I and several other family members had continual problems occur (just after Christmas) with the Vanilla Visa Gift Card. Even though there were available balances on each of our cards, we kept getting told by merchants that our cards were declined with no explanation given. After calling Vanilla VISA Customer Service and FINALLY getting an actual customer service rep on the line, I was given a little more information explaining the continual card declines we were experiencing.
The first time my Visa gift card was declined, the company blamed it on IT technical issues they were supposedly experiencing at the time. THEN I found out that if the purchaser is attempting to purchase something that costs more than the value on the card, the store clerk must calculate the cost difference in ADVANCE and collect the difference in cost from the customer BEFORE scanning the Visa gift card. If the store tries to scan the card FIRST (applying it against the total purchase price) and collect the cost difference from the customer second, the card will be declined. Even though these merchants are supposed to have some kind of contract in place with Visa instructing them as to the exact sequence in which to process these transactions, the problem is that MOST store clerks are CLUELESS as to how to go through this ridiculous exercise.
The process should not be this difficult and the burden should NOT be placed on the customer to have to teach store clerks how to process these cards!
The purchasers of these cards pay an additional fee over and above the value of the card. Then when the card recipient does not utilize the card within a specified period, the card's value will decline steadily over time.
In my estimation, when you factor in all the hassles customers experience in just getting the card accepted for purchase, these VISA gift cards (and others like them) are a ripoff and a scam. If the givers of these cards really care about the recipients they are trying to gift, they should stay away from these cards. Better to give cash or a specific store gift card that will be applied against the purchase price in a NORMAL fashion, without having to go through this nonsense.
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