McAfee refund/rebates?

[Dudhorse]

.... on 8/1 of this year I bought McAfee VirusScan v.8.0 at Staples and on
the package they had rebate offers that meant I could almost get the product
for free - the rebate offers expired on 8/15 so I got all the necessary
original sales slips and jumped thru all the pain-in-the ass hoops(even had
to send them the CD of my previous version of McAfee and the front page of
the original instruction book) - I made sure all the i's were dotted and the
t's were crossed and had it in the mail by 8/5 ........... well about a
month later I got a postcard saying they could not honor my rebate request
because the offer had expired. ??????
They McAfee(or whoever they contracted to handle the rebates) screwed me out
the rebates and I am kinda steamed about it all. This has happened before
with other things I have bought - they sucker you in with too good to true
rebate offers and thats the last you ever hear from them. At least McAfee
sent me official notification I was getting hosed.

Has this happened to anyone else???? Just for the record I like McAfee
VirusScan - I have had no problem with it and as far as I know it does a
good job.

 

[Smoker]

... on 8/1 of this year I bought McAfee VirusScan v.8.0 at Staples and on
the package they had rebate offers that meant I could almost get the product
for free - the rebate offers expired on 8/15 so I got all the necessary
original sales slips and jumped thru all the pain-in-the ass hoops(even had
to send them the CD of my previous version of McAfee and the front page of
the original instruction book) - I made sure all the i's were dotted and the
t's were crossed and had it in the mail by 8/5 ........... well about a
month later I got a postcard saying they could not honor my rebate request
because the offer had expired. ??????
They McAfee(or whoever they contracted to handle the rebates) screwed me out
the rebates and I am kinda steamed about it all. This has happened before
with other things I have bought - they sucker you in with too good to true
rebate offers and thats the last you ever hear from them. At least McAfee
sent me official notification I was getting hosed.

Has this happened to anyone else???? Just for the record I like McAfee
VirusScan - I have had no problem with it and as far as I know it does a
good job.

File a complaint at bbb.com
They've been very effective for me and may have had complaints from people
who've had the same problem as you.

 

[Vanguardx]

"Dudhorse" <[email protected]>
wrote in

... on 8/1 of this year I bought McAfee VirusScan v.8.0 at Staples
and on the package they had rebate offers that meant I could almost
get the product for free - the rebate offers expired on 8/15 so I got
all the necessary original sales slips and jumped thru all the
pain-in-the ass hoops(even had to send them the CD of my previous
version of McAfee and the front page of the original instruction
book) - I made sure all the i's were dotted and the t's were crossed
and had it in the mail by 8/5 ........... well about a month later I
got a postcard saying they could not honor my rebate request because
the offer had expired. ?????? They McAfee(or whoever they contracted
to handle the rebates) screwed
me out the rebates and I am kinda steamed about it all. This has
happened before with other things I have bought - they sucker you in
with too good to true rebate offers and thats the last you ever hear
from them. At least McAfee sent me official notification I was
getting hosed.
Has this happened to anyone else???? Just for the record I like
McAfee VirusScan - I have had no problem with it and as far as I know
it does a good job.

You said when you mailed the rebate form. You didn't say when you
bought it. Lots of those office store rebates are handled by that
office store (i.e., Office Depot, Staples, etc.). If you read the back
of the receipt or wherever, it says you must mail the rebate (so it is
postmarked) within some number of days of the purchase, like 4 or 7
days. It doesn't matter when the rebate *offer* ends (i.e., how long
they will issue the rebate). It matters that you postmark the rebate
before the offer expires AND before the N-day expiration after purchase
requirement. I'll see a rebate off a drive from the manufacturer and
another rebate from Office Depot which brings the price down to what I
would pay using an online vendor. I'll get the rebate mailed in time
for the manufacturer's portion of the rebate but might forget to do it
within the 5 days for Office Depot's portion of the rebate (i.e., I
bought it on a weekend and figured to do the paperwork on the next
weekend but by then it is too late). Those office store rebates are so
short for how soon you must postmark the rebate that I don't use them at
all anymore in comparing prices.

 

[Walter R.]

I have been gypped out of so many "rebates" that I refuse to buy anything
involving a mail-in rebate. It is not worth the hassle.

Just got another refusal postcard from Lowes, involving $ 40. And this after
crossing all the t's and dotting all the i's.

They are all rip-offs. Life is too short.

