Saving money with the ‘King’: The Burger King deal you’ve probably never heard of!
Okay, here’s an article that you probably didn’t expect: saving money on fast food. After all, fast food is typically what you go for when you want to eat out but do not want to shell out wads of money. It is also the option you go for when you just have that irresistible craving for sinful junk! 
In either case, it doesn’t hurt to save some cash when you’re out to eat that trash, right? If you agree, then read on:
It all started in the summer of 2004, when I was a poor graduate student trying to make ends meet. It so happened that I walked into the King’s palace to enjoy a frugal, unhealthy meal. After deciding on the best artery-clogging combination of food, I placed my order and made my payment. The cashier then handed me the receipt and it was then that I stumbled upon the King’s secret. The reason I call this a secret is because till date, whomever I have spoken with doesn’t seem to have noticed this deal. And the funny thing is that all you have to do to see this deal is to turn the receipt over to the other side and behold! It looks like the image below. Click on it to see a larger, more legible version.
- Reverse side of BK receipt
If you’ve managed to read the details of the offer from the image above, you probably agree that the King has a pretty good deal to offer here. If you haven’t read it yet, the deal states that you can get one FREE Whopper or Original Chicken Sandwich with the purchase of any size drink and fries after completing a brief survey. To complete the survey you need to do 3 things:
- Call toll free 1-866-425-4745 anytime within 48 hrs of receiving the receipt
- Complete the survey over the phone and get the validation code at the end
- Write down the validation code in the space provided on the back of the receipt
That’s all it takes. A few things to keep in mind:
- The survey is conducted with an automated voice answering system
- Before the start of the survey, you will be asked to enter the store number. This number can be found on the front side of your receipt
- In my experience, the survey usually take 3-5 minutes to complete
- Since I have done this quite a few times, there are a couple of shortcuts that I know to get it done quicker, but I think I should save that for another post!
- If you go strictly by the terms stated on the receipt, you need to redeem the offer within one month of your previous purchase. But most BK restaurants I have redeemed this offer at don’t seem to care about the one-month part and accept it almost anytime
If you do the math, this deal almost cuts down the price of your meal to half of what you would have normally paid. And the food still packs in the same amount of sinful, crave-satiating, ‘heart-stopping’ taste that you expect it to. The King has been extending this offer since 2004 and is still going strong. That’s why I always keep the receipt from my previous BK purchase in my wallet, lest I get that urge to pay him a visit again.
The best part about this deal is that most BK restaurants do not realize that when you redeem this offer, they should not be providing you with a receipt at the end of your purchase. So most of them still do, and guess what: the cycle continues! So every time I redeem this offer at a BK restaurant, they give me another receipt at the end, which I keep for the next time. In the unexpected event that they do not give me a receipt, I look around for people that may have left their receipts on the counter without any intent of retaining them, and continue the cycle from thereon (and visit another BK restaurant from then onwards of course!)
So next time the King summons you, make sure you put his little secret to good use!
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Saving Money with Online Coupon/Promotion Codes
Whether it is shopping for electronics, vacation packages, books, sports equipment or music, shopping online has become an integral part of our daily lives. According to survey results reported by the National Retail Foundation in 2007, a little over 30% of that year’s holiday shopping would have been done online. As we progress into the future, that percentage is likely to go up. With so much shopping being done online, there is huge potential to save money and there are many smart ways to do so. One such way is by using coupon/promotion codes when making purchases from online stores.
These coupon codes are very similar to the paper coupons you would use at your local brick and mortar retail store. In the latter case, you would need to have physical possession of the right coupon, cut it out (if required) and present it to the cashier while checking out at the retail store counter to get the required discount(s). Besides this, there are usually very limited ways to procure the coupon. You can either wait to receive it via snail mail based on coupon subscription services, borrow it from a friend, or print it from your computer. These limited sources often constrain the usage of such coupons.
Online coupons codes however, usually require only one detail: like the name suggests, the ‘coupon code’. It is usually an alphanumeric sequence that you need to enter in the appropriate field just before completing your purchase from the online store. If the code is valid, the corresponding discount reflects immediately on your total shopping amount. Below is an example of an Orbitz page, where it asks you to enter a promotion code (if you have one), before finalizing the purchase of the vacation package.
Orbitz coupon code entry example
Now the big question is: where do you get these coupon codes from. The best part about the information superhighway is that people are always more than willing to share information, and this includes coupon codes as well. There are hundreds of websites out there where people can share coupon codes that have actually worked for them. One of my favorites is www.retailmenot.com. Here you can search for the name of the online store for which you want a coupon code. The search results display not only the variety of coupon codes, but also the associated discount offers (BOGO, % off, free shipping, etc.), expiry dates, and most importantly whether it has actually worked or not. People can vote for a coupon code if it has worked for them, and you can decide to use it based on the number of votes that it has.
One drawback of this website is that it allows anyone to post coupon codes without verifying the authenticity of the codes. This results in a quite a few bogus coupon codes posted by some troublesome elements. But as I mentioned earlier, you can always use the vote percentage to decide on whether to try using a coupon code. To try out the code, all you need to do is type in the same code (or copy and paste it) in the coupon/promotional code field of the website you are shopping at and see if it applies the appropriate discount to your checkout total.
