I have to admit that we are “receipt hoarders” here in the NotMadeofMoney household. First, we save our receipts because we use them to enter the relevant information into Quicken, the software we use for our personal finances. But there are other reasons we’ve found for keeping our receipts:
Price Adjustments
I hate when I purchase something and then find it on sale a week later. Fortunately, keeping track of my receipts can relieve some of that angst. Some stores will let you simply bring in your receipt and show them that you paid more for the time within the last thirty days or so. Other stores will require you to return the item you purchased and buy the same item, again, at the sale price. In either instance, you’ll be glad that you saved that tiny scrap of paper.
Gift Returns
Despite all of your planning and shopping, some gifts just don’t come out as well as you hoped they would. Perhaps the sweater you bought your sister is a size too large or maybe your niece already has that Barbie that you selected for her. Having your receipt makes it easy to exchange that gift for another item that will be more useful to the recipient.
Defective Items – Sometimes bad things happen to our purchases. The CD player you bought might have played perfectly on Christmas morning, but now it is skipping like crazy. When you have to return a defective item to the store you purchased it at, having your receipt will make the process go much more smoothly. If your item has an extended warranty, you will need that receipt to prove your item’s date of purchase.
We do have a regular cycle of purging receipts so they don’t build up to an unmanageable amount. Anything that has a warranty or was given as a gift is kept in a special file. Receipts that are for regular grocery store items, gas purchases, etc. are shredded once they’ve cleared the bank and we’ve verified their accuracy.
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I’m doing research on electronic receipts. We have a survey on the link below. I would be interested in hearing what Not Made of Money readers have to say. We’re giving away 4 Visa gift cards in a drawing for those that want to enter.
http://app.zoomerang.com/Report/EditAndReviewPage.aspx
Keeping receipts is amazingly important, and not that hard to do once you get yourself on a system.
Always remember, nine times out of ten, when you try to return something, whoever you’re dealing with is going to try to use any means possible to deny the return.
The receipt is your first line of defense.