I came across an article recently about how to save money and shop on-line more effectively by taking advantage of freely available merchant discount codes. These codes can be entered at the checkout page of most on-line retailer web sites and can result in some real savings ($29 on average) with minimal effort. Well, I put this to the test over the weekend when I bought a digital camera. It was a regular single click Sony model which I bought for around $200 from an on-line retailer I found through Amazon.com. Using a 15% merchant discount code I was able to get $30 off the price - not bad for a few minutes of effort.

So how I did I find the relevant merchant discount code? There are various sites like, Currentcodes.com, RetailMeNot.com and CoolSavings.com but all I did was a Google search for "Sony Cameras on-line discount merchant codes 2008" and I got a whole list of codes. I picked the one that gave me the best deal and used it successfully when paying for the camera. Obviously you would substitute "Sony Camera" with whatever product you are looking for and the more specific you are (e.g. include a model number if you know it) the more accurate your search results. Adding the date will ensure more recent and unexpired coupon codes. Instead of the word "code" you could also use the word "coupon" as these are basically the same thing.

If you don't find anything you only wasted a few minutes, but the potential savings make the time to do this search well worth the effort. What's good about this simple saving strategy is that you can probably find a code/coupon for virtually any product or merchant that sells online. The sites that aggregate all these discount codes don't charge users because they can support themselves in a variety of ways, ranging from selling ads to sharing revenue with companies whose codes appear on the site. So if you see one trying to charge you money, move on.

Here are four points from the "experts" worth remembering when you next shop on-line:

•Never go to on-line checkout without first visiting a coupon-code website — or several — to see if there's a deal to be had.
•Do price comparisons of the product you're buying even if the deal already sounds good. Without a discount, it might not be the best price out there. Shopzilla and Froogle are among the best price-comparison sites.
•Factor in whether free shipping or a discount is more valuable before choosing one promotion over another if you're allowed only one such discount.
•Try to "stack coupons" — that is, bundle several codes together for more savings. Many online stores allow this, so it's always worth trying.

All the points are valid and useful, but I found that "stack coupons" rarely worked. Most only accepted a single coupon code and so pick the one that gets you the best saving. For example a $20 off coupon is only better than a 20% off coupon, if the price is less than $201.

The full article from USA today can be found here.

Photo courtesy PPDIGITAL

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Well Toshiba's HD-DVD format player was officially killed today by the Sony-Blu ray format. For me this is personal as I had bought a Toshiba A3 HD-DVD last year around Christmas, now an obsolete piece of technology. I got a good deal for it at the time - $169, but it is now selling for close to $120 as stores try to get rid of stock. It'll get cheaper over the weeks until it becomes a collectable.

The DVD format battle had been fought during the past several years. Sony has led a group backing its Blu-ray technology. Toshiba has promoted its HD DVD format, which it touted as the affordable choice for consumers. Persuading major film studios and US retailers (like Walmart and Best Buy) to issue movies in the Blu-ray format was crucial in Sony winning the battle. They lost the home video war - Sony Betamax versus VHS, but they won this time around. Toshiba is planning to stop production of all HD-DVD players by March 1st 2008 and to completely phase out the HD-DVD players by mid-year. No refunds or compensation will be provided to consumers who bought HD-DVD players.

There will be no more movies released in the HD-DVD format, so what's out there will be what's left. I can still play regular DVD's on the player so it will still have some use for me. I did buy it for the HD format, so it'll be disappointing not to have movies in that crystal clear format going forward. What's most annoying is that for the price I paid, I could have bought a top of the line regular DVD player instead of a mid-range HD-DVD player. Ah well, that's life in the technology fast lane. Overall for consumers this is a good thing as there is now only one choice for high definition DVD players.

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With the housing market in terrible shape and the number of foreclosures rising every day, mortgages have become a risky business. So to help you navigate the home loans jungle, I suggest a site called Refinance.com which is a free, online home mortgage refinance comparison portal that helps match consumers with lenders based on meeting their specific mortgage refinance needs. There is a considerable amount of information on the site to help consumers through this process and hundreds of lenders to choose from. No matter which state you are in, you can find rates for new home loans or mortgage refinance needs. There are also a number of useful mortgage calculators on the site with the “Easy Refinance Calculator” and “Which Loan Can I Afford?” great if you are looking to refinance your loan.

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