Rebates, Rebates everywhere, what's wrong with sales?

Boy, oh boy, do I hate rebates. It is so much work for so little possible gain. When you see a promotional flyer or e-mail showing a low, low price on something, it almost always now says after mail-in rebate tacked to the end of it. Ooooh, how that drives me crazy. It is bad enough doing it for home, but when it is for a business or large organization (like a university, for example!) it is even more ridiculous. To save $5 on a spindle of CD's, I am supposed to print out some form, fill it in, attach a receipt (which I was supposed to turn into accounting, which means I need to make a copy of it). Then I mail it in, costing an envelope and postage, hoping in 6 to 8 weeks I get a check back. Then I have to take that check and send it to our accounting group to take the measly $5 and put it back into our budget. What a long convoluted chain of events to save my organization a lousy $5. Do any organizations really do this? Or does one of the employees just take the rebate check themselves (it would probably be cheaper for the organization)? The total cost to an organization of processing a $5 or $10 rebate seems incredibly high, and I cannot see it as being worthwhile unless the rebate is at least $50 or more. Why can't retailers and manufacturers just lower the price? Then they would see people flocking to buy their products, instead of trying to tempt them with annoying rebates. That is why I like places like NewEgg, which does offer some rebates, but mostly just offers everyday low prices. Places like Best Buy, CompUSA, and Office Depot have a rebate on everything, and they drive me crazy.

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