Works-For-Me: Utilizing Company Guarantees

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Having grown up with money being tight and now having been married for nearly nine years with my husband in school the entire time while I have been blessed to stay home with two little ones, I have learned some creative ways to make our money stretch. One thing that works well for us is we make companies stand by their product. If I am going to spend our hard earned dough (or the money the government so kindly loans us poor students) on something, then I want it to be worth it.

Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t abuse the system and I also don’t expect things never to break especially when I have a two year old little man in the house. I operate with good consumer logic and I maintain reasonable expectations. Ethics and integrity are definite qualities I like to possess. However, if I buy a gargantuan box of diapers and one of them has no stretchy tape on it or it breaks off as I am trying to put it on my child, then I will take a few moments to phone the company … most phone numbers are printed on the box or you can easily find them on the Internet. I politely tell them my issue and more often than not, they are willing to over compensate me. They like getting customer feedback. For one lousy diaper in a box of 136, the company will normally send me a coupon for an entire new package of diapers! That is so worth my time, and it didn’t cost me a dime.

I have put several company guarantees to the test and except for maybe a few times, I have never been disappointed. If I purchase a new box of twist crayons and one of them doesn’t twist up, I don’t run back to Target. Instead I call Crayola and within a few days I have a coupon in my hand so I can go out and purchase a whole new box. If my package of cheese goes moldy before the expiration date, I call Tillamook and they gladly send me a coupon so I can get a new block of cheese. I have even had companies simply mail me a replacement product as opposed to a coupon.

Southwest Airlines has even refunded me a decent amount of money because I took the time to point out an unfair rule they had about using their free vouchers. In order to redeem them you have to go to an airport and purchase a ticket from the counter. Therefore you can’t take advantage of Internet prices. I let them know I didn’t think this was fair and consequently they refunded me the money I would have saved if I could have purchased my ticket online. And if you shop at Costco, they have the best no-hassle return policy of any company I know. I have taken used products back to them and within a few moments I have my money back.

I could go on and on with examples, but I think you get the point. Hopefully now you don’t think I am some kind of obsessive, pathetic and cheap freak . Like I said earlier, I do all of this with honesty at the forefront, otherwise it wouldn’t be worth it to me. Go ahead and try it out, though, and let me know how it goes.

For more clever Works-For-Me-Wednesday ideas, please visit Shannon of Rocks In My Dryer.

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