6 ms·

Extreme couponers were sent to prison in $31.8M fraud scheme

14 points by rrauenza 5y ago

sushid 5y ago
"Extreme couponers" is the wrong term to describe these folks. They were coupon counterfeiters. The article even states how the perpetrators didn't use the coupons themselves.
- junar 5y ago
  I think the article messed up there. The FBI press release claims that they did use the coupons themselves. Maybe the link should be changed? > Talens not only regularly used her own coupons, but she sold them to a large group of subscribers who found her through social media groups. https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/woman-sentenced-for-coupon-fraud-102121 https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/woman-sentenced-for-coupon-...
themodelplumber 5y ago
Ok, so they were counterfeiting and distributing coupons. > She trained herself in the different techniques she needed to manipulate barcodes to make these coupons work," said Special Agent Shannon Brill in the FBI release. Talens, who is considered the mastermind of the scheme, would create fake coupons with discounts "near or even over" an item's retail value. > Talens was paid more than $400,000 in digital currencies such as bitcoin and sometimes "exchanged coupons for stolen rolls of the special paper stores use to print out coupons," the agency said. She was reallllly getting sucked into it. I had a little (micro) taste of that once. I decided to try extreme couponing some years back, coinciding with extreme weight loss. I ended up losing my last 50 lbs while eating my way through boxes of various name brand chocolate bars that cost me almost nothing. (Well, and a salad here or there. And I exchanged my macros for getting it all over with faster via eat-whatever-you-like CICO) It was definitely an embarrassment of random riches though. One time I was able to buy about 20 high-end Zebra mechanical pencils for $.10 each. The cashier was stunned and it got a bit embarrassing as she exclaimed loudly and other people looked on. I'm not surprised people get sucked into this stuff, because you start to realize that you are making away like a bandit. Nothing ever just costs what it costs. So if you think that's an awesome way to feel, maybe it gets more intense from there, and you realize Photoshop is a thing? Personally I didn't like the excited reactions and making a scene at a store, though my kids and their teachers got some pretty great school supplies out of it.
runnr_az 5y ago
So... how does one counterfeit a coupon? Like, the affected stores' systems just accept coupon codes in a format like: "Huggies 99% off?" for any arbitrary product? I always assumed a coupon bar code just referenced some a central repository of discount options... but maybe that's wrong?
- flutas 5y ago
  (Old) Coupon barcodes are fairly standardized. https://fabulesslyfrugal.com/coupon-bar-codes-decoding-code/ https://fabulesslyfrugal.com/coupon-bar-codes-decoding-code/
- robbedpeter 5y ago
  Seems like the barcodes encoded the deal, and they figured out how to insert arbitrary discounts and resell high value products. You can find legitimate arbitrage opportunities with extreme couponning, but just like mechanical turk or ad view / click rewards "work" it very rarely reaches minimum wage when you account for time and profit. If people are making bank doing seemingly trivial stuff like this, it's going to be temporary and/or illegal.
  - SOLAR_FIELDS 5y ago
    I think it was in the early/mid aughts when grocery stores wised up. Couponing was a big deal during that time frame and I worked in a grocery store in the States at that time that would periodically do "double" and "triple" coupon weekends. We would have people walking out with $200-300 worth of merchandise on the triple weekends and they would have to scan a candy bar at the check out so that we didn't owe them money. It was always a cart full of pretty bizarre stuff that didn't look like a typical grocery trip in strangely large amounts (stuff like 4 bottles of Windex). They eventually stopped doing the double and triple coupon weekends once they figured out how much money they were losing. That was also before you could easily just walk into a store then turn around and sell what you bought online two hours later too.
- lxchase 5y ago
  Manufacturer coupons follow a GS1 standard in North America. It encodes values such as deal amount, if it’s a percent off or dollar off, minimum units required, if the coupon will work for a specific UPC or it works for the entire manufacturer, expiration date, etc. Most point of sale terminals only verify that the data is the correct format; it does NOT validate or authenticate. The cashier should act as a second check (theoretically a barcode printed on toilet paper for 100% off a TV would work for instance). The coupon gets collected and sent to a 3rd party clearinghouse 95% of the time. That clearinghouse will check for fraud and authenticity, and invoice the manufacturer on behalf of the retailer at the end of a month. Source: Led marketing for multiple CPG/Food companies, lmk if other questions, I don’t often get to talk about this on here!
syspec 5y ago
I'd love an in depth sorry on this. How did the coupons scan correctly?
- hnac12 5y ago
  There isn’t a central db of valid coupons, the discount and product barcode are encoded in the coupon barcode
- lxchase 5y ago
  I went a little more in-depth about how manufacturer coupons work in a comment above. Long story short there isn’t any “server side” verification. As long as you have the correct format, anyone can create a barcode that will scan and give you the offer you encoded. But you will be committing fraud (don’t do it) and it does get checked.
sebastien_b 5y ago
These aren’t really “extreme couponers” as much as they’re coupon fraudsters (they printed their own coupons).
DangitBobby 5y ago
Wow, the husband got 7 years because he "he was aware of and profited from the scheme." That seems pretty harsh when her sentence was 12 years. Is that normal?

