Cheap photo printing..is there a catch?

[BooseysMom]

I'm of a slightly older age (50!) and have always relied on Boots instant print service to print photos. The last batch has cost me over £20 for 42 photos some of which aren't even usable cos it takes too long to scroll up and down checking them. I'm aware of cheap printing services where you just send off what you want printing and only pay postage but surely there must be a catch somewhere! Or have I been wasting my money using this service when I should have used this?

I've always been pleased with online photos and have used a couple of different ones. Choose your digital prints carefully and spend some time selecting the right size, gloss or matte etc.

They take your data, that's how it's "free". Read the small print.

The online ones have been absolutely fine. So much so that I have no clue what customer service is like if things go wrong

I use the FreePrints app pretty regularly - 45 photos for about £3 in p&p. They've been fantastic tbh and I'd only bother with in person printing now if I needed something done urgently. Also their photo tiles are lovely.

For example:

"When you interact with our Services, even if you don't create an account or place an order with us, we may automatically collect information about your device and your browsing actions and patterns. We collect this information using cookies, server logs and other similar technologies as described in our Cookie Notice, which is available to you based on your location.

Some of our Services use data analytics companies, advertising networks, and/or social media companies to perform "cross-device tracking," which occurs when platforms, publishers, and advertising technology companies attempt to track a consumer's activities across smartphones, tablets, desktop computers and other connected devices. The aim of cross-device tracking is to enable us to associate your behavior with our services across devices."

They sell the data to social media and other advertising companies so they can build a full picture of people. The apps run in the background when you're not using them so they can track this kind of data.

You might not particularly care about that :) But equally, it might be a problem for you.

Thanks for the posts everyone.

This is amazing value! ...
I use the FreePrints app pretty regularly - 45 photos for about £3 in p&p.

But what I don't get is how do they even make any money from it when they only charge for p&p, even if they have your data?

Also DH has just pointed out that they also have your private photos whereas with an instant service like at Boots, there's no longer the option to order and collect later so they haven't got the photos.

They make money by selling the data that they collect. It's also very cheap to print photos if you've already got the printer and you're doing it at high volume.

I'm not sure whether they keep the rights to the photos -you'd need to check the terms and conditions. But in any case it's not much use to them if they do have photos because you can't do much with photos unless someone has signed a release form and they don't have things like brand logos on them. I used to use an app where you could supposedly get paid for photos and there was a lot of this red tape so it was really hard to make any money off it at all. They're not really interested in family snaps. It's the digital fingerprint your device holds that is valuable.

BertieBotts.

Thanks, i see now. When i think about the number of times I click on Accept Cookies, no end of companies have my data! So really I should just stop using the expensive Boots service and go online. I don't want to think about the amount of money I have spent on Boots prints!

I do think that sometimes. I give away my data for free all the time, might as well get something back for it.

They make money by trying to convince you to buy some of their enhanced products, like canvas printing etc. Freeprints are great. There is also a machine i've seen at our local ice rink that does cheap photo printing. not used it though.