No, Costco isn’t giving away $41 coupons to celebrate its 41st birthday. First of all, the outfit by itself is 34 years old. Second, a Facebook voucher getting wide attention is a scam.
Spotted as long ago as October, the fraud post said: “Costco – $41 OFF on Purchase of $50 or more to celebrate its 41st birthday.”
Botcrawl noted: “This is a survey-scam designed to phish personal information.”
Nearly a month ago, Costco itself warned consumers:
The membership store has a long-standing policy on such come-ons:
In December 2011, in fact, Costco was a target for another scam.
A survey purporting to offer free $1,000 Costco gift cards to those who follow particular links then do as told once there spread via Facebook,” Snopes said.
“In March 2012, the scam reappeared touting ‘Get a FREE $500 Costco Gift Card for FREE! (limited time only),’ and it popped up once again in October 2014 offering a ‘200 Costco cash card.’”
Several hoax websites seeking personal information are floating around, including: costco-com-2018.com and >costco-deals.life.
Some who took (or laid) the bait:
Costco celebrates New Year by providing FREE $41 voucher to Everyone! this week. https://t.co/Ff9Zqk2nSS
— Joyce South (@Roxjoyce) January 4, 2018
Get a Free $41 Costco COUPON to Celebrate their 41st Birthday https://t.co/JtFez8Rky8
— Shirley Jarrett (@shirleyjarrett) December 23, 2017
Get a Free $41 Costco COUPON to Celebrate their 41st Birthday https://t.co/7x0tshBDRI
— Jeanette Abernethy (@Jeanettea1Ab) December 20, 2017