The rules are the rules, and there is no way of getting around them, right? Well, not necessarily.
Whether we're talking about the law or just simple product promotions, if there's a flaw within a system, it's only a matter of time before someone figures out how to capitalize on it.
#1
Little community center/arcade where I used to live as a kid had an air hockey table in the back room. Somebody figured out that if you jimmy the coin slot in just the right way, you could get an extra 3-4 games out of one quarter until the thing was fully pressed in and you'd have to put in a new one. None of us had much money, so this was a lifesaver. The employees didn't really care because what money we did have was typically spent at the snack bar, so they made money off us anyway.
I kind of miss that place. They always had fresh watermelon for free for kids who had absolutely no money so nobody would feel left out.
252points
The now-viral question came to Rokzo after they had seen a similar thread elsewhere. (In fact, we at Bored Panda have covered a couple here and there as well.) "I always enjoy reading what people have to say, but sometimes reposting the question yields different answers so it's nice to see what different things people come up with," OP told us.
"Personally, if I gain a new perspective on how to do or approach something, maybe I can become more efficient at it. A loophole doesn't have to be a 'cheat' per se, it can be a 'path of least resistance' that can lead to quicker or better results," they added.
#2
Guy from Russia, if I remember right, scanned a credit card agreement offer he recieved, changed all the terms to be in his favor and sent it back, they let him use the card but ended up taking him to court. He won because they didn't read their terms and conditions that he had altered!!!
243points
But Rokzo also believes that loopholes don't have to be used to take advantage of anyone or anything. At the end of the day, you're the one who's in charge of your actions, so "be kind and use [loopholes] for good. It doesn't cost anything to be nice, and good advice is free too, so use the newfound wisdom to better yourself or those around you."
But if you need reassurance, there's plenty. Both companies and individuals dance around rules and regulations for any edge they can find. For example, take The Pandora Papers leak which includes 6.4 million documents, almost 3 million images, more than 1 million emails, and almost half-a-million spreadsheets.
There's the ruling Qatari family who avoided £18.5m tax on a London super-mansion, the Czech prime minister's failure to declare an offshore investment company used to purchase two French villas for £12m, and over 330 other politicians from 90 countries who use secret offshore companies to hide their wealth.
#3
I am the lucky beneficiary of a loophole:
Back in the 1960s, a school district in my hometown was broken up and absorbed into the surrounding districts.
Fast forward to 2003. I'm applying to colleges. I discovered that there was a scholarship fund for people living in that old district's area (like me). The district is gone, but the scholarship still exists! I applied, and got the scholarship. I don't think there were any other applicants.
209points
#4
Torvill and Dean’s bolero at the 1984 Winter Olympics lasted 4 minutes and 18 seconds, but Olympic rules state that performances can’t be longer than 4 minutes.
However, the timer doesn’t begin until the skates touch the ice, so they did the first 20ish seconds of their performance on their knees.
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206points
#5
In West Virginia there was a law that waived taxes for automobile title transfers between parents and children. A friend wanted to buy a car from his uncle. So the uncle sold the car to his father who then sold it to his other son who sold it to his own son, my friend. Three transactions. Zero taxes.
185points
#6
I used to work in a call center doing tech support for a dial-up ISP. The 10 hour plan was $9.99 and then there were various tiers including an unlimited plan for $50 or something like that.
I ended up moving to a different city and called up the call center to set up internet and I asked for the 10 hour plan. The guy (who didn't know I used to work there) tried to talk me into a bigger plan, but I stuck with the 10 hour plan.
Why? Because the company had no system for monitoring usage. You could use as much data as you wanted and it was all the same to them. There was no tracking system in place.
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173points
#7
A man in China purchased a first-class plane ticket — and used it to eat a year’s worth of free meals at the VIP lounge at Xi’an International Airport. The frequent diner purchased a first-class, fully refundable ticket aboard Eastern China Airline. He used the ticket to gain access to the airport’s VIP lounge, where high-rolling travelers dine for free, according to a report last week in the Chinese-language newspaper Kwong Wah Yit Poh in Malaysia. The man re-booked his first-class ticket over and over again and kept the gravy train rolling. Eastern China Airlines officials only recently figured out the man’s scheme after noticing his single ticket being re-booked 300 times over one year, according to the newspaper report. Airline officials admitted there was nothing they could do to stop the frequent diner.
A spokeswoman for the carrier called the man’s free-meal scheme a “rare act.” Still, Eastern China Airlines officials confronted him, and the human meal ticket stopped chowing down. The freeloader ended up cashing in his fully refundable ticket and getting back all his money.
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171points
#8
My brother once yelled "last one to jump in the pool is gay," and then jumped into the pool. However, I figured out that if I did not jump in then technically he would be the last one in the pool, and he is still gay to this day.
160points
#9
There was once a big uproar at some sporting event where the venue had an exclusive deal with Aquafina or Dasani, and they HAD to sell only that water. Any vendor on premise was forbidden from selling any other bottled water.
So the vendors started doing this: They posted signs saying, "Single peanut for sale, $1, free water bottle included with every peanut purchase." Genius.
