Design Crafters

In yesterday’s photo Christmas cards blog we started to talk about photo gift cards. Well, today I’d like to share with you some tidbits of information about gift cards you may find very useful.

Gift cards are great gifts because it allows people to get what they really want. There are however some things to pay attention to.

As mentioned yesterday, if the company has any indication of going out of business, you may want to avoid purchasing a gift card from them. The recipient may not be able to redeem it in time and that would be money down the drain for you.

Pay attention to the print on the back. In some states there is a law that gift cards can’t expire. They can however start to take off fees if not used within a certain timeframe, until there’s nothing left on them. It’s usually two years, which is my opinion is a reasonable timeframe to use it. The policy is usually printed on the back.

I’ve actually heard of people giving their non-used gift cards to their friends and family as gifts. In one case the gift card was so old that there was nothing left on it due to inactive fees. Whoops. In the second case, it was a gift card the recipient originally gave the giver. Double whoops. In the third case, it was so old the company didn’t even exist anymore. So be very careful when you re-gift gift cards.