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The Worst Gift Card Ever!
By JLP | December 11, 2006
So far, the worst gift card I have come across is the iCard Visa Gift Card. It costs $7.95 on top of the gift amount just to purchase. Then, there’s a $25 maintenance fee after six months. Finally, although the card doesn’t “expire,” you will have to pay $5.95 every six months if you want to keep using any unused balance.
Why is it so expensive?
Because that’s the only way Visa can make money off this card (unless they get fees from retailers who accept the card. Hmmm… I wonder about that.)
Anyway, if you don’t want to give a gift card from a specific retailer, then why not just give cash?
Topics: Giving | 8 Comments »
December 11th, 2006 at 12:32 pm
Yeah i wrote an article about gift cards. They are a money maker for the people that sell them. http://www.efipo.com/20061210/how-to-make-money-with-gift-cards/
Those semi annual charges, activation fee, and the maintenance fee is extremely steep. I’m guessing not many people will purchase that card IF they know the terms and conditions.
December 11th, 2006 at 1:18 pm
I’ve been reading about gift cards and scams and such – so you can imagine how happy I was to find two gift cards that were given to my kids last year. They are from Borders and still have the original amount on them. Hhmmm, I wonder if I will get charged a fee when I actually use the cards? Going to check that out now…
December 11th, 2006 at 2:52 pm
They’ve been trying to institute laws in Ontario(Canada) that would protect the people who get gift cards. Often people just leave them lying around to discover they’ve expired.
How can a gift card expire and still be a moral thing to do by a company?
December 11th, 2006 at 7:08 pm
Don’t know for sure, but I suspect one reason the cards expire is so the companies can book the revenue. Until the cards are redeemed (or expire) they cannot do that.
December 11th, 2006 at 9:19 pm
MOMM, I received a Borders gift card for my birthday in September, and used the balance over a couple months without any mystery fees.
I’ve always assumed that Visa (and such) gift cards do get a standard fee from the retailer. Having rung them up, they did process as a normal credit card.
December 12th, 2006 at 12:34 am
Wow! That has some of the most ridiculous fees I have seen for a gift card. I hope nobody sends me one of these cards. I bet the people on your Christmas list would be happier with cash anyway. There may be some exceptions to this however. I have seen people bid more money than the value of the gift card at some auction websites. These people might be happier with the gift cards.
December 21st, 2006 at 3:00 am
[...] Gift-Card Activation Fee – I already talked about this one. [...]
December 21st, 2006 at 8:09 am
WOW, I had no idea Visa was this cheap…or is it expensive?
Typo: second to last word in first paragraph should be “unused”.