Rebate + Rebate for 40D/5D?

By now most have heard of the upcoming Canon Instant Rebates, beginning May 18. In addition, beginning May 4, some vendors, like Amazon and Adorama, have offered a $300 rebate for purchase of a Canon Pixma Pro 9000 printer and 40D (or 5D), when purchased at the same time.

Now, that leads to some possibilities:

1. Combine both rebates? This would be an excellent deal. Picture this for example: Buy a 40D kit with 28-135mm IS lens for, let's say, $1100 after the instant $200 rebate (current Amazon price minus rebate). Add the Pixma Pro 9000 for about $450 for a total price of $1550. Sell the printer for, say, $375 after fees and shipping and the 28-135mm for maybe $325 and add the $300 rebate. Net cost for a brand new 40D = $550.
   
2. Reading the fine print on the 40D/Pixma rebate, near the bottom, it states that "Neither the Pro 9000 rebate (printer only) or the Pro 9000 and Digital SLR Rebate can be combined with any other offer or promotion". Now, what does that mean? Does it mean that you can't buy a 40D or 5D using an instant rebate and then try to claim the Pixma/40D(5D) rebate? How would that make sense? If so, it means that you pretty much can't buy a 40D or 5D after May 18 and expect to claim the $300 rebate at all. So the $300 rebate is essentially impossible to claim?

Most rebates ask you to cut out the UPC. If they do, you only have one UPC to submit.
*edit*.... nevermind, the rebates for canon now are instant. at least that's how it was last time.

jamesdmo wrote in post #5527421
By now most have heard of the upcoming Canon Instant Rebates, beginning May 18. In addition, beginning May 4, some vendors, like Amazon and Adorama, have offered a $300 rebate for purchase of a Canon Pixma Pro 9000 printer and 40D (or 5D), when purchased at the same time.

Now, that leads to some possibilities:

1. Combine both rebates? This would be an excellent deal. Picture this for example: Buy a 40D kit with 28-135mm IS lens for, let's say, $1100 after the instant $200 rebate (current Amazon price minus rebate). Add the Pixma Pro 9000 for about $450 for a total price of $1550. Sell the printer for, say, $375 after fees and shipping and the 28-135mm for maybe $325 and add the $300 rebate. Net cost for a brand new 40D = $550.
   
2. Reading the fine print on the 40D/Pixma rebate, near the bottom, it states that "Neither the Pro 9000 rebate (printer only) or the Pro 9000 and Digital SLR Rebate can be combined with any other offer or promotion". Now, what does that mean? Does it mean that you can't buy a 40D or 5D using an instant rebate and then try to claim the Pixma/40D(5D) rebate? How would that make sense? If so, it means that you pretty much can't buy a 40D or 5D after May 18 and expect to claim the $300 rebate at all. So the $300 rebate is essentially impossible to claim?

Can anyone make sense of this? I hope that scenario #1 is true, but I don't want to shell out $1550 to find out that it is not. Any idea how to verify whether the Pixma/SLR rebate is still good after May 18?

If this is possible, I am so down to do it.

I'm sure many will be doing this (including me). The resale market will be flooded with 28-135 lenses and printers. There is a $100 rebate on the printer without buying anything else so $440-100= $340. You will not sell the printer for $375 unless you hold it until the printer rebate expires (August 2), then put it up for sale. I'll probably keep my printer because $140 is a great price for a pro printer. Good luck to everyone on the resales.

EDIT: Some bodies are listed in the $999s'. If they sell in the $799s', then it will be good enough for me vs. the time and effort selling the other items.

I don't see why submitting the rebate would be an issue. The Canon rebate is an instant off so it is not like you need the UPC to submit for a paper rebate. As Linkzi said, I'll probably be doing the same thing too.

Well, you do have to submit the sales receipt for the printer/camera rebate and I wonder if the receipt will show evidence of the instant rebate. My only fear is that Canon may use this as a reason to deny the other one. You know how it is with rebates: most companies will take any excuse to deny them.

The key to this is not force the numbers. Realize that the printer is HUGE, so you will have to add about $40 for shipping (when I bought my 5D with Pixma 9000, shipping was close to $80). So your $430 printer is actually going to cost you more like $470. Now, let's assume you find somebody that is dumb, and doesn't realize there is a rebate on the printer and buys it for $375. You still have to eat the shipping and paypal fees, so net to you is roughly $325. There fore, you paid $470 for the printer, but only net'ed $325 for it, meaning you are now down approximately $150. You will get $300 in rebates from Canon, which means your NET rebate is $150 ($300 from Canon - $150 you have tied up in the Pixma printer). The numbers get worse if you don't sell the printer for $370, but closer to $300 (which is close to the going rate).

Don't kid yourself forcing the numbers to give you a deal that may not match reality. Be sure to include all of the HIDDEN costs when computing how much you will net.


If you really want to make this work out.

1. Buy the camera/printer from someplace that will give you free shipping
2. Sell the camera locally, so you do not have to incur shipping costs
3. Sell the camera for cash so you do not have to pay PayPal fees.

I did 2 of the 3, and saved myself about $80-90. I bought from B&H and they didn't offer free shipping (unlike Amazon), so I could have saved even more.

Very good advice, BigBlueDodge. If the hassle of potentially fighting Canon's rebate handling company plus selling on eBay which can be a minefield... if all of that is worth $150 or less then go for it. Don't inflate the numbers to make it an ideal situation--use realistic numbers and carefully weigh the benefits vs. the extra work/hassle of rebates and selling parts of the kit.

I agree. I've done this before and ended up getting my first Canon DSLR for net 1/2 cost, but you do have to keep all costs in mind and be realistic about resale value.

One thing going for me is that I have Amazon Prime and get free shipping always. I used the "going price" for the other items based on actual sales here and on Ebay. Just the other day someone bought the Pixma 9000 here on POTN for $375. When in doubt I estimate low.

True, some of the prices will deflate if lots of people do this. But, assuming that nobody would buy the printer for near the going rate would imply that Canon won't be able to sell any new printers to anyone that doesn't do the rebate. (Right.) Ebay is your friend on things like this because there are lots of people who don't look hard for the best deals. Anyway, no matter what, this ends up being a great deal.

If you have the cash up front to do this twice (and sell the second 40D along with the printer and lens) it gets even better. Use a family member's name for the second deal. You just better be real sure the rebate is good!