<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Aphrodite91:
I don't see why miles credit card should care if you're doing this sort of thing. They charge the merchant a certain fee per transaction and this fee is taken whether you buy gift cards or merchandise so they earn the same amount of money either way. </font>
They care because they are worried you will use this as a cheap way to get a cash advance, which has a higher default risk.
Of course, anyone playing this game probably plans to use the money orders to pay off the credit card debt, but there is some risk of blowing it instead at the casino and then defaulting on the credit card. Credit cards are happy to let you do that, but only up to your cash advance limit which is typically lower. than your full credit limit. Plus they want to charge you extra cash advance fees for allowing these higher risk cash advances.