course of several transactions but, twenty-four hours before the card expired, I was aware that there was approximately $1.50 cents burning a hole in my pocket, or my plastic. And I was loath to let that lucre go. It wasn’t the money so much. It was the notion that that’s what card issuers hope and expect you to do. A buck fifty isn’t a lot of money but it adds up over thousands of cards.
It won’t come as a surprise that a hundred-fifty cents doesn’t go as far as it once did. Definitely not at OK Pantry that sells items such as designer olive oils, potato sticks in a can, and $300 alpaca throws. I know. I bought my wife one for her birthday. But they also sell penny candy.
The problem was that I didn’t know exactly how much money remained on the card. Could have been $1.50. Could also have been $1.36 or $1.73. The challenge was to go right up to my card’s limit without going over it. And I knew the kind folks at OK Pantry would indulge me because they’re good people and not just because I recently made a major purchase. Also, I couldn’t think of anything besides penny candy that could be calibrated precisely to my card’s remaining balance.
The store, located in the Kinderhook town square, has an impressive candy selection but most of it, items such as British-made Cadbury Flake, were beyond my rebate card budget. I was pretty much limited to atomic fireballs, though their version is called Tongue Torchers; Lemonheads; and, ooh-là-là!, licorice hard candies made in France.
I gathered a critical mass of the jawbreakers that I estimated would approach but not exceed my spending limit and carried the bundle to the cash register. Robert and Dorothy, the extremely cooperative staffers, ran the card and announced it wasn’t rejected.
That meant that I still had money to spare. How much I didn’t know since I was flying blind but I went back to the penny candy section and grabbed some more. Fortunately, there wasn’t a line forming behind me in mid-afternoon on a school day. So I added the additional items, we went through the process again and, at $1.73, I still remained under the limit. We couldn’t keep doing this all day so I claimed victory, took my candy and went home.
It only occurred to me later that I could call the number on the card and get my balance. I had nineteen cents remaining on it. No worries. I’m not going back to the store. I can live with myself returning less than twenty-five cents to Visa, Cooper Tires, Jamie Dimon, or whomever. But I like to think I worked the system, no matter how modestly. Plus, those licorice candies turned out to be surprisingly strong and delicious.
Ralph Gardner Junior is a journalist who divides his time between New York City and Columbia County. More of his work can be found in the Berkshire Eagle and on Substack.
The views expressed by commentators are solely those of the authors. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this station or its management.
