I was a grocery store manager. Manufacturers do not offer valid print-at-homee coupons for free items that do not require a purchase. These are always fake coupons and the store is not reembursed for those.

They may offer a Buy One/Get One, but if you see a print at home coupon that says "Free Coke" with no other purchase necessary. It is a fake coupon.

A few years ago, some of the major print-at-home coupon services were either hacked or people were making counterfeits with their names on them. People were coming in with coupons for a Free full size box of Velveeta cheese. It would scan just like the others, but then a couple weeks later we get the message that those are fake. We just lost around $6 per coupon.

Then they started making fakes that weren't Free. They would be for $2.99 off a bottle of Simply Orange juice. That is pretty close to the actual price of the OJ, but doesn't say FREE so not raising red flags. They got a lot of those through before the store gets notice that they are fake.

So what is the store to do? There is no way to know which are real or not. We would receive a list each month of new ones they had found, but there is no way for the cashiers to memorize all of them. So the stores start making more stringent print-at-home coupon rules.

Basically, if a manufacturer wants to offer a free item, it will be on the glossy paper and either be in with the clippable coupons in the paper, or mailed directly to the customer. Again, if you have a print at home coupon that says FREE with no purchase necessary, it is fake. You might be able to slip it through at a mom and pop store, but the bigger stores are not going to accept it. If a cashier overrides it and accepts it anyway, they are going to get in trouble for that because the store is not going to get paid for that coupon. I know this because I got my butt chewed more that once over those coupons.