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150points
#10
Went to a private school where the teachers were real power hungry sh*t heads, you could get in trouble for having your shirt untucked, and some would be real a*s bags about it, literally crouched down and scooting along the benches at lunch time, ie even at lunch if it popped out while sitting you could get in trouble, I ran through the school hand book and it said sweaters with the school emblem can be worn at any time, so I bought one 3 sizes too big and wore it constantly, it went down to almost my knees and I would happily announced that I wasn't even wearing the uniform shirt let alone tucking it in. the a*s teachers got pissed off and took it to the school dean but I was right and it was allowed, like half the school switched to sweaters after that.
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148points
#11
There was a promotion a bunch of years back where Hoover included a plane ticket to select destinations around the world (from Europe) with any purchase of one of their products over $100. People could buy a vacuum that was like $109 and get a $600 plane ticket for it. Hoover ended up having to have people work crazy overtime to fulfill the demand for the cheapest model, and eventually they stopped honoring the promotion, which caused the people who hadn’t collected on it yet to sue them.
The company made 30 million from the promotion and lost 50 million in plane tickets and legal fees
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137points
#12
i still use the loophole of jumping on a shuttle bus out of LAX to a parking garage(/or hotel, yes) and then calling an Uber/Lyft from there to avoid the airport prices. Brings the ride home down to $10 from $40.
133points
#13
When I was in college, a parking sticker to park your car on campus was something like $250 a semester.
Senior year, we were sick of this, so I bought one, stuck it on my car, (it was front facing and stuck to the inside of your window facing out) and then we took a high resolution photo of it. We edited the photo on a laptop and sent it to a sticker making company. They printed a sheet of those for like 8 bucks. We got a couple pages of stickers and gave them out to our trusted friends.
As long as no one parked illegally or next to each other on campus, there was no reason parking police would notice we had the same parking number. Never got caught and saved a ton of money because we split the price of the original sticker.
10/10 would do it again. But you best believe I came out of that place with 45k in student loans, but that’s a separate issue.
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128points
#14
In music festival or venue that use reusable cups, you usually pay like 1$ for the cup refundable when you bring it . There's always cups left everywhere that people are to trashed to bring back. Collect a couple, cash the refund and there you go : free drink.
Drank all day long for 5$ at Osheaga the last time I went.
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125points
#15
When I was 10-11ish, I really loved my little pony. And there was an app on the app store for equestria girls (an MLP spinoff), where you did quests and stuff. Well, to complete the quests you often needed help from MLP characters. The way that you got their help was either by scanning a doll, or using gems. You had to pay for gems, and only got them for free rarely. I had no Equestria Girls dolls, so this really sucked for me. Until I thought, "Hang on, what's stopping people from just going to the store and scanning dolls?" which then led me to realizing that I could just look up pictures online and scan them. It ended up working, and I was so proud I bragged to my mom about it for ages.
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124points
#16
In the shipyard, you gotta have safety glasses. If you lose them, our safety department makes you talk to your boss's boss and have him write a note saying that he talked to you so you can have another pair of glasses. Well, I walked in to the safety office without safety glasses and asked for another pair. They said to go get a note. I then asked if they were going to let me walk out without any safety glasses. They knew that wasn't allowed, so they gave me a scratched up pair. Well, the reason they had those on hand is because you can trade your scratched ones for new ones. So I took the scratched ones, dealt with them for a day, and then went in the next day and traded them in for new ones. Never had to talk to my boss's boss and get a note.
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107points
#17
NY State had a glitch in their Motor Vehicle system for a while. If you got a moving violation, you would plead guilty, and overpay it by $5. They would send you back a check for $5, but you don't cash it. They would not apply points to your license until the case was fully adjudicated. If you waited until a year passed, and then cashed it, those points would roll off, so you would never actually have any points showing on your license.
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101points
#18
In the Netherlands you can get crazy discounts in the december month with a coupon in the mac Donalds app. But these coupons would expire after like 4 min so you couldn’t use it all day. The loophole was that you just could screenshot the QR-code on the coupon and use is al day. Oooh I gained so many kilograms that december. Dont mind my bad english btw..its not my mother Tongue you know.
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99points
#19
The promotion at subway were you would get a free 6 inch sub if you bought a 25$ gift card. Then you buy another gift card with your 25$ gift card and get an other sub. You could do that to infinity the year after they changed it so you cant buy gift cards with gift cards
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96points
#20
A good shot but not eventually a real loophole was the "drink Pepsi, get a Harrier jet" guy.
In 1996, Pepsi ran a promotion where you could collect points by buying Pepsi products. The more points you got, the more stuff you could get, such as t-shirts, free Pepsi, sunglasses, etc. They also had a commercial where they advertised a Harrier jet for 7 million points.
One guy read the rules of the promotion and found that you could buy points fo $0.10. That means to get 7 million points you'd have to pay $700,000. The going cost for a Harrier at the time was about $20 million or so.
So, one guy raised the money, bought the points and demanded the jet. When Pepsi refused he sued them.
He lost, but it was a good try.
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93points