AbhiBus runs a separate coupon code for each state road transport corporation. We read all nine from its own offers data on 26 October 2026, with full terms. Every headline is roughly double what comes off the booking: "Save up to Rs. 500" on UPSRTC and HRTC is 10% up to Rs. 250 instant discount plus 10% up to Rs. 250 of AbhiCash cashback credited only after the journey - and existing users get Rs. 50 of cashback and no instant discount at all. The "Rs. 300" codes (APSRTC, TGSRTC, KSRTC, UTC300) split the same way. RJ100's "50% off" is 50% up to Rs. 100; OSRTC's 20% is capped at Rs. 75 but usable ten times per user, where most are once. No code needs a minimum fare, none can be combined with another offer, and all are operator-locked. Nothing was booked.

We read every offer line on makemytrip.com/offers/ on 26 October 2026 - 103 of them - and looked at the dates rather than the percentages. Sixty-nine carry an expiry date and not one states a year. They read "Expires on 31 Oct", "Expires on 30 Dec", "Expires on 31 Mar"; one reads "Expires on 30 Sep", which on 26 October is either four weeks past or eleven months away. Another 29 lines carry no validity text at all, and 5 run on a live countdown (all showing 08h:52m at the same moment - three of them ICICI Bank card offers). The dates cluster hard: 51 of the 69 land on just four days, 16 of them on 31 Oct. Fourteen named codes are published, and the longest-dated are the regional bus codes. Nothing was booked.

Flipkart's namkeen, biscuit, instant-noodle and tomato-sauce results read on 26 October 2026: 287 listings, 283 of which state a net pack weight in Flipkart's own pack-size field. Divided by that weight the shelf runs Rs. 9.26 to Rs. 504.29 per 100g - and the discount badge runs backwards against it. Rank every listing by unit price and quarter the list: the cheapest quarter carries a median 50% badge, the dearest quarter 13%. Shelf medians: sauce Rs. 32.50 per 100g, namkeen Rs. 33.50, biscuits Rs. 56.00, instant noodles Rs. 109.97. Inside the noodle shelf, imported brands run Rs. 131.26 per 100g at a 9% badge against Rs. 65.00 at 26% for everything else. 98 listings publish no rating. Nothing was bought or tasted.

Amazon's soan papdi, kaju katli, mithai gift box and rasgulla tin results read on 26 October 2026: 76 listings, 40 of which state a net weight in their own titles. Divided by that weight the shelf runs Rs. 18.80 to Rs. 337.50 per 100g - an eighteen-fold range inside one category. By type: tinned rasgulla and gulab jamun a median Rs. 20.20 per 100g, assorted gift boxes Rs. 39.90, soan papdi Rs. 46.00, kaju katli and barfi Rs. 172.25. The badge runs backwards against all of it - cheapest third by unit price, median 26% off; dearest third, 10%. The deepest badge in the read, 87% off a stated Rs. 2,300, is on the one seated listing with no rating. One tile was dropped for a Rs. 22,500 stated MRP on a Rs. 225 tin. Nothing was bought or tasted.

On 26 October 2026 we priced eleven shelves across six Indian retailers - about 1,100 live listings, all in one morning - and then asked what the discount badge measures. It measures the stated MRP, which the seller chooses. Rank any shelf by real unit price and the badge runs backwards: Flipkart grocery badges a median 50% on the cheapest quarter and 13% on the dearest; Amazon's mithai shelf, 26% against 10%. Inside one claimed MRP the percentage is just the price restated - 24 sweatshirts claiming Rs. 999 run Rs. 283 to Rs. 628 and 37% to 72%. Two shops print different "originals" for one product: a XECH kettle is 6% off on Amazon and 60% off on Flipkart, and the 60% listing is Rs. 57 dearer. Four stated MRPs in one morning were decimal-point errors producing 95-99% badges. Nothing was bought.

We priced lip balm, body lotion and cold cream on Nykaa and Amazon within one hour on 26 October 2026 - 38 and 62 listings - and matched every brand on both. The products that match exactly cost exactly the same: Laneige Lip Glowy Balm Rs. 675 on both, Deconstruct SPF 50 Rs. 193 on both. What differs is the evidence behind them - that Laneige balm carries 1,72,307 ratings on Nykaa and 24,792 on Amazon, and across the shelves the median count is 6,938 against 2,509. Where prices do diverge they diverge both ways: Nykaa is Rs. 49 cheaper on Deyga, Amazon Rs. 46 cheaper on WishCare. Amazon's shelf is wider and cheaper at the median (Rs. 199 vs Rs. 258) but its badges reach 95% on stated MRPs twenty times the price - two decimal-point errors we excluded. Nothing was bought.

Flipkart's "wifi router", "wifi range extender" and "dsl modem router" results read on 25 October 2026: 116 listings, 115 of them printing a Mbps figure, 93 rated. Priced against that figure the shelf runs Rs. 0.61 to Rs. 30.17 per stated megabit, median Rs. 3.50. Seventy-six of the 115 state exactly 300 Mbps - and inside that one tier the ticket runs Rs. 849 to Rs. 3,299 and the badge runs 1% to 76%. The deepest discount in the read, 76%, is Rs. 4.05 a megabit on four ratings; one of the cheapest megabits, Rs. 1.67, is badged 43%. No listing here states an MRP above 8x its price, which is unusual and to this shelf's credit. The Mbps figure is a theoretical link rate, not throughput. Nothing was bought or speed-tested.

