What is a "rain check"?

RoadWarrior2Go

Actually, a rain check has a couple of meanings. I believe it originally came from baseball. It was when a customer was given a new ticket for the make-up game if a baseball game is started but does not reach the point of becoming official (5 complete innings). This idea is generally credited to Charles Ebbets. As noted below it is also something retailers do for customers when the merchant runs out of an advertised item. The merchant will give the customer a rain check to buy the out of stock item when it is back in stock. Another use of the term rain check is when people decline an invitation. If someone asks you to go out for drinks and you either can't go or don't want to go you might politely ask them for a rain check suggesting you'll do it at a later time. http://www.bartleby.com/61/54/R0025400.html Dec 25 07, 7:45 AM

breeze51

I just discovered that this same question was asked by darkpresence in November 2006. Skymoms65 gave the following answer: This term comes from baseball, where in the 1880s it became the practice to offer paying spectators a rain check entitling them to future admission for a game that was postponed or ended early owing to bad weather. By the early 1900s the term was transferred to tickets for other kinds of entertainment, and later to a coupon entitling a customer to buy, at a later date and at the same price, a sale item temporarily out of stock. http://www.answers.com/topic/rain-check Dec 25 07, 6:57 PM

McGruff

This has been asked a number of times. http://www.funtrivia.com/askft/Question24964.html http://www.funtrivia.com/askft/Question42974.html http://www.funtrivia.com/askft/Question72373.html Dec 26 07, 12:05 AM