Business as usual

Is there a waiting period for Blackhawk Pathward GC's after the purchase before we can use them for MO. I didn't have any issues in the past using them immediately. Off late I have issues when swiping for MO it doesn't recognize the card.

Any luck on getting these drained on a single swipe? I got the same BIN (446317) from TGCS during fee free promo but haven't gotten a chance to go to WM to try yet.

Earlier this week loaded my Discover card at Walmart with these in a single $500 swipe.

TGCS always works for full $500 in a single swipe. Same is true for any InComm bought online. The only issues are with Brick and Mortar purchased InComm.

This makes sense to me, because the brick and mortar stores are where the cards get tampered with this time of year, and that's why InComm was sued, so they need to put security mechanisms in place for those ones. Of course, this part is just conjecture on my part, but the fact that TGCS cards "just work" 100% of the time comes from tons of personal experience.

TGCS is now my go to source. I have given up on Simon.
446317 works great, and you can even put on your name on it. And depends on the design you get, there is no "GIFT CARD" mark. Looks like a real debit card. Fast 2 day shipping, and no extra fees.

And I just hit my first snag with TGCS. Ordered 19 cards from them, and ran through activating all of them via the phone, one after another. The velocity must have caused the issue, because on the 18th card, they said "your phone number can not be serviced". I waited 24 hours and called back. New security challenge on the phone line, but no worries there. Once I got past the simple "what's 4+4" security challenge, the 19th card wouldn't activate.

Had to open a case with the CSR online. Now I need to upload a bunch of documents and have a card mailed to me. What a hassle.

Oh well, first hiccup though I've pushed many tens of thousands through them, so don't think of this as a complaint. Just as a heads up, don't get overly pushy about activating your cards all as fast as you can like I did ;-)

excuse but what is TGCS? if u dont want to post it on the board can u shoot me a PM

The gift card shop

In the last week, Vanilla VGCs and SecureSpend Visas from Safeway and WM/WMNM have been failing for $250 swipes at WM and WMNM. A single $250 swipe fails, $10 + $240 works, and $10 + $490, which used to work, failed and locked the card. I haven't tried $249, $240 + $240, or other combos due to lack of time, cards, and staffed SCs.

Vanilla Visas from WM have been working for me for card loads to Discover, One, Serve, and WM Money card with no issues as recently as this morning at multiple WMs. I buy them at SCO and liquidate them the next day for $2 less than the load amount and haven't run into any issues. I can't speak on SSVCs because those have been a PITA for me in the past and I avoid them now.

Today I bought a $500 at CVS, Walmart and a grocery store as i've done many times. They were a MC sutton, vanilla sutton and vanilla pathward. I activated them an hour later. The MC worked fine. I tried the 2 vanilla's at a couple of online casinos like I've done many times. Both did not go through. I checked the balance online and both said the balance was on hold. I called 1-800-India and talked to a rep who immediately said you're card has been compromised and we need to send a replacement. I said it hasn't been compromised, the transaction was just denied and then you locked my funds. Why don't you just unlock the card? He insisted it was compromised because I tried to use them at an online casino which isn't allowed (done it hundreds of times). I gave him my details and he said they would mail a new one.

I'm not sure what's with the new policy of straight up locking cards after a denied transaction. I'm also not sure why the cards didn't work this time. Not good either way. I'm not overly mad but I feel I might need to file a complaint with my state's financial office. It's one thing if they want to block casinos, it's another if they automatically lock a card and hold it hostage for 10 days.

They may no longer work where the merchant verifies addresses, which IME means most online sites - www.flyertalk.com/forum/manufactured-spending/2146629-simon-mall-gift-cards-2024-onwards-23.html#post36765782


Trying mine online at a utility company didn't lock mine though, so maybe that's merchant specific?

Not sure if any reasoning is because of zip verification. Could be. I’ve been doing it for awhile, even several just the day before. There are many online casino that even the same card will work at one but not the other but they’ve never locked the card. Maybe it did change overnight. I’m seeing some other posts that just in the past week places like tax payments are no longer working. Maybe they’re cracking down on certain merchants ability to process them. I’m not a big complainer but I think it might be time to file a complaint with the state regulators. I don’t think it’s right that these companies sell a visa or MC and then arbitrarily determine they don’t like you using it at certain merchants.

Bought a $500 VGC Pathward backed by BHN from Kroger affiliate. The new packaging has a huge gray blob that covers the CVV. In removing it, I accidentally scratched off some of the magnetic strip. It subsequently did not swipe at the card reader when buying a MO. I ended up just burning the VGC on my energy bill, but if this happens again, is there a remedy for getting a replacement?