My kids have been bugging me that they are out of toothpaste and mouthwash. Yes I know, how can I expect them to brush their teeth properly every night without the proper supplies?
Then, BAM! I received an online coupon today from CVS rewards offering 25% off your purchase. When I read the fine print on the coupon, I was able to confirm it was 25% off the entire purchase up to $400. So, I bought some discount CVS gift cards at 15% off, made my list for CVS, and headed out to the local store.
Of course, we had a long and expensive list and when we got to the store we found some other good deals that you find from time to time in the aisel: Buy one get 50% off Colgate Toothpaste, buy 3 Powerbars for $6 – you get the picture. As I was wandering the aisle, I noticed another customer walking up to a Red kiosk in the store and printing off additional coupons. So, I gave it a try by entering my CVS rewards number: Scored another coupon for $4 off $20 purchase of Powerbars – which I was going to buy anyway.
Finally, we made our way to the register. The assistant manager happened to be working the register which turned out to be a good thing. We had two full grocery carts of items. He scanned the items, then called over an assistant to bag them. After about 5 minutes, they were done with the order and I handed over the coupons which they then scanned in. We had maxed out the 25% entire order coupon at $99 savings. Then, we started to pay with our gift cards. We had 10 relatively low dollar gift cards that he started scanning. Finally, he reached the final gift card – I looked at the register and we had a $7.65 balance to be paid. Great! I thought: We will have a balance left on our final card. He swiped the card………and nothing happened. He tried it again…….and mumbled something about having to VOID the sale. I offered to pay the remaining balance with my credit card……..nothing. I forked over some cash……couldn’t even take that.
Apparently, we had maxed out the lines of code that the register could recognize: between all of our items, the coupons, the 25% overall coupon (which created an additional line item for each real item), and the gift card payments!
So, he had to VOID the sale and start over, then split the total sale into two orders. Even this turned out in our favor because when he VOIDed the sale, we still got our coupons from the original sale – which included an additional $2 in CVS Bucks – which we then applied to the re-do of the order. It took another 5 minutes or so but it was worth it….
TOTAL SAVINGS:
Original amount: $575.09
From Coupons and in-aisle specials: $155.84
From 15% discount CVS cards: $62.92
Total Savings $: $218.76
Total Savings %: 38%
Don’t believe me? I attached a picture of the receipts. You can do it too!