14 points by rrauenza 5y ago

"Extreme couponers" is the wrong term to describe these folks. They were coupon counterfeiters. The article even states how the perpetrators didn't use the coupons themselves.

junar 5y ago
I think the article messed up there. The FBI press release claims that they did use the coupons themselves. Maybe the link should be changed? > Talens not only regularly used her own coupons, but she sold them to a large group of subscribers who found her through social media groups. https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/woman-sentenced-for-coupon-fraud-102121 https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/woman-sentenced-for-coupon-...

themodelplumber 5y ago

Ok, so they were counterfeiting and distributing coupons. > She trained herself in the different techniques she needed to manipulate barcodes to make these coupons work," said Special Agent Shannon Brill in the FBI release. Talens, who is considered the mastermind of the scheme, would create fake coupons with discounts "near or even over" an item's retail value. > Talens was paid more than $400,000 in digital currencies such as bitcoin and sometimes "exchanged coupons for stolen rolls of the special paper stores use to print out coupons," the agency said. She was reallllly getting sucked into it. I had a little (micro) taste of that once. I decided to try extreme couponing some years back, coinciding with extreme weight loss. I ended up losing my last 50 lbs while eating my way through boxes of various name brand chocolate bars that cost me almost nothing. (Well, and a salad here or there. And I exchanged my macros for getting it all over with faster via eat-whatever-you-like CICO) It was definitely an embarrassment of random riches though. One time I was able to buy about 20 high-end Zebra mechanical pencils for $.10 each. The cashier was stunned and it got a bit embarrassing as she exclaimed loudly and other people looked on. I'm not surprised people get sucked into this stuff, because you start to realize that you are making away like a bandit. Nothing ever just costs what it costs. So if you think that's an awesome way to feel, maybe it gets more intense from there, and you realize Photoshop is a thing? Personally I didn't like the excited reactions and making a scene at a store, though my kids and their teachers got some pretty great school supplies out of it.

runnr_az 5y ago

So... how does one counterfeit a coupon? Like, the affected stores' systems just accept coupon codes in a format like: "Huggies 99% off?" for any arbitrary product? I always assumed a coupon bar code just referenced some a central repository of discount options... but maybe that's wrong?

flutas 5y ago
(Old) Coupon barcodes are fairly standardized. https://fabulesslyfrugal.com/coupon-bar-codes-decoding-code/ https://fabulesslyfrugal.com/coupon-bar-codes-decoding-code/
robbedpeter 5y ago
Seems like the barcodes encoded the deal, and they figured out how to insert arbitrary discounts and resell high value products. You can find legitimate arbitrage opportunities with extreme couponning, but just like mechanical turk or ad view / click rewards "work" it very rarely reaches minimum wage when you account for time and profit. If people are making bank doing seemingly trivial stuff like this, it's going to be temporary and/or illegal.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 5y ago
  I think it was in the early/mid aughts when grocery stores wised up. Couponing was a big deal during that time frame and I worked in a grocery store in the States at that time that would periodically do "double" and "triple" coupon weekends. We would have people walking out with $200-300 worth of merchandise on the triple weekends and they would have to scan a candy bar at the check out so that we didn't owe them money. It was always a cart full of pretty bizarre stuff that didn't look like a typical grocery trip in strangely large amounts (stuff like 4 bottles of Windex). They eventually stopped doing the double and triple coupon weekends once they figured out how much money they were losing. That was also before you could easily just walk into a store then turn around and sell what you bought online two hours later too.
lxchase 5y ago
Manufacturer coupons follow a GS1 standard in North America. It encodes values such as deal amount, if it’s a percent off or dollar off, minimum units required, if the coupon will work for a specific UPC or it works for the entire manufacturer, expiration date, etc. Most point of sale terminals only verify that the data is the correct format; it does NOT validate or authenticate. The cashier should act as a second check (theoretically a barcode printed on toilet paper for 100% off a TV would work for instance). The coupon gets collected and sent to a 3rd party clearinghouse 95% of the time. That clearinghouse will check for fraud and authenticity, and invoice the manufacturer on behalf of the retailer at the end of a month. Source: Led marketing for multiple CPG/Food companies, lmk if other questions, I don’t often get to talk about this on here!

syspec 5y ago

I'd love an in depth sorry on this. How did the coupons scan correctly?

hnac12 5y ago
There isn’t a central db of valid coupons, the discount and product barcode are encoded in the coupon barcode
lxchase 5y ago
I went a little more in-depth about how manufacturer coupons work in a comment above. Long story short there isn’t any “server side” verification. As long as you have the correct format, anyone can create a barcode that will scan and give you the offer you encoded. But you will be committing fraud (don’t do it) and it does get checked.

sebastien_b 5y ago

These aren’t really “extreme couponers” as much as they’re coupon fraudsters (they printed their own coupons).

DangitBobby 5y ago

Wow, the husband got 7 years because he "he was aware of and profited from the scheme." That seems pretty harsh when her sentence was 12 years. Is that normal?