Shop Scan Save - save money on your shopping [App of the week]

What is Shop Scan Save?

It’s an app which features money-off promotions for grocery and household products like toothpaste, food, washing tablets and drinks.

The savings can vary from 20p to £1 off the in-store price and can be redeemed in shops that use PayPoint, such as Co-Op, Spar, Londis and many local convenience shops – there are over 23,000 shops across the UK.

You get your own unique ID – or barcode – which is shown on the screen of your smartphone and will be scanned when you visit the shop. This is where the ‘scan’ comes in.

Simply select an offer item in the app, visit the store and ask the cashier to scan the app’s barcode to redeem the offer.

It’s all handled through the PayPoint terminal which prints a money-off coupon which the cashier scans at the till, followed by the barcode of the product you want to buy. You pay the discounted price and will have saved a few pennies.

Shop Scan Save is available free at the following links for Android and iPhone (iOS).

Read our app reviews for a look at some of the best apps available.

5 reasons to try Shop Scan Save

Offers are conveniently delivered to your smartphone
You don’t have to cut out or print coupons, or remember to take them with you. All the offers are to hand, so you might be out-and-about, need a light refreshment and can use the app to find an offer.
Offers are available locally across the UK
Over 23,000 shops across the UK have a PayPoint terminal, including many local convenience shops as well as well-known stores. It features a handy Store Finder which links with Google Maps. It detects your current location and displays the stores nearest to you on the map, along with the store name and its postcode.
It’s free and you’re not signing-up to any schemes
You might save money and it’s as simple as that. When you launch the app for the first time, you can opt out of any marketing and notifications.
New offers are available on a regular basis
The app is updated with new offers every couple of weeks. The latest offers are also posted on shopscansave.co.uk, so you can preview these before downloading the app. There’s even a free chocolate offer if you’re the first to redeem an offer in a shop.
You pay at the till – no payment details are required in the app
As you pay at the till there’s no security risks to worry about and if your phone is lost or stolen it can’t be used to buy things on an account.

Elisa’s impressions of Shop Scan Save

The app is easy to use and uncomplicated – I have a fairly basic Android smartphone and experienced no problems. There aren’t loads of screens to get lost in, just several sections – your ID screen (the barcode), How To, Offers, a store locator, and a section for the app’s settings and information.

It’s fairly new and while over 23,000 stores can participate, many may not be aware of the offers. However, a help guide is also included within the app so if the person behind the till doesn’t know how to redeem the offer, you can help talk them through it. It’s pretty straightforward after the first time.

Plus, if you’re the first person to redeem an offer at that store, the app will be updated with an offer for a free 4-finger KitKat within 24 hours (even better). You can use the store finder to check if a store has been used to redeem an offer – those indicated by a green dot are where no offers have been redeemed yet. Any purple dots still indicate a store where you can redeem the offer, it just means that someone has beaten you to claiming that ‘first redeemer offer’ for the free chocolate.

It’s a shame that each offer in the app can only be redeemed once, but new offers are delivered to your smartphone every couple of weeks. The latest offers are also posted on shopscansave.co.uk, so you can preview these before downloading the app to see if there’s anything you’d like.