[Expired] Staples: No Activation Fee On $200 Visa Gift Card Purchase (6/13 – 6/19)

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• 1) Do these 200 VGC's work as single load at WM for BB or need to be less than 99/swipe?
  2) What about the $200 MC gc's?

  • $200 single load works at the regular terminal and not MC/CS. MCGC is more or less dead. You can only do $99 load at MC by QUICKLY changing the payment method to debit and using the PIN. This is for MB VGC and MB MCGC.

• An abnormal experience. I was trying to load BB Amex with MB VGC from Staples. I usually register the card and set my own pin. However, yesterday I was using a card that was not registered and was using the default pin. Swiped 4 times and payment was declined every time. Used another VGC and it went through. I called the automated line to check balance and to set my own pin. Balance was intact and was able to set my own pin. Used the card to load and it went through on the first try. My assumption is that the default pin was either not set or was corrupted. My first such experience. I will try to set my own pin always to avoid such headaches in the future.

• Can anyone provide the details related to the BB card I read in the comments or maybe a link to the details.
  Thanks.

  • http://www.bluebird.com

    • Thank you. I assume this is to reload the card with mastercard or Visa gift card at Walmart?
      Which one is preferred?
      BB American express prepaid debit account or BB bank account?

      • Mine is BB bank account - come with a BB Visa debit card.

        • And no issues with the card right?

          Thanks again.

        • See TJ's post on June 16, 2021 on the following posts.

        • Thank you for all your help. I applied for the BB bank account.

• No $200 left and $100 ones have activation fees in California!

• Only 2 left... till I rotated the rack and bam, 50+ more $200’s. Got 5 today no issues. Just about done fulfilling my sub for my Ink Cash.

  Judging by the comments here, I’m lucky. My store seems to make no effort to hoard them, cashiers don’t even blink at me buying 5, no ID check.

• First store I went to said they were out. I feel like they lied. The second one had none of the $200 on the rack, but all in the back. The lady who brought them out did say the limit was 1k but I had two people and I used Apple Pay for mine and the second person used my physical card. Anyway all worked out. Put 2k on my new card. Went to Walmart to liquidate via Bluebird which worked just fine. Kept one $200 no load card fee card for Father’s Day.

  • Not to mention risking ruining this entire process for everyone by posting what you are doing in a public forum for a chase employee to read that can put a stop to 5% altogether as a result

    • Oh come on. That’s the point of these websites. I’m not the only one.

    • Here we go again... Chase(who has assets worth Trillions) doesn't give a hoot about an anonymous poster describing what he does with VGCs. They aren't going to go AMEX and stand up a RAT based on this post.

  • What's the point of paying a $2 fee for Bluebird when you can use these cards as is basically anywhere? Your earning points then giving some back from the fees.

    • My Bluebird has no fee. I load it to Bluebird then I can bill pay it to the credit card or another card or deposit cash in my checking. No fees though.

• I went today to buy 5 of them. The store had a lot of the them but a cashier invented her own rules and literally told me that I am eligible for only two because there is no activation fee.
  I will come back tomorrow again.

  • Got 5 yesterday, a lot of cards were still available.

  • That’s when you ask for a manager and ask them to show you in the weekly ad where it says limit 2. Clearly states limit 5. I’ve noticed cashiers have to do nothing special other than peeling back the tab and scanning the card, the $6.95 savings is added automatically, 5 go through just fine.

    • Yeah, I saved a screenshot with this offer on my phone now. Tomorrow I am gonna to show them if they do not hide the cards or pretend they are sold out.
      The full story was more ridiculous. I came around 3 pm and took 5 cards. The cashier was a young lady but immediately another one (senior or manager) appeared at the register. They started to remove part of coverage on the back of protection envelope to activate the cards, when the senior cashier first noticed that there was no activation fee. Then she said, ‘ah, you are eligible only for 2 because there is no activation fee’. So they put aside 3 other cards with already reveled code on the back and did not sell them to me! I did not want to argue with her because at that time I did not have the screenshot and nowhere in the store was information about this offer. So if tomorrow they say me that the cards are sold out, it means they are hiding them and lying because today at 3 pm, I was first who came to buy them, and the senior cashier was unaware of this promotion and the racks were full of the cards, therefore it is highly unlikely that they could be sold out tomorrow.

      • They lie that they are sold out, seen that first hand

• I went in at 1 today, all sold out. You guys are brutal lol

  • I suspect they were not sold out, but were hidden from the rack by a shop staff. Staff may lie like today they lied to me that only two are allowed per customer.

    • They always hide them behind the counter at my store. They said they were sold out

      • call the staples corporate customer service number regarding "only 2" when the ad specifically says 5 and also share the "hidden behind the counter" trick. It gets taken care of very quickly in my (numerous) past complaints. Ask that the regional manager call you with resolution.

• Most of nova stores are playing games. None available at 10am when they had thousands the day before. Calling corporate first thing on Monday to complain. Last time they gave me $100 GC for the inconvenience.

• I used up the $25k limit on my ink cash card. Called chase to change it to ink plus but was told that’s not an option (can only change to ink unlimited and ink preferred). Anyone had same experience?

  • LOL trying to switch to Ink Plus or Ink Bold cards that have been gone for 4-5 years already.

  • Ink plus is not available for new sign ups or product change. It’s been like that for past 4-5 years I think.