Of course not. It's not my job to audit the company's books to find money they have thrown away. But watching my own money is my responsibility, so if they charged me $100 instead of $10 you bet I would.

I use the $25 coupon occasionally. I got a few for a local Italian restaurant and the waiter told me they were phasing them out and this would be that last time. I have two more printed for the same place. :confused:

The ones you already bought shouldn't expire. Just remember that most, I think, are limited to one per month.

Also, as far as I'm concerned, that's a good sign for the restaurant when they stop with these insane deals. That means they're probably healthier, financially.

Does anyone know the economics behind these? What cut of the coupon price, if any, ends up at the restaurant? Is restaurant.com just banking on a huge non-use amount?

Correct, 1 per month, expire in one year, good Sun-Thurs.

While I totally agree that one should not intentionally try to reuse a certificate that has already been used, it is not the restaurant that gets screwed. The money one pays for the certificate goes to restaurant.com, not the restaurant itself.

Every time I have used a certificate, the restaurant has kept it. I print the certificates right when I buy them and put them in a folder. That way, if I have a copy of the certificate, I know it has not been used.

There is a serial number on the certificate that is reported to Resturaunt.com. It can only be used once.

If the restaurant drops out of the system, they will no longer be valid unless the restaurant wishes to redeem them. If they don't want to redeem them, contact restaurant.com and they will give you two codes valid for 2 other certificates of your choice.

These are promotions, advertising for a restaurant. It has nothing to do with the health of a restaurant. A good restaurant that is doing well knows it has to expose itself to new customers and different segments, such as price sensitive customers. This is a great avenue for restaurants to do so in a very cost effective way.

As previously stated in this thread, Restaurant.com gets all the money from the certificates. The restaurants even have to pay to be part of the service and agree to be in it for 1 year minimum.

I didn't think of that. Thanks.

The once per month rule is tough as I now no longer give them as gift certificates. One month we tried using one and were told that we used one a week prior, which wasn't true. We didn't argue with the waiter, we just didn't use the cert. I then checked with a friend who used I one I got him the prior week.

I now only give them as GC's for either other cities, or restaurants I don't go to.

Restaurant.com works a lot like the Entertainment Book discounts. It's another form of advertising or promotion. Entertainment keeps what you pay for the book and the restaurant pays by giving you the discount. In many cases the restaurant doesn't even have to pay Entertainment for appearing in the book. In fact, the more restaurants Entertainment can recruit for the book, the more valuable the book is and the more books Entertainment can sell.

These are really excellent forms of advertising, since it allows the restaurant to measure quite precisely how well the advertising is working. With standard types of advertising, it is much more difficult to measure the effectiveness of an ad.

So same thing for RewardsNetwork? The restaurants just eat the discount for the advertising?

Yes. It's just like they were issuing their own coupon but through a different avenue.

The best thing is if you can match up a Restaurant.com participating restaurant with a RewardsNetwork.com participating restaurant. Although technically against the rules from each, I have double-dipped with both promotions many times by paying with a registered credit or debit card, of course.

Today especially if your restaurant isn't promotion minded, with few exceptions, you'll be closing forever soon.

I've had almost all these issues... Being in California, my certs don't expire.