Is it time to go back to paper gift certificates at retail?
August 26th, 2010 • Posted by Bill Bice • Permalink
Selling gift cards under the new Federal CARD Act includes a very interesting carve out: paper gift certificates that are only sold at retail are exempt from the new law.
If I was running a small spa in a state with less restrictive expiration date requirements than the new federal law, I'd have to seriously think about it. If it would reduce sales because of longer transaction times, I wouldn't do it. Otherwise, those little plastic cards would a find a new home in the trash can.
Here's a quick summary of the National Conference of State Legislatures information on state-by-state expiration date requirements:
| States | Expiration |
| California, Connecticut, Florida, Maine, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington |
No expiration allowed |
| Massachusetts | 7 years |
| Louisiana | Greater than 5 years |
| Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, New Mexico, Ohio | 5 years |
| Maryland | Greater than 4 years |
| North Dakota | Greater than 6 years |
| Vermont | 3 years |
| Arkansas, Hawaii, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Tennesee | 2 years |
| South Carolina, Kentucky | 1 year |
| Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming, Washington D.C. |
No requirement |
If you're not ready to go back to paper, there's another interesting carve out for gift certificates that are for services. Once again, federal law no longer applies. SpaBoom now features additional expiration date settings in order to take advantage of this exemption for your Instant Gift Certificates.
You could also promote gift cards at retail for a service instead of a dollar amount. The exemption only applies when there is no dollar value on the gift card, so you need different gift cards created for different services.
Or, you can use SpaBoom to create Instant Gift Certificates for services, and print them out. There is no commission charged on Instant Gift Certificates sold at retail.
• Trackback • Posted in Spa Gift Certificates
South Carolina law is one year, unless the expiration date is printed on the front in all caps that is 10pt font or larger, then any expiration date is valid.
As of November 2008 in Canada, businesses were no longer allowed to have an expiration date on gift certificates. At first we were a bit traumatized by this new legistlation, but now honestly, it really isn't a big deal. Change is sometimes the thing most feared.