Gift cards (1 Viewer)

[Terminalxylem]

We have a ton, which have been collecting dust in a file cabinet. Over 50, accumulated over the last decade.

Sorted them into categories, and threw away quite a few, either due to missing the expiration date, or the business no longer existing.

Anyway, I was trying to use the rest.

Started with Amazon cards. Their site is pretty easy to load cards directly into your account. The only problem is, over half the cards were inactivated. Not sure if there is an expiration date, as we've had some of them for years. In any event, I called the help line, and discover several were refunded. Not redeemed, refunded. Is it possible someone gave a gift card, then contacted Amazon to refund the balance? Seems crazy. In the end , I was only able to redeem $65 of $300+ No bueno.

My next goal is VISA gift debit cards. I've got ten of them, a couple Vanilla brand, three from work, and the rest labelled "GIFT CARD" in big letters. Only the Vanilla cards have the value designated on the card. Some require calling a number to activate them.

I tried to use one as payment for an online order at REI. I entered it into payment info, hoping I could use multiple cards in one transaction. No dice. Once I entered the first gift card, the order was immediately sent for processing. I have no idea what balance the card held, but it was definitely less than the order total. I was hoping the balance would be deducted from the total, and I could enter other cards, but now I have to call REI resolve the balance separately. What a PITA.

Anyone else have this problem?

Any tricks to consolidate the VISA debit cards? I've read you can load them onto PayPal or Venmo, but some fees may be applied.

Other ways to redeem/sell them?

 

[brun]

I recall there are sites that buy & sell cards with balances but don't recall what sites.

I use Amazon a lot so I always add new gift cards into my account promptly. I usually buy new Amazon gift cards when my gift card balance gets lower than 100.

 

[MTskibum]

I have about ~500 dollars in Dairy Queen gift cards. My grandpa gets 25 dollars of gift cards for each of my kids for every holiday.

It is even worse for my brother, they get the gifts cards yet live in Rock Springs, Wyoming and there is not a Dairy Queen within 200 miles of where they live.

 

[phandango]

Any tricks to consolidate the VISA debit cards? I've read you can load them onto PayPal or Venmo, but some fees may be applied.

My wife got a Vanilla Visa gift card from her boss for Christmas. What I ended up doing was loading it as a "gift card" balance on Amazon, since we order from there so much. Basically, you go to your Amazon account, go to the payments section, and at the left toward the bottom it'll say, "Add rewards and balances." What you're doing is using the Visa gift card to buy an Amazon gift card for yourself, which can then be used as Amazon credit. But you have to know the exact balance of the gift card.

 

[Willie Neslon]

There's a bunch of sites out there where you can sell gift cards or trade them for other gift cards. Just google "sites that buy gift cards". Here's one where you can trade your dairy queen cards for amazon and other cards.

https://www.cardcash.com/

 

[Desert_Power]

Any tricks to consolidate the VISA debit cards? I've read you can load them onto PayPal or Venmo, but some fees may be applied.

They should swipe at Costco. You could consolidate them all onto one big Costco card or just use them as purchases.

 

[ILUVBEER99]

I'll never understand why people give gift cards over cash. Cash is a universal gift card. It's not more classy to give a gift card. It just makes it a PITA for the recipient.

 

[RG623]

I'll never understand why people give gift cards over cash. Cash is a universal gift card. It's not more classy to give a gift card. It just makes it a PITA for the recipient.

Here’s money that was good anywhere, that is now good at only one place

 

[MTskibum]

There's a bunch of sites out there where you can sell gift cards or trade them for other gift cards. Just google "sites that buy gift cards". Here's one where you can trade your dairy queen cards for amazon and other cards.

https://www.cardcash.com/

Thanks, they would give me 67 cents on the dollar and i appreciate the help. We will use them all eventually, although we just got a new stack of 2 for easter.

 

[Uncle Leo]

These companies that sell these are laughing all the way to the bank. They collect your money and keep what you don’t use. That’s why the retailers sell these. Yes, some even sell competitors cards so they can collect your cash.

 

[jrt103]

sell them on ebay

 

[pollardsvision]

I'll never understand why people give gift cards over cash. Cash is a universal gift card. It's not more classy to give a gift card. It just makes it a PITA for the recipient.

Clark Howard loves to rant about gift cards. So much wasted money sitting on unused gift cards.

Not even considering how often they are used to scam old people.

 

[Brony]

I'll never understand why people give gift cards over cash. Cash is a universal gift card. It's not more classy to give a gift card. It just makes it a PITA for the recipient.

Cash might be used for hookers or jazz cigarettes. Gift card says "I Love You and Keep off the drugs you dirty hippie."

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I'll never understand why people give gift cards over cash. Cash is a universal gift card. It's not more classy to give a gift card. It just makes it a PITA for the recipient.

Cash might be used for hookers or jazz cigarettes. Gift card says "I Love You and Keep off the drugs you dirty hippie."

Yeah. So like he said. Give cash.

 

[MAC_32]

I track our gift cards on a tab within our grocery list on google keep. Before I did this we didn't take advantage of them all the time.

 

[Terminalxylem]

Ever heard of giftcardmall.com? Several of the cards are from there. None have the value printed on the card (unlike most other VISA debit gift cards). The help number on the back is non-operational, and the site requests an name/address/email to register the cards (required to activate the cards and limit money laundering, reportedly).

There is a tab to check the value of the cards without registering, but it started giving me an error message after I’d obtained the info for 3 of 5 cards (one of them was $200).

I‘m not a fan of giving my info willy-nilly, lest I end up on the receiving end of a bunch of spam/junk mail, or worse. And the whole thing seems kinda scammy to me. Plus I can’t recall who gave me the cards.

Anyone know more about cards from this site?

 

[massraider]

There's a bunch of sites out there where you can sell gift cards or trade them for other gift cards. Just google "sites that buy gift cards". Here's one where you can trade your dairy queen cards for amazon and other cards.

https://www.cardcash.com/

Thanks, they would give me 67 cents on the dollar and i appreciate the help. We will use them all eventually, although we just got a new stack of 2 for easter.

After Christmas, I used to make specific gift card trips. Like, gather them and go spend them, on a mission.

Amazon cards are the best, those coffee gift cards are from people who secretly hate you.

 

[Dan Lambskin]

we have quite a few unused ones, my wife gets a ton of Starbucks ones from her students

Amazon and Target get used pretty quickly, anything else sits in a drawer and I occasionally go through and try to plan usage for