I had a canon printer and every time it would run out of ink, I would refill it with universal ink refill kits. That worked well until my printer just up and died. There was no reviving it (at least not for how cheap you can buy a new printer). So there it was… we bought a new Canon printer for about 30 or 40 dollars (can’t quite remember). I ran out of ink really quickly (I print a lot of coupons) and continued the job of refilling the ink cartridge with a refill kit. This was really messy and every time I put it in the computer again, it kept saying the ink was low. I had to refill a lot more often than I thought I should. And when I would refill, it was such a mess. After a bit I thought that my cartridge was just dried out so I should buy a new one. I did and went through the ink in about a week or two. I tried refilling and it was so messy. I was just so fed up with it not working. I called the ink refill kit place and they didn’t have any suggestions for me, but offered to send me more ink. What I really needed was the ink I had to stop overflowing from the cartridge I had (after I put the ink refill in, in just about 2 seconds, it would start gushing out the top and then if I gave it time, it would gush out the bottom).

One of my friends said that staples or office max would professionally refill printer cartridges so I called them to see if they could help. They do refill cartridges…except for canon printers. Go figure.

I vented my frustration to my husband. I mean, come on, it was almost cheaper to just buy a new printer (that comes with ink already) than buy the store cartridges. I looked online for ink, but wasn’t really satisfied with those cartridge prices either, and that’s why I resorted to the ink refill kits. They worked great with my first printer, but not my second.

After venting to my husband, he came up with (what I thought) was quite a thrifty deal. First off, he kept trying to convert me to a laser printer (which I would love) but they are a big upfront cost.

This is what we ended up doing. If you go to staples.com, we found a Brother color inkjet printer/copier – refurbished at 299.00 (On their website, this is regularly a $500 printer!… here is a link: http://www.staples.com/Brother-Refurbished-DCP-9040CN-Digital-Color-Copier/product_848095?cmArea=SEARCH ) Then they had a $50 off instant savings (update: looks like it’s $70 off now! – I emailed them and they adjusted my instant savings $20!!!) On top of that, you get a $50 credit if you take your receipt and turn in your old printer to them! And this is free shipping too so I don’t have to drag my kids out to a store to pick it up (the hubby can take care of the receipt/$50 credit)!!!! And if you go through ebates, you get 4% cash back. So you’re getting a $500 printer for approx. $190! (they do add tax though). Another plus is that it’s a copier too so you can make copies of all the rebates you send in.

And then, toner for the printer costs about $48 (here’s the link http://www.supermediastore.com/product/u/toner-tn115bk-brother-dcp-hl-mfc-9040-9045-4040-4070-9440-9450-9840-cn-cdn-cdn-cdw-black-comp?utm_source=googleBase&utm_medium=pcsite&utm_content=Brother+Toner ). You can print 5000 papers with this toner! 5000!! Wowsers! That seemed like a thrifty deal to me!!

So I’ve received my printer and I’m going to take my receipt in this week with my old printer to get the other $50.. one happy coupon printer here!
FYI – you can probably get a cheaper printer refurbished that isn’t color that would be cheaper than the above (I just haven’t looked into it b/c I was going to get a color one)

The coupon will print 48 hours after the qualifying purchase. I know, I know, this brings back nightmares from three years ago when all CVS ECB's were like this, but I would say just bear with us and speak up to customer service that the coupon should print instantly instead of two days later…

Happy Shopping!

They are ringing up for $.06!!

Perfect if you need just a little more to use all your ECB's!

In SC, tax is charged after *store coupons* have been deducted. CVS coupons like the $4/$20 and similar coupons are recognized as a *store coupon* and basically function in the register as a discount. If you purchase $20 worth of stuff and use a $4/$20 coupon, you are not charged tax on the $4 that is deducted – the coupon is treated as a discount. Most ECBs are generally *not* considered to be store coupons, and normally you DO have to pay tax on the amounts that they pay for. If you purchased $20 worth of stuff and used $20 ECBs to pay for it, most likely you will be charged tax on the $20 worth of stuff. Same thing goes for manufacturer's coupons – if you buy $20 worth of stuff and use $20 worth of manufacturer's coupons, your subtotal will be $0.00 but you will have to pay the tax from your original $20 total. If you were to buy the same $20 worth of stuff and use a $4/$20 coupon and $16 worth of coupons and ECBs, you would have a subtotal of $0.00 after coupons, and you would pay tax on the $16.00 total that you had after the $4/$20 coupon was applied (remember the 4/20 is a store coupon and functions as a discount, so you do not pay tax on the $4 that was taken off from it).

There are some exceptions to the ecbs not taking off tax, though. For example, if your ECB does not print at the time of purchase as it should, and you have it manually printed for you, when you redeem it, it will be recognized by the register as a store coupon and will function as a discount. The same thing goes for when you use a raincheck that gets back ecbs – since they have to print raincheck ECBs manually, when you actually use those manually printed ecbs, you are not charged tax on the amount that it pays for. Also, quarterly ecbs (the 2% that you get back from your quarterly spending) and ecbs that print from using the CVS Green Bag Tag count as store coupons and function in the register as a discount, and you are not charged tax on those amounts. I *think* that ecbs earned from purchasing CVS brand products also work this way, but I haven't purchased any CVS brand products earning ECBs in awhile so I'm not completely sure.

If you'll notice on your receipt, when you use CVS coupons and ECBs, some of them will show up as 'CVS Coupon' and some will show up as 'CVS manufacturer coupon' (can't remember the exact abreviation that they use for 'manufacturer' but you get the idea) – the ones that show up as 'cvs coupon' work as a store coupon and function as a discount and you are not charged tax on those amounts. $/$$ coupons, manually printed ECBs, quarterly ECBs, greenbagtag ecbs, and actual CVS store coupons will show up as 'cvs coupon' on your receipt and you will not be charged tax on the amounts that they take off. Regular ecbs will show up as 'cvs manufacturer coupon' and you will be charged tax on those amounts. Manufacturer coupons will just show up as 'coupon' and you will be charged tax on those amounts.

As stated before, these rules work in SC and I cannot guarantee if the tax laws are the same in other states or not, but it may serve as a guideline to help you figure out if your state works the same way or not.