 

[Smoker]

I have been gypped out of so many "rebates" that I refuse to buy anything
involving a mail-in rebate. It is not worth the hassle.

Just got another refusal postcard from Lowes, involving $ 40. And this after
crossing all the t's and dotting all the i's.

They are all rip-offs. Life is too short.
--

Walter
The Happy Iconoclast www.rationality.net
-

Manufacturers or issuers of rebates (like stores) are betting that enough
people won't go through all the trouble or do it in enough time to qualify
for their enticing rebate. The money they lose on the few who do is more
than made up by the profits off those who don't, or rebates wouldn't exist.
I wonder if there's anyone who was never ripped off by a rebate offering?

 

[Miles Fromier]

Manufacturers or issuers of rebates (like stores) are betting that enough
people won't go through all the trouble or do it in enough time to qualify
for their enticing rebate. The money they lose on the few who do is more
than made up by the profits off those who don't, or rebates wouldn't exist.
I wonder if there's anyone who was never ripped off by a rebate offering?

They bank your money and earn the interest on it while you to the dance. Even if you do get the "rebate", you don't
get the earned interest that money would have made in an interest earning account. Essentially you have given them
an interest free loan, and as you say - most people won't bother to reclaim their hard earned money or will default on
the terms of the rebate offer.

So there are those that realize they were ripped off, and there are those that don't realize that they were ripped off.

 

[Larry Sabo]

I wonder if there's anyone who was never ripped off by a rebate offering?

Me, but I've only had 5 or them. Use the freeware program
Rebate!Rebate!...

(http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_description/0,fid,8341,00.asp)

....to track and follow-up on your rebates, and minimize the chance
something will slip through the cracks.

Cheers,
Larry

 

[BeeVee]

X-NO-Archive:Yes

... on 8/1 of this year I bought McAfee VirusScan v.8.0 at Staples and on
the package they had rebate offers that meant I could almost get the product
for free - the rebate offers expired on 8/15 so I got all the necessary
original sales slips and jumped thru all the pain-in-the ass hoops(even had
to send them the CD of my previous version of McAfee and the front page of
the original instruction book) - I made sure all the i's were dotted and the
t's were crossed and had it in the mail by 8/5 ........... well about a
month later I got a postcard saying they could not honor my rebate request
because the offer had expired. ??????
They McAfee(or whoever they contracted to handle the rebates) screwed me out
the rebates and I am kinda steamed about it all. This has happened before
with other things I have bought - they sucker you in with too good to true
rebate offers and thats the last you ever hear from them. At least McAfee
sent me official notification I was getting hosed.

Has this happened to anyone else???? Just for the record I like McAfee
VirusScan - I have had no problem with it and as far as I know it does a
good job.

I've had the same experience with McAfee,
so now I buy direct, take the rebate right off the top.
purchase by credit card and usually do the same with them all. (merchants)
If there is a rebate, I make the merchant responsible before
I purchase the product..I get it in writting. Then Charge It.


Here is a contact that will get you help @ McAfee
FWIW
BeeVee

Donovan Hunter
Overseas Technical Coordinator
Performance Development Specialist
McAfee Retail Technical Support
Email: (e-mail address removed)
AKA (e-mail address removed)

 

[Vanguardx]

X-NO-Archive:Yes



I've had the same experience with McAfee,
so now I buy direct, take the rebate right off the top.
purchase by credit card and usually do the same with them all.
(merchants) If there is a rebate, I make the merchant responsible
before
I purchase the product..I get it in writting. Then Charge It.


Here is a contact that will get you help @ McAfee
FWIW
BeeVee

Donovan Hunter
Overseas Technical Coordinator
Performance Development Specialist
McAfee Retail Technical Support
Email: (e-mail address removed)
AKA (e-mail address removed)

Off-topic (of thread):

You have an slightly invalid no-archive header. Add a space between the
colon used for the header delimiter and its value. Read
http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/X-No-Archive.

I always wonder why posters bother with the X-No-Archive header. Anyone
replying to their message, like with this reply, will obviate that
header if the content of their message was included in the reply (and
the reply does not itself perpetuate the X-No-Archive header). Since
you think X-No-Archive will actually keep your posts from getting
archived, and since you are using Outlook Express, do you realize that
you can add the X-No-Archive header (or any header you want) within the
headers portion of the message (instead of sticking it in the first line
of its body)?

 

[Ant]

...

