Originally Posted by
Mary2e
I received 2 Vanilla cards as gifts. I activated them and checked the balance. They are intact.
I loaded them to my Amazon account and when I tried to use either, they were rejected - several times. I changed them to be credit cards instead of default debit cards, as Amazon instructed, and they still were rejected.
I tried in a fast food place, and they were rejected too.
How do I get the darned things to work?
There is likely a security freeze on the card. You are going to have to call the number on the card and probably sit on hold for 20 or 30 minutes (I had to wait 45 minutes once) to speak with a CSR... The Vanilla cards are very fraud alert sensitive in my experience. For that reason, I no longer buy them and get US Bank cards instead. I too was not able to use one at Amazon, or PayPal, and when I spoke with a representative she said that Amazon and PayPal are "restricted merchants" and that I should try using the card somewhere else!?! The cards also have a cool-off period after you buy them. You can't use them for a certain period of time (30 or 45 minutes if I recall). If you tried to use the card immediately after purchase, that may have been what triggered the fraud alert.