Sunday 30 April 2017

Modern day couponing (south African style)



I'm becoming  a couponing queen, and in  modern times couponing is no longer clipping out of magazines and newspapers its gone digital!

South Africa has caught onto the concept and is doing an excellent job of it. There are a few apps and sites that I use with almost every shopping trip I do. Now these are exclusive to South Africa, some are bound to a particular shop and others are open to many.


Snap n save: Is an open one, with a long list of shops you can shop at ranging from Pick n pay, Spar, Checkers, Checkers Hyper, Makro, Woolworths, Shoprite Usave, Food lovers market, Clicks, Dischem and so many more.

How does it work: Register, Log on to the website or app and check what offers are available, click on 'book' if its an offer you'd like to buy. Your booked offers go into "booked offers" you have 48 hours from booking to buy the items before they are removed from your booked offers.

Shop at one of the listed shops buy the item and keep your till slip, when you get home ( Or in the car or where ever really) log into your snap n save account, click on snap and follow the prompts, which will guide you through submitting your till slip ( select store you shopped at, select the items you did buy) and take the photo or photos if your slip is long. Be sure to include the whole slip, with date and time, store name, and goods purchased. Click on submit.

It can take up to 4 days to get your money back in your virtual wallet.

For more in depth FAQ,s go check their page..

Where can I spend my cash back:  when you have more than R10 in your e-wallet you can cash out. You can choose either to have it eft'd into your banks account, or changed into a wicode. A wicode is a 7 digit number that is entered at the till when you have shopped at one of the participating stores and that amount is deducted from your total. The participating stores list is constantly growing, right now it includes: Checkers, Checkers Hyper,Pick n Pay, Pick n Pay Hyper, Dischem, Cellucity to name a .few

Sign up now using my unique promo code “Laurend826” to claim your R10 when you snap your first till slip. 


Unilever: This one is specific to Unilever products and works on wicodes or your cell phone number depending on the store. The participating stores are: Spar, Checkers, Pick n Pay, Dischem and Shoprite. Start by going to the Unilever site, register, choose a shop, their offers are then displayed. Each retailer seems to have wicodes that run from the first of each month to the last day of the month. You may only buy one of an item at each shop ( but if Pick n Pay, Checkers and Spar have the same offer you may buy one from each of them as they all have different wicodes)

Add the item you want to your basket and checkout, a unique wicode is then sms'd to you. You tell the cashier you have a wicode and they enter it when when they have rung up your purchases, your discount is then applied and taken off your final total.

So that's an instant cash back deal :)

You can also use Snap n Save on any applicable deals so at times its a double coupon.

Pick n pay app: This one only started the beginning of April but is really proving itself. Its connected to your smart shopper card and has improved on many features. Namely they now give you discounts based on what you frequently buy at pick n pay, and even give you money off coupons if you spend over a certain amount ( R5 off R50 or more spent, R10 off R80 or more spent are two I have received) so if  you frequently buy a certain brand of bread, or coffee etc you now get discounts!

You start by downloading the app, register using your smart shopper card, offers unique to you are listed, you select the ones you want and they are automatically loaded onto your smart shopper card! As easy as that. Buy the listed items, swipe your card at the till and the discounts are deducted. If you don't buy them on that day they are saved until you use them or they expire ( they have a one to two week time frame depending on the offer. New offers are loaded weekly, from what I can tell that happens on a Thursday)

( here you can use your pick n pay discount and a snap n save discount on the same item if it is applicable eg: Snap n Save have a weekly discount on any brand of bread and any brand of milk 1 litre or more. So if Pick n Pay has a discount on bread  or milk you can actually coupon twice.)

Also did you know that as a smart shopper card holder you can get the pick n pay food magazine for free each month?


Spar app:  Spar app is new to me, I knew the loyalty card existed but was told by a few different spars that the card was bound to a particular store, so if you shopped at a few different spar stores you had to have an independent card for each store. That seemed impractical to me. With the app you don't need a spar card, you register, select the items you want to buy from their offers. Go to your preferred spar, buy the selected items, tell the cashier you have special offer items and want to enter your cell number, you then  enter your cell phone number at the till point and the discount comes off. The offers seem to be valid for around a month.


Checkers site: Checkers site has a wicode option, you can select offers, or browse the offers available and get a general code for all the offers. I found this one the least user friendly as I never got the code sent to my cell number, but it always worked if I entered my husbands number.I also found that the offers haven't been changed in many months, I'd go as far as saying this whole year. But saving is saving and if they have items you want to buy on their promo list use the code, enter the wicode at the till point and the discount is applied. 



Some tips:

1. Make sure you are buying the correct brand/size/flavour listed on the coupon or it won't apply. Some coupons are very specific about size/weight/flavour eg: 'Sasko brown bread 700g'. others will just say 'any  brown bread'.

2. Check the expiration date of the coupon and use it timeously.

3. I make a list of the coupon items on my grocery list, I add the wicode next to the item so I don't forget to mention it to the cashier.

4. Keep your till slips for Snap n Save until you have your cash in your e-wallet for that item. Sometimes for unknown reasons an item can be rejected, you can resubmit for that item if you're sure it was an error on their part. I have had this happen twice and both times I got the cash manually added to  my e-wallet within 48 hours of resubmitting.

5. Use reusable shopping bags, have you recently checked the price for a bag? Using your own bags can save you around R4 a week, that may not sound like much but a saving of around R20 a month is not bad, and also fantastic for the environment.


Just for interest I tracked my savings for the month of April, and they are as follows;

Snap n Save: R49.80
Unilever: R172
Pick n Pay: R97.41
Spar: R8
Checkers: 0


Making my savings for April R327.21

My savings on bags for the month is around R30 as I did a big grocery shop, and a bulk buy at Makro.

I'm excited to see what the savings for May will be :)

No comments:

Post a Comment