[snip]

and since you are using Outlook Express, do you realize that
you can add the X-No-Archive header (or any header you want) within the
headers portion of the message (instead of sticking it in the first line
of its body)?

How so? I'm not aware you can add any X-headers with OE. Please tell.

 

[Vanguardx]

...

[snip]

and since you are using Outlook Express, do you realize that
you can add the X-No-Archive header (or any header you want) within
the headers portion of the message (instead of sticking it in the
first line of its body)?

How so? I'm not aware you can add any X-headers with OE. Please tell.

When composing a new message, use the View -> Show All Headers menu. In
the Keywords field, enter anything since it really isn't often relevant
(maybe some other readers allow you to search in the Keywords header but
not OE). I usually enter "world" (sans quotes) or something about the
topic. Then hit the Enter key and you will see a new line get added in
the Keywords field. Actually this new line is not part of the Keywords
header but instead becomes a whole new line that will get added to the
headers portion of your message. Then enter your new header line, like
"X-No-Archive: NO" (or Yes, or some other completely different header).
So you end up with the Keywords field looking like:

world
<newheaderline>

I found this through a Google search
(http://www.google.com/search?q=+"Outlook+Express"+%2BKeyword+%2Bheader+%2B"X-No-Archive").

 

[Ant]

"Ant":

When composing a new message, use the View -> Show All Headers menu. In
the Keywords field, enter anything since it really isn't often relevant
(maybe some other readers allow you to search in the Keywords header but
not OE). I usually enter "world" (sans quotes) or something about the
topic. Then hit the Enter key and you will see a new line get added in
the Keywords field. Actually this new line is not part of the Keywords
header but instead becomes a whole new line that will get added to the
headers portion of your message. Then enter your new header line, like
"X-No-Archive: NO" (or Yes, or some other completely different header).
So you end up with the Keywords field looking like:

world
<newheaderline>

I've known about this for some time, but didn't think it worked
properly. Although OE shows the lines as new headers, it appears some
newsreaders do not.

This person (using Tin on Unix) sees them all on one line:
http://groups.google.com/groups?as_umsgid=ut8JKFO#[email protected]

However the extra headers in my post show up fine in Google's archive:
http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=ey8VnEM#[email protected]&output=gplain

It looks like it's to do with the differences in end-of-line format
on MS and Unix systems. I suspect OE sends each header line with the
Unix EOL, because news servers would expect it, but carriage returns
entered within a header (such as "keywords") stay in the MS format.

I found this through a Google search
(http://www.google.com/search?q=+"Outlook+Express"+%2BKeyword+%2Bheader+%2B"X-No-Archive").

The first hit from that search takes you to an MVP site, so perhaps
the technique does work with archivers like Google. However, I know
it does not work with news servers if you insert control headers.

 

[Judy Swift]

Just to let you know, the person Donovan Hunter listed below is no longer in
a position to assist you in any capacity concerning a rebate. It has been
quite some time since he held that title. I know because I work with him.

 

[Joe Smoe]

don't understand why anyone would pay for a piece of junk like mcafee, when
you can get several AV programs for free... like grisoft AVG... or avast
or antivir...

I have been gypped out of so many "rebates" that I refuse to buy anything
involving a mail-in rebate. It is not worth the hassle.

Just got another refusal postcard from Lowes, involving $ 40. And this after
crossing all the t's and dotting all the i's.

They are all rip-offs. Life is too short.
--

Walter
The Happy Iconoclast www.rationality.net
-

Manufacturers or issuers of rebates (like stores) are betting that enough
people won't go through all the trouble or do it in enough time to qualify
for their enticing rebate. The money they lose on the few who do is more
than made up by the profits off those who don't, or rebates wouldn't exist.
I wonder if there's anyone who was never ripped off by a rebate offering?

 

[Vanguardx]

don't understand why anyone would pay for a piece of junk like
mcafee, when you can get several AV programs for free... like
grisoft AVG... or avast or antivir...

According to Virus Bulletin
(http://www.virusbulletin.com/vb100/archives/products.xml):

McAfee
16 passes, 17 fails (51% failure rate)

Grisoft AVG
5 passes, 20 fails (80% failure rate)

Avast
9 passes, 19 fails (68% failure rate)

AntiVir
2 passes, 8 fails (80% failure rate)

Norton AV - the one that many like to slam
25 passes, 6 fails (19% failure rate)

Kaspersky
23 passes, 13 fails (36% failure rate)

NOD32
28 passes, 3 fails (10% failure rate)

You can figure out the rest. The above represents the historical
failures of each product, not how they currently compare regarding
coverage (which you can check at http://www.av-comparatives.org/).

