I think I have written about my aversion to Gift Cards before. Yes
I have several on hand myself and I have certainly given out my share but that
doesn’t mean they don’t make me nervous. They make me actually jittery. What if the
Company is no longer around when I get around to using a Gift Card I have? What
if I lose a gift card? Right now my husband is searching for a $50 Keg Card and
I can’t get it off of my mind.
An edition of Daily Finance this week provides a nice list of alternatives if you can't get around to using your gift card or it's just not a card you have much interest in
This article to seems to suggest that 56% of cards don’t get
used. Consumer Reports magazine had last estimated that 25% of cards remain
unused more than a year after received , CardSwap which is a Canadian site for
buying, selling or donating gift cards estimates that Canadians waste up to $1
Billion a year by not cashing in gift cards.
No matter the actual total-it's a lot of money. The most popular reason for not using a gift card is reported as "not having enough time to shop "(59%). I am definitely included in that group. The second most popular reason given by consumers for a gift card not being used is not finding an item that they want to buy at that particular retailer (35%). So, that sort of defeats the entire reason that the person gave the gift card in the first place. Lost cards are somewhere in the neighbourhood of 10% and some estimates of cards issued in a year are as high as $90 Billion.. I prefer not to do the math on this.
In some US States retailers are now required to register the cards in
a name because gift cards will now be covered by “unclaimed property” legislation (which I have definitely mentioned
on this blog before) Oh America you are beautiful sometimes.
In any case, the article lists the following
sites with some pros and cons of each. As an added bonus, most of these sites
are also able to check your card balances as well (a much more efficient way to
find the balance instead of searching through each retailers Gift Card Granny-Canadian Site
Raise Marketplace-Where you set the price
Card
Giver is such a great site-they get an amazing amount of cards that have even
less than $1 which they are grateful to receive because they all add up. I am
waiting to hear back if Canadian cards can be donated here.
Canada’s biggest site
right now for Buying, Selling or Donating gift cards although donations seem to
be restricted at this point to specified gift card drives
Many
Canadian charities now gladly accept gift cards and the information for doing
that is on their website
The rules about gift cards related to expiries, fees, terms or conditions vary by Province. The Retail Council of Canada has a summary of Gift Card legislation on their site
Retail Council of Canda-Gift Card Legislation by Province
The rules about gift cards related to expiries, fees, terms or conditions vary by Province. The Retail Council of Canada has a summary of Gift Card legislation on their site
Retail Council of Canda-Gift Card Legislation by Province
Perhaps
this long weekend might be a good time to clean up and out our wallets if you
have too many old gift cards lying around
No comments:
Post a Comment