We all like to save money whenever we can – and there are plenty of websites out there offering online shoppers exclusive discounts.
We’ve decided to give these sites a closer inspection to see if they can back up their claims. Check out the results of our test and read our helpful tips on making the most of these voucher sites.
What are they?
Voucher code sites offer you various codes (also known as promotional codes, e-vouchers or discount codes) which are meant to save you money at a variety of different online retailers.
These voucher codes are designed to encourage you to spend when perhaps you wouldn’t otherwise. Stores want you to shop on their websites and these codes are designed as incentives for you to shop with them, rather than their competitors.
Voucher code sites provide the codes that you then use during the checkout process to claim your discount. In theory, they allow you to make savings you can’t get anywhere else. In reality, are any of them really as good as they sound?
How do they make money?
Websites like this make their money using online affiliate marketing schemes. When you click a link on a voucher code site, it will be a special tracking link to show that the voucher site sent you there.
Then, if you buy anything on the site you click through to, the voucher site will earn a percentage of the amount you spend as a thank you for directing your custom to the retailer.
All this is completely behind the scenes and costs you nothing.
Using the codes on voucher websites should be a straight forward business. Here’s how you do it…
- Go to the voucher code site and look for a deal or a store that interests you.
- Click on the link and it will open a new window with the voucher code in it.
- Make a note of the code and then go to the store site to shop in the normal way – some of the sites will open the store’s window for you.
- Once you’ve decided what you want to buy and filled in your details, look for a text box that invites you to use a discount code.
- Then simply type or paste the code into the box and continue the checkout process as normal. At some stage it should tell you how much of a discount you are entitled to.
- Usually this will be before you need to fill in payment details. If the discount does not show you can always cancel the transaction before you finally submit your order.
Are their deals really exclusive?
Voucher sites often say that their codes are exclusive to them but the odds are that they aren’t. If you look on several different sites you will often find very similar, if not identical deals available.
Voucher sites also have a tendency to sell deals that are actually available without the need for any code, as something exclusive. For example they might sell a 50% sale as an offer, but really anyone can access it on the retailer’s website.
They do this because they want you to click through to the retailer from their site, so that they earn a commission.
We looked at nine of the biggest voucher code websites and tested several codes from each site. We were looking to see whether they would work as promised and give us the exact deals that were claimed. We also checked the websites of the stores featured to see if you could get the same discounts without the codes.
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We’ve got Find out which voucher site is best for:
However, bear in mind the fact that the offers displayed on these sites change frequently, so it’s always worth shopping around in order to get the best deal. See below for a rundown of all the main voucher sites, or go straight to our conclusion.
The test
What was bad - One of their Body Shop deals didn’t need a code and the voucher had expired anyway. Another one, for 10% off any online purchase, simply didn’t work at all. They have a place where you can vote on whether a specific code worked or not and then the number of votes are dipslayed
What was good -The free delivery voucher for orders over £249 at Currys worked well and we were able to save ourselves £6 on orders over £35 at Hawkins Bazaar.
What to watch out for - This site has a button on each coupon for you to click to say whether or not the code worked, which wasn’t a very promising start.
What was bad- A few links were broken and although Save.co.uk promotes the fact that they check their voucher codes daily, some hadn’t been checked for a couple of weeks. The site is also jam-packed full of information, which is a little overwhelming when you’re trying to navigate your way through it.
What was good- The site offers printable vouchers as well as online ones which is a plus, and they really give you a good heads-up when it comes to offers that are going out of date. Their “staff picks” and “today’s most popular vouchers and deals” is also a nice touch and the fact that they promote deals as well as vouchers means you get a good idea of what’s really on offer.
What to watch out for- If you see an offer you want to go for be sure to click on the voucher code itself and not the name of the deal (e.g. 25% off voucher). By clicking on the name of the deal you will be sent straight to its corresponding site, which is a pain if you haven’t noted down the discount code.
What was bad - We thought the site looked cheaply made and had a limited range of offers. On the day we tested, the site’s grocery section only offered deals on products we had never heard of. Many of which were either out of date or simply didn’t work at all.
In the travel section, the multi-attraction passes on offer are in fact available to anyone.
What was good - The site did have some printable money-off coupons for you to use in Spar shops and a deal where you could save money in Focus stores
What to watch out for - This site has an American and a British version so make sure you click on the UK version if you are going to use it or you’ll end up with a load of offers for American stores.
- Onlinevoucher.co.uk
What was bad - A coupon for Halfpriceperfumes was invalid which was a pity as we hadn’t seen this voucher anywhere else.
We looked at a voucher for £5 off toys and gadgets at Gizoo but after applying the code we were given free delivery instead.
What was good - Another voucher for 5% off at Lingerieplease did what it said it would and also gave us extra shopping vouchers to use with them another time.
This site has a long list of companies they have vouchers for and they are easy to find on the alphabetised list.
What to watch out for - Many of the other vouchers on this website are the same as on other sites but on the plus side, it does specify which of its deals are meant to be exclusive, so you can see at a glance which will get you something different.
What was bad - This site offered 20% off at Marks and Spencer but the same offer is available on the M&S website, so you won’t be saving anything extra.
When we tried to save money on Cadbury chocolates we weren’t given a code to use.
The money off books at Play.com link took us to a Batman DVD instead, albeit with free delivery but that is available on the store’s website so again, no saving there.
