Gift Cards - Credit Card (Barclaycard & M&S)

retiredbanker1

If you are not sure then this is my workaround which has worked to date - buy something else as well as the gift cards - make sure the other purchase goes through the till first then tell them you want to purchase a gift card - I can only talk about my experiences but in my case they have always gone through as goods purchased not cash.
(I am assuming you are/were purchasing in store not online)

DullGreyGuy

Heidiho said:

Ah I see - so it’s not Rewards Gateway who decide if it’s a cash transaction but the card issuer? Good to know that about Barclaycard as I’m planning to use one of those for my next instant voucher purchase later tonight 

Its a combination of the merchant services provider who decide what MCC applies to the business and then the card issuer who decides which MCCs (or merchants) are "cash like"

DullGreyGuy

35har1old said:

DullGreyGuy said:

adamL said:

Hi, 

This has never been an issue with my old credit card (Santander 123) but after reading some stuff online, I'm now not sure whether I need to be concerned. Basically, does a purchase of a gift card or e-voucher (the platform is Reward Gateway and shows up as "your-saving.com" on account statements).

Does this count as a cash transaction for either the M&S Credit Card? Or Barclaycard Avios Credit Card? Both are MasterCard. 

The fine print is non definitive. And I didn't a get straight answer when I called. 

Thank you very much
M

When a merchant wants to be able to take payments they approach a merchant services company and sign up for one or more accounts (they may want to split up their business for various reasons). Against each account the merchant services provider will apply a code (MCC) which basically says what the merchant does and in the case of multiple accounts it may be different. So Thomas Cook may have one merchant account identified as a travel agent and a second identified as an FX company for their travel money business. 

When a merchant asks for payment the merchant services company applies to the request this MCC and your bank can then decide how they want to treat it, so with the TC example above the first will be treated as a the purchase of services and the second will be a cash advance because buying Euros is a cash like transaction. 


So, buy a gift card with your normal weekly shop at Tesco, it will go through their tills and present as a supermarket purchase so a product. Go to an online vendor that does nothing but sell gift cards and their MCC will be something more focused which your bank may have decide to categorise as csh like. 

There have been some reports of cash like fees being applied to some credit cards when buying gift cards online, I just use my AmEx card which doesn't have cash like fees so is a non-problem.

No discount on gift card purchased in Tesco 

Who said there was? Just saying it won't count as a cash like transaction