More Giftcards.com Visa Changes
For awhile Giftcards.com was a decent place to purchase Visa gift cards. They often ran free shipping codes, the cards are personalized with your name and they work at both Walmart and Target. It was a sweet spot for sure!
Of course the cards became popular and thus things slowly began changing. Last month the free shipping codes ended and the fee per card went up from $4.95 to $6.95. Now it seems that one other change has been added. As The Points of Life points out, you can no longer get first class shipping for $1.99 per card.
This means that the cheapest option for shipping is USPS Delivery Confirmation which costs $7.45 per order. If you only order 1 or 2 cards then the price is the same. Thus it makes sense to maximize by ordering five cards. Unfortunately it isn’t quite that simple. Here are some things to consider:
- The maximum dollar amount per card is $500
- The maximum order amount including all fees and shipping is $2,500
By reverse engineering this, I have determined the best course of action is to purchase 4 X $500 cards and 1 X $457.80 card. This will bring the total of your order to exactly $2,500. (If you apply “G Money Points” then the math changes by the amount of rewards you apply.)
The Math
So does it make sense to do this? Here is the math:
- Face value: $2,457.80
- Shipping & Fees: $42.20
- Fees as a Percentage of Face Value: 1.72%
That is not good at all, however there is another calculation to consider.
Purchases from Giftcards.com earn 1% back in rewards. Therefore this purchase should earn $24.58 in rewards for your next order. If you factor in the rewards, then the cost is only $17.62 or about .72% of face value. Not too bad considering.
Order Denials – A Bigger Issue
Perhaps the biggest hurtle when it comes to Giftcards.com is the cancellation of orders. I know a lot of people who have had orders cancelled for seemingly no reason. Larger orders that creep close to the $2,500 mark seem to be cancelled more often. I think this is more of an issue than the cost.
If you don’t have a history with Giftcards.com, be prepared to start small and work your way up. That is really the only thing that seems to work consistently. Of course starting small means paying a lot more because of these changes, which probably isn’t worth doing.
Conclusion
While the elimination of the $1.99 first class shipping option hurts for smaller orders, there still can be value in purchasing orders of multiple cards if you can get them approved. Unfortunately Giftcards.com seems to be tweaking their offerings and that doesn’t appear to be good news in the long term. This goose isn’t dead, but it is barely hanging on.
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Looks like $250 is the maximum amount on visa cards you can buy online according to my favorite site giftcardplace.com. May be in-store the limits could be different. I remember last week I went to Walmart I saw a Visa card up to $500 limit.
Here is the link I found the information – http://www.giftcardplace.com/buy/visa-new-gift-cards
I tried to use the newly ordered (Sept.) 500 visa gift cards to load serve in Wal-mart Kiosk (Dallas, TX). Error message pop out again and again. Didn’t went through for any cards. Do you have any idea how it happened?
Sometimes this happens from time to time. Normally when people go back at a different time or to a different store it is resolved. What bank are the cards issued from? Where did you get them?
Shawn,
Can you use a aEGC to pay for the VGC?
Jim
Won’t be ordering from here anymore. Had two orders last week. First one was approved and processing, the second one was canceled. Now they’re refusing to ship the first order too and told me I will receive my refund in 10-14 business days.
These people are not on top of their game. Front line customer support literally has no idea what’s going on. They just read off of a script. After telling them that I’ve had a dozen successful orders on my cc they ask if I might’ve entered the wrong billing address. Literally every single call ends the same: “maybe you put in the wrong billing address. this security measure is for YOUR protection. you’re welcome to try another order.”
Seriously people, avoid the headache.
Why bother then? Factoring in the build-up cost before you can even get the optimal order size, it’s easier to just go to the mall, grocery store or cv s.
Will wait for special discount or free s&h offer while making trips to Simon mall near home to buy instead