 

[Joe Smoe]

that is easy to point out the failure rates on the page, but look at some of
the data on the page...
like this..
June 2003: Windows XP Professional Status: PASS
Product name: Grisoft AVG Anti-Virus System 6.0.478 275


the point of my statement is that mcafee and norton both reduce the
performance of your system. I don't know why you would pay to reduce the
performance of your system, when you can get the same protection for free.




"Vanguardx" <see_signature> wrote in message

don't understand why anyone would pay for a piece of junk like
mcafee, when you can get several AV programs for free... like
grisoft AVG... or avast or antivir...

According to Virus Bulletin
(http://www.virusbulletin.com/vb100/archives/products.xml):

McAfee
16 passes, 17 fails (51% failure rate)

Grisoft AVG
5 passes, 20 fails (80% failure rate)

Avast
9 passes, 19 fails (68% failure rate)

AntiVir
2 passes, 8 fails (80% failure rate)

Norton AV - the one that many like to slam
25 passes, 6 fails (19% failure rate)

Kaspersky
23 passes, 13 fails (36% failure rate)

NOD32
28 passes, 3 fails (10% failure rate)

You can figure out the rest. The above represents the historical
failures of each product, not how they currently compare regarding
coverage (which you can check at http://www.av-comparatives.org/).

 

[Vanguardx]

that is easy to point out the failure rates on the page, but look at
some of the data on the page...
like this..
June 2003: Windows XP Professional Status: PASS
Product name: Grisoft AVG Anti-Virus System 6.0.478 275

Why would I care about a particular test case (and which is way back
over a year ago) that happened to pass? I want to know how well the
product has proven itself - OVER TIME - to know how effective it has
been. I also want to know how effective it is NOW and that is the
*only* single-test case that I am interested in. However, even an
excellent result (and not just a pass but shown by av-comparatives.com
as to how effective it is in various categories) for the most recent
test can be swayed by a extremely poor history which indicates that
product doesn't get updated quick enough to compete with other
solutions.

Also of note is that the testing is done against the *Pro* version of
AVG, not the freebie version. It is unlikely that the freebie version
fails less than the Pro version (80% failed tests), and it may have an
even worse failure rate (although, in the case of AVG, I didn't see
anything listed in the Pro version that would indicate detection was
less effective than would be provided by the freebie version, but the
Pro version doesn't get a good rating, anyway).

the point of my statement is that mcafee and norton both reduce the
performance of your system. I don't know why you would pay to reduce
the performance of your system, when you can get the same protection
for free.

You do NOT get the same *level* of protection. You only get the same
*type* of protection but not necessarily at the same level. Windows XP
comes with its freebie Internet Connection Firewall (ICF) which changed
to the Windows Firewall with Service Pack 2 and, yes, it does provide
some firewalling capabilities but no one thinks it is better than even
the freebie firewalls available from 3rd parties, and where they all are
free but obviously do not provide the same *level* of protection.

Fortunately I have not yet been one of those claimed users that became
afflicted with significant performance loss from using Norton AntiVirus
in my last 4 systems. I have seen it temporarily interfere with e-mail
(if e-mail scanning is enabled) but then I've seen way more McAfee users
bitch about problems with e-mail scanning. I haven't seen enough of AVG
users to know if it can cause similar problems.

 

[Dudhorse]

that is easy to point out the failure rates on the page, but look at some
of
the data on the page...
like this..
June 2003: Windows XP Professional Status: PASS
Product name: Grisoft AVG Anti-Virus System 6.0.478 275


the point of my statement is that mcafee and norton both reduce the
performance of your system. I don't know why you would pay to reduce the
performance of your system, when you can get the same protection for free.


.... you get what you pay for or not pay for at least when you pay for
something you have some kind of economic leverage - if its free and it sux
you go out and get something else thats free and also sux - however if you
pay and you are unhappy you take your money elsewhere and they lose out at
least thats the theory I work with. I find it hard to believe that the
free demo version of any AV is as good as its paid counterpart. Plus
having good functioning AV protection is important enough to me and others
for us to forkout some hardearned green to get it. I personally do not
have the time nor resources to reinstall everything and rebuild a HD from
scratch after a serious virus/worm attack. Been there done that!