4.) Coupon Lingo – What are you talking about?

Couponers have a language all their own, and unless you are equipped to handle the translations, you will be quickly confused, you head spinning out of control and your ability to determine if you’re saving money or losing it quickly coming into question.  What I’ve tried to do here is provide you an abbreviated list of terms and phrases that you will most likely hear and use when you’re couponing.  This is by no means an all enclusive list and I would encourage you to email me with additional terms that I have missed.  What I’ve tried to provide is the ones that you’ll hear and you’ll need to know from day 1:

• ECB – Extra Care Buck (CVS store credit voucher that wi ll print when specific items are purchased).  These can be used on  future CVS purchases and can be used in multiple for a single item, so that if you have 5 $1 ECB’s, you can turn them all in when you buy a single $5 item.
• RR – Register Rewards (Walgreens store credit voucher that will print when specific items are purchased).  These are actually manufacturer coupons and can be used in several stores as such, meaning that they follow the same rules and regulations as any other manufacturer coupon, that being that you can’t use more than one for a single item, or to illustrate, from our example above, if you have 5 $1 RR’s, you could only use 1 RR if you are just purchasing a single $5 item.  Too, you can NOT use a RR to pay that you received for a specific item to pay for another like item and receive another RR.
• P&G -Proctor and Gamble
• SS – Smart Source coupon insert
• RP – Red Plum coupon insert
• Peelies – Sticker like coupons found on products.
• MQ – Manufacturers Coupon
• SQ – Store Coupon
• OOP – Out of Pocket Expense  (It is quite common to see someone say, “Retail was 79.85 but I paid 1.23 OOP”).
• Q or CPN – Coupon
• TMF – Try Me Free offer
• WYB – When you Buy
• CAT – Catalina coupon (Any manufacturer coupon that prints from the register based on the items that you have bought.)
• B1G1F, B2G1F – ”Buy one get one Free”, “Buy two get one Free”  (Also seen as BOGO – as in Buy One Get One)
• TEAR PAD – A pad of refund forms or coupons hanging on a shelf at the store.
• BLINKIE – A machine at stores in the aisle that “spits out” coupons, one at a time (named usually because of the little red blinking light).
• UPC – Universal product code (the black lines on the product that identify the product purchased).
• POP – Proof of purchase (like a product label or UPC)
• Stacking – The ability to use a store-level coupon coupled with a manufacturer-level coupon for a given item.  When you start stacking coupons for savings you start seeing prices REALLY drop, and it’s also when you start seeing items for free as well as overages.
• Overages – When the value of your coupons is worth more that the price of the item on the shelf.  Each store handles overages differently so you will want to check with each specifically, as well as review the coupon policy, which I have pulled from some directly.  Some stores will allow you take the cash, some will require that you purchase additional items so as to ensure the number on the register is positive, and still others have a policy of wiping out an overage if one exists (in  this instance I recommend buying something or else you’re just throwing away money that is essentially…yours!

So you’re equipped with the coupons and the terminology and you’re just about ready to hit the stores.  But first you need to learn to change your shopping mindset because you’re couponing now…it’s a whole new ballgame out there.

Next:  Coupon Lifestyle – Rethinking how you shop