Gift Card Review

If you look-up the term Gift Cards in Wikipedia they define it as a card that contains a restricted monetary value which is issued by either a bank or a retailer that is used as an alternative to purchasing a physical gift. To a person it means being able to easily give someone a present they know will be appreciated. But to a bank or store it means a hell of a lot of money. Data from 2006 shows that Canadians spend 1.8 billion on those cards while Americans spend a whopping $80 billion dollars.

This has spawned an entire industry geared around selling accessories such as gift card holders that combines a greeting card and a place to insert the gift card. And if you want something a little more substantial there are always a huge variety of various gift card packaging options like boxes, bags, envelopes and even tins. This is all great but recent estimates on card redemption rates showed that about 10% of these cards never get cash-in.

You almost certainly have seen gift cards being offered at many of the major retailers. They can be bought in amounts as little as $10 on up to hundreds of dollars. Once purchased they may be redeemed at any point for the products that are available at that particular store of chain of stores. They are a fantastic way to give person a gift that you know they will like because they will be the ones choosing it. That’s fine if you know what place that person likes or often goes to, but what if you don’t? This is where banks have come in to offer their own kind of gift card.

There are gift cards that are good for virtually any product or service and may be redeemed at almost any retailer but are backed by the banks. However before you run out to obtain one of these cards there are a few downsides you should be mindful of.