Beware of the free printer

Last week I purchased a new laptop at a major brick and mortar electronics reseller. As I was completing my purchase, the salesperson asked me if I wanted the free printer included as a bonus that week with every laptop purchase.

I thought to myself, “I don’t need a new printer.” But free is awful hard to pass up. Was there a catch? Yes. The dreaded rebate. The printer really costs $90.00 with $90.00 in rebates. Not one rebate, but two. Ugh.

Well, I decided to go ahead and take the printer figuring it to be another opportunity for me to review and test out a new printer. The next day I cracked open the box, removed the packaging material, installed the print cartridge and plugged in the printer. The only step remaining was to connect the printer to the PC via the included USB cable. The included USB cable. The included cable. Where is that darn included USB cable? Gotcha! There was a second catch. There was no included USB cable.

OK, I thought to myself. No biggie. I’ll just run back to the store to pick up a USB cable which I was sure costs under $10. Wrong again. $31.99 for a USB cable! So now I’m paying $90.00 plus $31.99 plus tax for my “free” printer.

I decided that I am savvy enough to find a quality USB cable for much less than $31.99 so I went back home and hit the Internet. A few minutes later, I found this gem at Amazon.com. Problem solved and under my budget no less.

I probably don’t need to say this because you’ve all heard it a hundred times, but printers are no exceptions. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.