cut-rate

cut-rate (not comparable)

1. Offered for sale or rent at a lower than usual rate.

   Synonym: discount

   Sometimes cut-rate airfares are available because the seat would otherwise go empty.

   • 1961 January, “News in Brief”, in Trains Illustrated, page 10:

     Cut-rate first class return fares are again on offer for weekend travel between London and Glasgow or Edinburgh until March 25; compared with the ordinary fare of £10 16s, £7 10s is the Saturday price of a first class return between Euston and Glasgow, while £7 7s 6d, instead of £10 13s, buys a first class return on Saturdays between Edinburgh Waverley and Kings Cross ...

2. (by extension) Cheaply made.

   Synonym: discount

   Antonym: first-rate

   Near-synonyms: second-rate, third-rate, fourth-rate, fifth-rate

   For this jobsite, we'll have none of those shoddy, cut-rate materials, please. Send us the good stuff for this job.

• curtate