...to query a zero balance on a gift card?!

[Nessalina]

I got a £50 gift card from work when I left for maternity leave - I've just gone to spend it and there's no money on it! I feel super awkward asking the lass who sorted it out about it, but I don't see what else to do, other than chalk it up to a loss
I didn't keep the receipt that was in the gift card, so if it's gone out of her account, then there's no tracing it I assume? She's lovely, so I'm worried that a) she'll be mortified, and b) even if it has come out, she'll just stump up the £50 herself and put herself out of pocket which wouldn't be right.

A few years back I bought HMV cards to put in my kids Christmas stockings. That ended up being the year HMV were going out of business. So, after Christmas I gave my kids the cash value of the cards and stuck the cards in my purse. Months later HMV has gotten over whatever it was and we're staying open, we went to the city and I gave the boys back the cards to use. Only one of the bloody things worked, the other hadn't been properly activated when I bought it, and since it was months later I no longer had the receipt...

Bought 2 X £20 cards for Christmas
Bought 2 x £20 cards back from kids when HMV were going out of business
Only 1 of the bleeding cards worked so ended up giving the other child £20 to cover their purchase.

Never crossed HMVs doorstep since!

Hmmm, I think it sounds a bit fishy. But then if she's claiming she out the receipt in with it it may well be a shop error.

If the card wasn't activated at purchase, your colleague wouldn't have been charged the £50.

Surely she'd have noticed?

Yes I also think she won't have been charged if it didn't have a balance on it. It's very odd

Are you sure she hasn't just...bought it, spent it and out the receipt in to make it look legit and blame it on a shop error?

I had this with a couple of Waterstones gift cards, my kids were given one for £20 each from their uncle, the balance said zero, And I ended up never chasing the uncle, but I wonder if it is common and some kind of thing company's do to "scam" their customers?

Most people would be too embarrassed to query it with the gifter! (I was)

But there would be two receipts. The gift receipt which she would have give you, and her receipt which she might have stuffed in her purse or handbag or wherever.

I won a £50 Selfridges gift card in a work raffle. I don't live in London, so it was a while (more than six months) before I was in London and went to spend it.
They said it had expired! I complained, but it was clearly in the tiny print Ts&Cs!

I hate giftcards - better to give money - especially to family!

It's not very likely that the workmate has stolen the same collection money imo.

Much more likely that the shop assistant has mucked it up somehow, it's not an unusual thing to happen.

I don't suppose there's any chance that the receipt is still in your bin is there? I've missed the bit where it says the card was probably bought at a self service till, is that really what happened? Self service tills are difficult enough for a few bits of shopping, I can't imagine anyone choosing to try and buy a giftcard at one

I bought 2 £15 iTunes cards from Tesco as emergency presents once. I was mortified when one friend rang to tell me there was nothing on it. In fact neither had been validated and I no longer had the receipt. I've never bought cards from them since.

Some gift card are quite tricky to activate through the till (ex retail worker here) so it's very probable the card wasn't activated in the store but I'm not sure what you can do about it if no one has their receipt. Do you know if it was bought recently?

OP is it worth checking that the balance is definitely zero? because if there was a gift receipt that would indicate that the card had been activated. The gift receipt has the gift card number on and the amount and is printed off the till when the card has the money put on to it. I'm just wondering if the money is on the card and the problem was with the till this morning.

Having had this happen to me twice, when I buy gift cards, once the transaction is completed, I then ask the shop assistant to scan the card to check the money is on there. Occasionally they are , but most of the time they understand.

I always worry about this type of thing happening every time I buy one of these things. I liked the old fashioned paper vouchers showing the amount. I'm not even going to buy one from a supermarket now and if I do I'll make sure I keep the receipt. I hope you get it sorted, it's a large amount to loose.

I think this must be very common. It happened to me with WHSmith when I bought something online from them, which turned out not to be in stock - crap stocktaking system. They (eventually) sent me a giftcard refund - I must have paid by giftcard originally - but they didn't activate it. A few months later I went to spend it and there was nothing on it - so annoyed. I nearly sent it to someone in a birthday card too - so glad I didn't do that!

The shop assistant was quite rude about it, saying there was nothing he could do. I haven't shopped there since...

I work in Asda and we have a function to check any of our own gift cards on the till to check both the balance and the history.

So if you bring in an Asda gift card we can scan it and immediately see that there's £7.53 on it now but we can also get a list saying that on September 1st (for example) £20 was initially loaded on to the card, on the 4th you spent £4.50, on the 10th £3.97 and on the 15th £4 ... leaving the £7.53 balance it currently has.

If it is a gift card for a specific store (Asda/Tesco/Mothercare/ToysRUs/Argos etc) where you can use a card for multiple transactions and don't have to use it all in one go then you should be able to go into store and ask them to check the current balance and the credit redemption history too, so you could see if it was activated and loaded in the first place.

Buggery buggery bollocks. It was Asda she bought it from, she's told me the date and I've spoken to them and they can't trace the card number for that date or the few days before (just in case). If she paid cash that's the end of the trail Asda will be up £50 though

Will the receipt show whether or not it was activated?

Have you thought - maybe she didn't actually top up the card?
Well, not the one she gave you.
She might have topped up her own gift card on the sly instead?

I would press it with Asda. Surely they reconcile their tills at the end of each day. Were they £50 up?

Even if she paid cash the gift card number itself would be scanned into their system when they added the money to it.

She's claiming not ot have the receipt anymore.....was she even aware at the time that she'd left a receipt in in your stuff?
If you didn't check it - it could easily have been her grocery list receipt you ended up with.

Asda won't be £50 up as they will have to pay whichever shop the gift card is for.

So, if you go to Asda and buy a £50 card for mothercare for example Adsa have to give the £50 to mothercare for when you go in and spend the card otherwise it wouldn't be right.

Did you speak to asda head office or the store? I'm impressed that they could check at that level of detail, I used to work in a supermarket and I know the wouldn't have been able to do that even if you knew which till it was.

Good news!!! Texted colleague again and it turns out she paid on her credit card, and Asda have been able to trace the payment! It's showing as activated at their end, and the purchase has gone through, but my card definitely hasn't been, so I'm to go in tomorrow and apparently he should be able to process a refund and then reload it... sounds positive!!!

Really good news OP