Besides www.retailmenot.com, my second option usually is to google for the online store name followed by the term “coupon code”. So if I were buying the Orbitz package deal in the example above, I would google for “Orbitz coupon code”. You then have to do some sifting through the results to find any valid coupon codes out there. Some other credible websites that share coupon codes are (in no particular order):
Here is an example to demonstrate how useful this money-saving tip is. Just a few weeks back, I booked a Vegas flight + hotel package on Orbitz for four of my family members. On searching www.retailmenot.com for Orbitz coupon codes, I found a code that gives $100 off per hotel room for 5+ nights of stay. And since I was booking 2 hotel rooms, this coupon brought down my total package price by $200!! Two hundred bucks for just spending a couple of minutes searching for the right coupon code sounds like a great deal to me. There are coupon codes out there ranging from the smallest of Yahoo stores to the biggest online retail giants. So the next time you’re looking to buy something online, don’t forget to spend a few additional minutes looking for those valuable coupon codes.
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Saving money with Online Savings accounts (High-Yield Savings accounts)
A lot of you may already know about this, but you’ll be surprised by the number of people who do not. And that is why I think this topic deserves an entire post.
What are Online Savings accounts? They’re regular bank accounts, except for the fact that all the money handling is done online. The most important difference lies in the fact that you will never find a brick and mortar office for an online savings account banking service.
So what’s the big deal about these Online Savings accounts? 3 words: Higher Interest Rates !!! The difference between Online Savings and regular Savings account interest rates is usually at least 3%. To put things in perspective, let me give you an example. Imagine you had $10,000 kept aside to be saved for a rainy day. If you were to deposit those $10,000 in a regular Bank of America Savings Account for example (which typically has an interest rate of 0.2%), you would get back (0.002 * $10,000) = $20 in interest earnings at the end of the year. However, if you were to deposit the same $10,000 in an Online Savings Account (like ING Direct for example, which currently has an interest rate of 3%), you would get back (0.03 * $10,000) = $300 in interest earnings at the end of the year. That is a good $280 in extra income!
At this point, you’re probably thinking there’s a catch! The only catch here, if you can call it that, is convenience. Like all things in life, you always pay a premium for convenience, and the same applies here. The reason that these Online Savings Account can afford to offer such high interest rates is primarily because of the low overhead costs that they incur for their operations. As I mentioned earlier in this post, they do not have any brick and mortar branches, which significantly reduces their overhead. Additionally, all their customer service is handled over the phone or via the internet, which means that their customer service staff is not constrained by location. Their customer service resources can therefore be based out of common office locations and can still cater to the needs of customers across the nation via phone/internet, thereby saving on overhead costs. These benefits are thus passed along to the customer in the form of higher interest rates.
But the price that the customer has to pay for this is convenience. You can never actually walk into a physical branch location for this bank and deposit or withdraw your money. You always need to link it electronically with an existing checking account from a brick and mortar bank. This means that you must maintain a checking account (with a Bank of America, etc.) from which you can electronically transfer your money to and from your Online Savings account. Typically the transfer takes about 1-2 business days. So if you wanted to withdraw cash from your Online Savings Account, you would first have to transfer it to your Checking account, which may take about 2 business days, before finally withdrawing it from your checking account. This is only a minor drawback in my mind, since you can always maintain a small amount in your checking account to withdraw for emergencies.
To help you decide, the advantages and disadvantages of Online Savings accounts are summarized below:
Advantages:
- High interest rates (at least 3% higher than a regular savings account)
- Usually do not require a minimum account balance
- FDIC insured up to $100,000 (as are regular savings accounts)
- Online account management
- Easy ACH money transfer capabilities (with no fees whatsoever for ACH transfers)
- Ability to set up joint accounts
Disadvantages:
- Inconvenience: No physical branch locations to withdraw cash immediately. Need to wait about 2 business days to transfer money to a checking account
- Might not be a good option if you are not comfortable with banking over the internet (though most of these banks usually employ the highest level of online security features)
As you can see, the benefits far outweigh the drawbacks. So if you do not already have an Online Savings account, I would advise that you start thinking about opening one. There are a multitude of online banks offering such accounts. Some trusted ones are:
- ING Direct (Orange Savings account)
- HSBC Direct
- Emigrant Direct
- Capital One Direct banking
- WaMu Online Saving account (has different tiers of interest rates, based on your account balance, need to have a WaMu Checking account as well to avoid any fees)
- E*Trade Financial
- GE Interest Plus (has different tiers of interest rates, based on your account balance)…etc.
I will not bother with posting the interest rates for each of the above accounts as they are subject to change as per the FED’s interest rate policy. I currently have an INGDirect and EmigrantDirect account. The reason for having the INGDirect account is because of the good interest rate and the ease of use of the account. The reason for the EmigrantDirect account is that if you can maintain a monthly balance of $10,000 in this account, you are eligible to get the EmigrantDirect Platinum credit card, which has a cash back of 1.4% on all purchases (which I think is a good deal as most other cards usually only offer a cash back of only 1% on all purchases).
After reading this, if you do decide to open an Online Savings account, I recommend that you go with ING Direct. Besides having a good interest rate (not necessarily the highest though), it has good customer satisfaction ratings and a very user-friendly interface. Besides, it was the first bank to introduce the concept of Online Savings accounts.
PLEASE NOTE: If you are interested in opening an ING Direct account, email me at: sudeepbapat@gmail.com and I will send you a referral link via email. If you use this referral link to open an account with a minimum of $250, you will get an additional $25 deposited to your account as a referral bonus. Additionally, I will receive $10 for referring you, so it’s a mutually beneficial situation.
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