What was good - This site offered discounts on a wide range of products from books to pet care.
What to watch out for - This site has codes to use when pre-booking a parking space at your local airport. However, you can save money by pre-booking direct with the airport so this voucher was worthless.
What was bad - This site had a free delivery coupon to use at Argos but it and all the other Argos discounts it offered, expired on the same day we looked at them. So clearly you need to be quick to make use of these coupons.
They also include categories such as home insurance and car hire in the contents list on their home page but when we clicked on them it either went to a blank page or to a list of companies but with no current offers.
What was good - We didn’t find anything much to like about this site on the day we checked but another day it might have better deals.
What to watch out for - The site is very cluttered which makes it a little hard to navigate until you get used to the layout.
What was bad - We liked the sound of a voucher for 5% off Christmas hampers at Virginia Haywood.com but when we tried to use it, the code flashed up on the screen and then was gone before we got the chance to make a note of it.
What was good - The best vouchers on this site were in the Tickets and Events section, with money off vouchers for activity days at Buyagift.co.uk. We saved £5 on the cost of a Ferrari driving day.
We also got 20% off a set of headphones at AdvancedMP3players.co.uk.
What to watch out for - Most of the other categories we looked at had no coupons available on the day we checked and we found this a little discouraging but again, on another day things might be different.
What was bad - Many of the so called bargains on this site are simply deals that the stores offer themselves anyway.
Vouchercodes had a deal for Christmas trees at John Lewis that was simply the store’s standard price. It also says that you can get £100 cashback on laptops but again, that was available at John Lewis itself.
Another voucher for money off at Game was already expired when we tried to use it.
What was good - The voucher for £19.85 off at WeightWatchers did work when we tried it and didn’t need a code, you just followed the link on the site.
What to watch out for - This is another site that at first glance can seem a bit overwhelming. Try using the colour coded categories on the left hand side to make life easier.
What was bad - We tried to use the £151 off car insurance offer available on this site but it didn’t save us a penny on our quote. However, there are so many variables involved with car insurance so it might work better for people with simpler requirements.
Both of the two discount codes we tried to use at Thorntons failed to work and we were told that they didn’t exist.
What was good - We did get 10% off at Mothercare with a voucher which saved us £35 on the price a pushchair.
What to watch out for - Many of the vouchers listed on this site are the same as others we’ve seen elsewhere so the implicit exclusivity with most voucher sites is certainly not true here.
What was bad - We looked at a great sounding offer to save £44 per year on magazine subscriptions but it was the same saving that anyone can make from subscribing and paying by direct debit.
The voucher for £30 off a satellite navigation gizmo at Halfords, only covered a model that was not available.
We also tried to save money on products and delivery at Whittard of Chelsea with several different codes but none of them worked.
What was good - We really liked the way this site is presented. It looks much more professionally done than many of the others and that makes it much more user friendly.
What to watch out for - This is another site that asks you to let them know whether the codes work, so maybe we shouldn’t have been surprised that the codes we tried weren’t working.
What we liked…
We were quite impressed with the selection of Dixons deals at Myvouchercodes. These kinds of deals are great for saving money on items you are already planning to buy but don’t be persuaded by discounts to pay for something you aren’t actually looking to purchase.
We also loved the money off coupons for activity days at Voucherheaven. This was partly just because it worked smoothly but also because it was something a bit different from the usual shopping offers around.
The visual presentation of the majority of the voucher code websites we checked appeared to be a bit on the cheap side but Everydaysale was much more slick looking, which we really appreciated.
What we thought…
The Moneymagpie team were pretty unimpressed with most of the sites we checked. There do seem to be a few good offers available but they are hard to find and it can be a pretty dispiriting search for a code that actaully does what it claims to do.
If you have the time and patience to trawl through the many vouchers on each of the various sites then they can save you a bit of money. But it certainly isn’t a quick or easy process and it isn’t going to make a huge difference to the price you end up paying. Especially as in most cases the discounts are taken off before the delivery charges are added.
If you are looking for anything in particular you might well be disappointed, as vouchers are only available for certain items and often only for short periods of time. If you happen to look at just the right site at just the right time, you might get lucky and find something you want with a discount code that works. We at Moneymagpie would suggest that you only use these sorts of voucher sites if they are offering discounts on a wide variety of products in a shop you would be looking at anyway.
It is also important to look out for expiry dates on coupons because the sites are not always updated on a daily basis and it can be extremely frustrating to waste precious time filling in your details only to be told at the last possible moment that the voucher is no longer valid.
Many of the sites also had a section that announced new or exclusive vouchers codes but many of these were either not exclusive or simply didn’t work, so don’t necessarily believe what they say.
On the day we tested we really weren’t impressed with many of the vouchers we looked at on these sites. Moneymagpie’s Sarah uses them a lot though and says they can sometimes be great for money off at Pizza Hut and for getting free delivery on your online grocery shopping orders. So keep an eye on the websites and see what you can find!
Useful links…
- MyVouchercodes
- Wow-coupons
- Onlinevoucher
- Shopping-bargains
- Latestdiscountvouchers
- Voucherheaven
- Vouchercodes
- Discountvouchercodes
- Everydaysale
What are your top picks for voucher codes? Let us know on the Money Talk Forum.
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