Questions on the 'fine print'

I've been reading the fine print on the coupons (never used to do that other than a curtesy glance before) and came across this one that has me wondering...the words I'm wondering about I've bolded.

its on greek yogurt cups from yoplait.

"void if altered, copied, sold, purchased, transferred, exchanged or where prohibited or restricted by law including LA, NV and ND. One coupon per purchase of specified product(s). Good only in USA, APOs & FPOs."

altered, copied make sense, thats pretty much a no brainer. I know you can not sell or buy coupons, but you can charge and pay handling fees to get them. What about the transferred, exchanged. Isn't that what we do here?

Not really sure what that means if not in the context of how we trade coupons here.

the prohibited or restricted by law is a whole other ball of wax, I don't live in those states so not as concerned...but does that mean some states don't allow coupons for what reasons? Thinking on yogurt the live cultures in yogurt might be the reason?

thanks!

This is a question that has come up before many times.

Here is our take on it. The fine print on the coupon says that it is VOID if sold, purchased, transferred or exchanged. Meaning that if the manufacture were able to somehow trace that the coupon was one of the above they could decide not to pay the retailer.

However...this does not mean that it is illegal to do any of the above. Although some traders say that they are accepting a "handling fee" for their coupons and are not selling them. The reality is..they are selling them. And we don't pretend that they are doing anything differently. Hence the reason why the "handling fee" is higher for a hot coupon and a lesser valuable coupon to a coupon user is lower.

Now as far as transferring or exchanging...hard to enforce. The manufactures I have spoken with have told me that although it is frowned upon, they are not going to enforce the transfer or exchange of coupons. There are no laws on the books as far as I am aware of that make it illegal. However a manufacture could in theory file a civil lawsuit against someone who is caught transferring or exchanging a coupon. However they have better things to do than to go after the average (or even the hard core) coupon user who swaps coupons with their mother, neighbor, friend or some random person online.

That being said, it is an individual choice that each person has to make if they feel comfortable buying or trading coupons.

thanks, makes sense. I know I'm asking a lot of questions, still learning, and making sure i'm not doing anything wrong here, since so much has changed over the years. That and I'm probably comparing it too much to the online digitized embroidery design world, where they do go after you lol, and quickly.

We like questions...nothing wrong with questions.