I’ve gotten “mall” gifts cards as presents from my students before (good at a couple of local malls, all owned by the same corporation). I don’t know if they were charged a fee for buying it, but if you wanted to check the balance on it, you were charged .50, which I thought was outrageous. If you didn’t use the thing for a year, it started to decrease in value a certain amount every month.
I do like the store-branded cards, and have bought a bunch as Christmas gifts.
I like gift cards and, as dorky as it is, I like the cute little holders they often come in.
Sure, cash can be placed into money holders as well, but…there’s just something cute about those cards.
I like them. Especially compared to getting cash. If I get cash, I just skip going to the ATM for a week. It’s not even like a real gift.
OTOH, if I get a J.C. Penney gift card from my Mom, I will use it to buy clothes, which is her intended purpose.
Similarly, I can buy my nieces Abercrombie and Fitch gift certificates, because I know they like it, and that way their mom doesn’t have to complain about how much the stuff costs, and I don’t have to actually buy clothes for anyone.
I like getting gift cards. A card to somewhere like Target for me is perfect - I can get clothes or DVDs or photo frames or whatever else I want. I’ve never gotten one for a store I don’t like. It’s usually like Target or Best Buy or a clothing store the giver knows I like. I have a hard time giving people lists of specific stuff I would like - but I can always use and enjoy gift cars. Giving them is easy. My 16 year old cousin likes Hollister. I know what size he wears but have no clue about what he already has from there - so he is getting a Hollister gift card for Christmas. He will definitely use it. I do like to be able to get more personal gifts, but in this case I haven’t seen him in at least six months and he’s at the age where his tastes in everything change and can be elusive. But I know he likes Hollister so he will like his gift.
Further on that - I was just meandering mindlessly around the Internet and happened to run into a chart of popular Canadian gift cards and what fees were involved. It appears that my employer paid an additional C$1.75 up front as an “initial fee” for the C$100 Visa branded gift card I got. I would have been charged a C$1.50/month “maintenance fee” starting the 7th month after I got the card (since I used up the card on my next shopping expedition less than a month after I got it, I was never dinged that fee).
I can see credit-card branded “gift cards” as being occasionally useful. At school, we always put money towards a Christmas gift for the ladies who clean our dorm. They probably don’t make very much money, but rather than giving cash (a little gauche and not secure, either) we get a Visa card.
The only person I have ever bought gift cards for was myself when Amex had a temporary offer allowing you to buy gift cards for 80% of the usual point value. I cashed in all my points for cards and bought stuff I was going to buy anyway.
I think gift cards are the gift that says “I couldn’t be bothered looking for a gift for you.”
Depends…I have received two gift cards that pissed me off…one was from my real estate agent (who promised a hefty reward for future customer referral) that was a $20 card at a store where NOTHING was under $100…gee, thanks.
The other was a well-meaning, but not-well-thought-out gift card from my niece who sent me to a store filled with folksy, country motif items…my house is entirely modern/art deco!
I did see an interesting gift card yesterday at Target - it cost $50, but not only did you get $50 purchase at Target, the card itself was an MP3 player you could keep even after making your purchase - no, it was not iPod, but still…neat idea.
So yeah, gift card can be good, but at least buy them from someplace where the person actually can find something, and make it in an amount that is worth going to the store and you don’t have to shell out more money just to buy something worthwhile.
These things have got amazingly more popular the past couple years. For example, just today the mall I work at sold ~$36,000 in gift cards (they are general mall cards, good for any of the 120 stores). Crazy I tell ya!
We were made aware that one family member really wanted (expensive item) for Christmas. We each got him a gift card for the store that would carry that item. It was just a slightly less boring way of giving him cash, but it also let him know that we knew what he wanted.
I just gave my (teen) sisters-in-law gift certificates for the cinema for Christmas. I could have given them cash, but I know it would probably get frittered away on expenses - phone bills, fuel, etc. I mean, I’d happily give them money to help out with that stuff if they need it but it’s not what I want to give them for Christmas. With their gift certificates, I know they’ll get to see a few movies and hopefully have a good time. Also, if I gave them cash and that was all the money they had at the time then they would probably feel irresponsible spending it on movie tickets, but they could still use their certificates to go see a movie without feeling like they “wasted” it - there’s nothing else they could have spent it on. And I suppose they could always sell the certificate to a friend for it’s face value to get cash should they desperately need it.
It was my Dad’s birthday four days ago. I was going to get him a voucher to Bunnings (hardware store - and more!) but talking to Mum I discovered she planned to get him a Bunnings voucher, so I got him a box of chocolates instead. Then my brother and sister-in-law gave him a $50 Bunnings voucher for his birthday, and another $50 voucher for his Christmas present. I guess none of us are sure which tools he wants/needs/has, but we all know there’s always something else at Bunnings that he’d pick out for himself.
This *can * be true, of course. When I get a Best Buy giftcard from someone who lives a block away from Best Buy, that was clearly a matter of their convenience rather than my taste.
However, my friends usually get me Borders giftcards, which is pretty much the perfect gift for me. They know I love reading, and music, and movies, but they *don’t * necessarily know what I already have, or am most interested in acquiring at the moment. Ergo, gift card. That’s not impersonal, it’s just practical.
I agree with you to an extent, but you say you love music and movies, both of which can be had at Best Buy. Is Borders just a more convenient store for you to get to?
I’m just playing Devil’s Advocate - I’d like a card to either one, but of course with the Border’s card, I’d have the option of books added in.
You pretty well summed it up. There’s no Best Buy that’s convenient to me, and I’m about 80% more likely to buy books than cds or movies. I also just find Borders to be a much, much more pleasant shopping experience than Best Buy. So people who know me know that I’d vastly prefer the Borders card.