Reliance Digital publishes the full terms of every card offer it runs as a separate page on its own site — 428 of them are listed in its own sitemap. We read fifteen on 25 October 2026. The "up to" figure is always the top-slab figure. The festive SBI offer headlined "Up to 15000 Instant Discount" pays Rs. 1,500 at its own Rs. 15,000 minimum; Rs. 15,000 needs a Rs. 2,00,000 purchase on credit card EMI. Above Rs. 50,000 the slabs are flat amounts, so the effective percentage falls as you spend more within a slab. Every offer page also excludes No Cost EMI transactions, so the instant discount and No Cost EMI cannot be combined — the product page does not say so. Two offers are live today; four indexed pages have already expired. Nothing was purchased and no card used.

Reliance Digital hosts the full terms of every payment offer it runs on its own site. We read seven UPI and coupon documents on 25 October 2026. The live UPI offer caps at Rs. 2,000; the live card instant discount caps at Rs. 10,000 — and because every page forbids clubbing, the method chosen at the last screen is worth up to Rs. 8,000 on a large basket. Two of these pages also contradict their own headlines: one is headed "5% upto Rs.5000" over a bullet reading "5% upto Rs.1000", another "Flat 5%" over a bullet reading "Flat 10%". Both have expired. The Smart Offer coupon pays Rs. 500 at Rs. 5,000 and Rs. 1,000 at Rs. 10,000, to "select customers" only, till 31 October 2026. A larger WhatsApp coupon was redeemable in-store only and ended 4 October. Nothing was purchased and no UPI transaction made.

Libas's own Diwali Sale collection, read on 25 October 2026: 212 products, 996 variants, every one of them discounted. Prices run Rs. 679 to Rs. 3,729 (median Rs. 1,694) and badges 44% to 89% (median 71%) — so the sale is real, and deeper than the '50 - 70% Off' Libas advertises, with 107 of 212 products beyond 70%. But the percentage is not telling you what you pay. Sorted by band, the median price barely moves — Rs. 1,789, Rs. 1,999, Rs. 1,774, Rs. 1,669, Rs. 1,199 — while the median stated MRP climbs from Rs. 3,299 to Rs. 6,749. Two kurtas here both cost Rs. 699: one is badged 89%, the other 83%. We also expected the deep markdowns to be broken size runs, tested it, and found the opposite. Nothing was bought or worn.

Reliance Digital runs No Cost EMI under two separate sets of published terms, both hosted on its own site. We read both on 25 October 2026. The rule that catches people out is the first one: the cart must contain exactly one item. Both pages state that any additional product or service item — installation, a warranty, an accessory — "will automatically disqualify" the No Cost EMI and the brand cashback with it. The TV and large-appliance scheme is stated valid till 30 November 2026; small domestic appliances till 31 December 2026, naming only HDFC, SBI and ICICI. Both warn that your own bank may charge an EMI conversion fee the store does not control. And because No Cost EMI is a brand-subvented transaction, it is excluded by name from every instant bank discount the store runs. Nothing was purchased and no EMI taken.

Amazon's "comforter double bed", "quilt razai double bed" and "duvet insert" results read on 25 October 2026: 86 listings, 80 rated, and only 34 stating a GSM figure. GSM - grams of filling per square metre - is the only published number that says how warm a comforter is, and grouped by it the discount runs backwards: 200-220 GSM averages a 70% badge, 300-400 GSM 56%, and genuine 500-600 GSM winter weights just 44%. Fifteen of the 34 are exactly 220 GSM and most call themselves an "AC Comforter" - summer bedding - in their own titles. The cheapest listing is Rs. 399 at 120 GSM badged 80%; the best-reviewed 500 GSM is Rs. 3,200 badged 29%. Four round MRPs cover 45 of the 86 listings. Nothing was bought or slept under.

The same three kitchen queries read on two retailers on 25 October 2026: 190 Flipkart listings and 79 Tata CLiQ listings for knife sets, chopping boards and dish racks. Each leaves you unable to judge what you are buying, by opposite routes. Flipkart's median discount badge is 74% on a median stated MRP of 3.87x the price — with Rs. 999 printed as the list price on 57 listings, 30% of the shelf, and 59 listings claiming more than 5x. But 82% of its listings carry a review history, median 291 ratings. Tata CLiQ's median badge is 30% on a 1.43x median MRP with nothing above 5x at all — yet only 33% of its listings are rated, and the median count among those is two. The baskets differ, so prices are not ranked. Nothing was bought.

Markers, highlighters and document files read on both marketplaces on 25 October 2026: 41 Amazon listings and 206 Flipkart listings. Here Amazon is the inflated shelf — a median stated MRP of 2.87x the selling price against Flipkart's 2.10x, and a 65% median badge against 52%. Three hours earlier, on home medical devices, the same two retailers ran 1.88x and 2.79x — the other way round. Neither marketplace has a pricing posture; the category sets it. Sixteen stated MRPs cover Amazon's whole stationery shelf, with Rs. 999 on eight listings. Flipkart's review coverage here is the weakest of the run: 57% of listings rated, median 72 ratings, against Amazon's 95% and 467. Nothing was bought or tested.

MakeMyTrip's offers page lists sales run by the airlines themselves alongside its own promotions. We read it on 25 October 2026 through a rendered browser — the cards do not appear in a plain fetch — and captured 102 offer rows. Five are carrier-run sales with five different end dates. Jazeera Airways' 21st Anniversary Sale at FLAT 21% off ends 30 October and is the deepest guaranteed airline discount on the page; EVA Air up to 15% runs to 12 November, Lufthansa up to 10% to 31 October, IndiGo at a flat 7% to 30 December, and Air Astana's free baggage offer to 26 October. Two things worth knowing: the anniversary sale is Jazeera's, not MakeMyTrip's, and one card on the page was still listed 25 days after its own stated expiry. Nothing was booked and no route was priced.