Example of a fake coupon.
A long time reader who shares coupons with me almost everyday emailed me a deal that was highly suspicious, which gave me the idea for this blog post. Here are 7 telltale signs of a fake deal. The fake coupon she sent me is shown above.
1. The deal is too good to be true. In this case, the coupon was for a totally free 12-pack of Coca Cola without any purchase. Yeah, right. Red flag.
2. The expiration date was six months out for a totally free deal. Major red flag. In general the better the deal, the less time it is available.
3. The coupon is a pdf, which are especially easy to manipulate and tamper with. Not all pdf coupons are fakes, but this is a yellow flag.
4. The coupon has someone else’s name or email address on it. Identifiers like these mean the merchant wants to limit coupon sharing and may ask for identification. Then again, they may not. No flag, but embarrassment potential.
5. The coupon has no expiration date. I’ve seen plenty of legit coupons with no expiration date, which is a major oversight (read: idiot move) by merchants. You can argue until your face is blue that the coupon is valid, but a merchant may not honor it anyway. Yellow flag.
6. The coupon has a fake logo or the wrong font. Merchants and brand owners are extremely careful to use consistent fonts, colors, and logos. If something looks off, it may have been doctored with software like Photoshop. Red flag.
7. The coupon was scanned from paper. It can be difficult to tell is an online coupon is a scanned image. Look for hazy tone, unexplained lines, marks, or blotches. Paper coupons are not meant to be scanned and emailed across the globe. Many merchants do not accept online coupons because of this practice. Yellow flag.
8. The coupon did not have a UPC code, which means it can’t be traced. Red flag.
9. The coupon is from the Internet, which makes it slightly suspicious because online coupons are easier to fabricate. Many stores no longer accept any kind of Internet coupon because of scammers. Yellow flag.
Thanks, Tina!
Welcome to Bargain Babe! I’m Mara, and I’m so glad you’re here. I am an obsessive bargain hunter and penny pincher, and I am determined to live a full life without EVER paying full price. 
What’s the point?
The picture was pretty small, but it looks as though it may have been one of the free 12-pack coupons you can get through My Coke Rewards.
You have to save up a lot of codes to get them, but they *are* legitimate coupons. What’s not kosher, as you say, is reproducing them.
You can save yourself some embarrassment by not taking a fake coupon to the store. Two years ago there was a fake JC Penney coupon floating around. I didn’t realize it was fake. Boy, was I horrified when told that it was — they were looking at me as though I were this huge scammer. And I wasn’t. I was simply naive.
You said the expiration date was 6 months out, then you said there was no expiration date. Can’t really see the coupon but yes there are a lot of fake coupons going around. I’m a retail manager and we see them a lot.
Rhonda: BB wasn’t contradicting herself; she was giving two of the seven signs of a fake coupon/deal. There might be no expiration date, or it might be overly “generous” before it expires, as in six months.
It’s actually VERY easy to tell if a coupon has been scanned. Even the best scanners cannot accurately pick up the dot pattern that is usually found behind the expiration date, plus any very tiny type will get muddy in the process. Ditto for the bar code.
I actually printed some coupons and scanned and reprinted them and gave to one of our local stores because they had a few cashiers who really couldn’t understand what to look for and needed to call a manager every time they got on IP. Once you look at them side-by-side, it’s VERY obvious.
@Dolly Domestic Good points! I’m impressed that you took the time to help our your local cashiers learn about fake coupons. The more cashiers know, the more legitimate coupon clippers can save.
very interesting article. i liked this post a lot!