Where do I begin? I received a comment a week or so ago wanting information about Wal-Mart's in-store coupon policies. Simple enough. I began searching. I could not find them posted anywhere on their website (and I looked hard). I finally broke down and wrote the company on their "Contact Us" page. I got this email the next day:
Dear Wendy,
My name is Arthur. I am with the Walmart.com Customer Service Team.
Thank you for allowing me to assist you today.
Wendy, at Walmart.com, we have the same pricing policy as your local
Wal-Mart store, which is to bring you a wide variety of your favorite
products at Every Day Low Prices. You may find lower prices on certain
individual items at other online stores, but our goal is to save you
money across our wide assortment of products. We assure you that we are
always striving to work with suppliers who can help us serve our
customers with the best possible values.
Currently, we are not able to accept manufacturers' coupons through
Walmart.com at this time. However, we are committed to bringing our
customers a wide assortment of products offered at Every Day Low Prices.
As an added value, we offer "Rollbacks," or lowered prices, on many
items and we add products to our selection daily, so visit us often to
see what's new!
Wendy, I apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced.
Thank you for visiting Walmart.com. We appreciate the opportunity to
serve you and look forward to your next visit.
If we may be of further assistance, please email us at help@walmart.com.
We are here to serve you 7 days a week!
Sincerely,
Arthur
Customer Service at Walmart.com
Simple enough. The only problem was... I wanted their IN-STORE information, not their online policies. Back to square one.
I wrote back to "Arthur" and asked him about this specifically (again)... nothing. NO reply at all. I was at a standstill. I decided to write to the company website on their "Contact Us" page after searching extensively for information. No reply...
Yesterday, I got a mysterious call. It was a nice guy from my local Wal-Mart. I told him I needed information about the company's policies on accepting coupons in the store. Silence. I repeated myself and said that I was writing for my blog and REALLY needed to know. I did not want to give everyone the wrong information.
He said they had a copy of that somewhere and he could fax it to me. I told him that it would be so much easier if he could just email it to me. He then said, "I can't email it to you, all I've got is a paper copy."
I could not believe it! With the ga-zillions of dollars Wal-Mart has... they don't have the innovation to email their coupon policies? Impossible!
Fax I received from Wal-MartI have shown the copy I received by fax. I can hardly read it. It looks as though it is a copy of a copy of a copy. It is obviously not written for the general public. I could not help but notice that the bottom of the page says "March 29, 2007 --- Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. --- Page 1 of 8 --- CONFIDENTIAL."
I will do my best to write exactly what it says:
Wal-Mart accepts the following types of coupons:
* Manufacturer coupons (Cents Off)
* Free merchandise (or Buy-One-Get-One-Free) coupons
* Store coupons
* Internet coupons
* Soft drink container caps
The following are guidelines for accepting coupons:
* Wal-Mart only accepts coupons for merchandise we sell and only when presented at the time of purchase.
*Coupons should have an expiration date and be presented within the valid dates. Do not accept expired coupons.
* Only one coupon per item is permitted. Multiple coupons for one item will generate a "does not match" message and the system rejects the coupon.
* Tender coupons at the end of the sale allowing the Customer to see the coupon amount deducted from the total purchase.
Notes:
* Wal-Mart does not accept "Percentage Off" coupons. Wal-Mart believes in offering low prices everyday rather than short term percentage off deals.
* A salaried manager can refuse to accept a coupon if it does not meet any or all of the acceptance guidelines.
This was not terribly helpful although informative. I still do not know their policies concerning competitor's coupons. I still do not know for sure if they will accept competitor's advertisements and price-match them. Can you believe it?
I thought this was going to be easy--- like the article I wrote about Target. At Target, you ask a simple question, you get a simple answer. At Wal-Mart, you ask a simple question...... don't get me started!
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