no, yes

In my experience you're wrong and it's actually the opposite.

The problem is that you people are answering yes/no to an "or" question. "Is she alive or dead?" "Yes." "No." It doesn't work.

You can use Vanilla cards bought at CVS immediately. Other stores can differ, but CVS is fairly consistent across different locations.

IME, all vanillas I bought from wag and cvs were activated and ready to use immediately. That is for both visa and mc variants and I have been buying MOs at the grocery store beside the drugstores right after buying the GCs.

The last batches of vanilla visas I bought and liquidated immediately were the variable holiday themed that rang up fee free, from WAG last week.

I've been buying OV at CVS for about 2 years now and they've always been activated immediately.

Let's see, I"ve doing this now for 3.5 years and only had a couple of my VGC from CVS not be ready to use when I left the store, I got this, "card will be active in 24 hours" at the bottom of the reciept. So for me, I was correct.

I wish people would stop being so quick in shooting others days without a lot of data to back them up.

Me too. I've been doing this for a few years as well and purchased who knows how much in OV from CVS. Only once have I had a delay in the funds being available. I also had another occurrence in which the card couldn't be used at Target and when I called in, the automated system forwarded me to customer service. The CSR said the funds were there, but the card itself wasn't activated. She said this happens occasionally, and the funds posted to that same card the next day. Not sure how that happens, but it was scary as I had been the victim of fraud just months prior.

My CVS today is saying multiple card transactions - all vanilla gift cards must be bought using one credit card. This came from corporate and is related to AML.

Oh, the joys of random made up CVS rules... I wonder how that works when I do my usual transaction where the first payment is auto draining a grocery VGC with 2-3 bucks on it...

I just bought 2 with 2 vgcs and 1 credit card.

Not uncommon at all.

CVS's system is acting up for me today. Tried to buy 2 $500 VGCs and the register said I had reached the daily $2K limit. I had bought 2 more yesterday for $500 each, so I assumed I was within the limit since it is based on face value of the card(s). Strange......

happened to me yesterday.
bought some around 8 am 2 days ago
went around 11 am yesterday and said i already met $2k limit....

so i just didn't buy any yesterday...

it happens time to time

Look at the time on your purchase two days days ago. Had 24 hours past when you tried to make the following purchase?

Local CVS having inventory problems..... BUT they LOVE me. :D