I have not but come across a sound purpose why there must be costs or expiration on gift cards. First, by getting gift cards, shoppers are basically giving the card issuers an unsecured loan, on which they earn no interest, even if the card is not redeemed for a year or far more. Second, if the company goes bankrupt, there is quite little opportunity the cash will be returned (except in a couple of situations, like lately with Linens and Items).
So, if consumers are taking on these dangers by acquiring gift cards, why should really they then be subjected to charges and expiration? They could possibly as effectively change the present card charge disclosures to read like this:
Dear Present Card Buyer,
We seriously appreciate the unsecured loan you gave us. With each other, you all gave us $97 billion in loans in 2007, up from $83 billion in 2006. You know we could use the additional cash, offered all the talk of a recession. We thank you for not charging us any interest or fees on the loan. We will put your cash to operate straight away and produce excellent returns on it. You could even hear about all the kudos we will get from Wall Street due to our outstanding earnings (which will be helped by the cash we get when your gift card expires). Heck, our CEO may possibly even purchase his third McMansion in the Hamptons after we reward him for generating excellent use of your loan. A handful of house cleaning products:
1. If you purchased the gift card from our web-site, we may possibly charge you a processing fee, separate from the shipping charge, in order to get you the card that shows that we owe you cash. Really feel cost-free to obtain stuff in our shop up to the amount of the loan (present card value). But if you don’t hurry, we will punish you just about every month by charging you ridiculous charges. These charges can begin as soon as six months into the loan. We may well even start off your costs as early as a month into the loan if we so want. And don’t forget, the charges will continue until the balance on your present card reaches ZERO. Why? Since we can. Yes, your state legislatures are all complaining about this due to the fact it is an election year. Do you truly consider they will do some thing about this?
2. Also, we have noticed from practical experience that some of you like to wait a lengthy time, and we imply a long, lengthy time to redeem your present card. It requires a although for us to get your $one hundred gift card to ZERO if all we are charging is $two.50 every single month. So, we now have a greater thought. We will charge you the $two.50 for sometime and if you nevertheless do not redeem your gift card by a particular date, say within two years, your card will expire. When prepaid gift balance expires, we will get all the money left on the card. You are probably questioning if this is legal. Properly, no 1 has told us it is not.
3. And don’t even assume about losing your card. We reserve the correct not to replace lost or stolen present cards. Yes, we know that if you drop your Savings Account Statement or CD Certificate, the bank will replace it, but we are not a bank, so we can do what ever we want. If we feel generous, we could replace your gift card, but we will charge you a charge, up to $15 to teach you a lesson.
4. Lastly, if you purchased a bank issued present card (like Visa, MasterCard, American Express, or Discover), then you far better study the fine print and develop into familiar with costs like Transaction or Statement Copy Charge, Foreign Currency Conversion Charge, Verify issuance Charge, and Transaction Charge / Balance inquiry Charge. And one particular last factor Never contact the FTC mainly because they may well be willing to push for laws to limit costs on retail gift cards but they have not been willing to touch us, the bank issued gift cards. Why? For the reason that our lobbyists are carrying out an exceptional job.
We hope you take pleasure in your gift card.
It is my belief that present card issuers will be far better off and make extra revenue if they eliminate charges and expiration from present cards considering the fact that the adverse publicity about present cards from both state lawmakers and the news media has led some customers to stay away from gift cards. This is particularly correct during the holiday season when every single local news station and newspaper appear to run a story about the dangers of present card costs and expiration.