This and That: ‘Twas The Season'

    by Elizabeth Wright      January 2004 

Well, the gift-giving/receiving season is over now. And once again I wonder how many of you fell for the old “rebate” gimmick. Never will I understand why so many people think this is a good idea (other than the merchants who laugh all the way to you-know- where).  I zealously read the newspaper inserts advertising computer goods for sale. Comparing them to other types of merchandise in non-computer related stores, I find that nearly every item for sale in computer stores has a rebate attached to it, while other things we might be buying are just out there with a price attached and you can take the price or leave it, perhaps to find the same item for sale cheaper somewhere else.

Having done my best in previous articles to draw attention to how ridiculous it is to give a company more money for a product on the theory that you will be getting a certain percentage of the purchase price back at some future date, I find that not only is the practice still going on, but, in fact, it seems to me to have escalated. If the rebate originates with the manufacturer, why not just lower the price to the retailers? If it originates with the retailer, why not just put it on sale at the point of purchase? As it is, you have both types, sometimes even a combination where you are forced to send two separate rebate requests through the mail.

When do we say, “I will keep that money in my account, drawing interest for me,” rather than, “Oh, here, please take my money, put it in your account/accounts and your company’s annual report of earnings, and if I do everything just right, you might send some of it back to me at some future date”. Will we, as consumers, ever get this picture?

So far, the carrot-and-stick rebate practice does not seem to have spread to retailing in general, although car dealers have been doing it for years. But my natural pessimism makes me think it will spread rather than die out from public outrage.  P.T. Barnum was right, and if you don’t know what I am referring to, believe me, the retailers do understand.

Most new computer buyers are so quaintly naive that you almost want to see them surrounded by cute bunny rabbits and daisies. Many have asked for advice before making their first computer decision, but once in a store and in the hands of sales people, everything they might have been told quickly fades from their conscious minds. But even they usually realize rather soon that they may perhaps have been too hasty in their purchases. This usually transpires when the first problem arises with the system and they find little or no satisfaction from the dealer. But that is something that will always be with us.

This in no way explains to me why knowledgeable users continue to play the rebate game. Perhaps it is because so many of them have long since stopped shopping for any other type of merchandise. They simply don’t have contact with anything like the rest of the retail world. Many of them actually do still buy books and magazines, but would they go into a book store and expect to find rebates on all the items for sale? What about buying groceries? A rebate on canned soup? Bread? Milk?

Please, someone out there, tell me why buying with rebates is a good practice for the consumer. I understand it will continue as long as it is eminently profitable for the manufacturers and dealers, and that has to be the ultimate irony of the entire electronics revolution.

    Elizabeth Wright is a member of the OKCPCUG and a regular writer for the eMonitor