Gift cards are only a good idea if the person receiving them uses the store or website to which they're attached. I know that I go through my wallet and desk drawers once or twice a year to clean out old or expired gift cards. Some of them, I'll probably never use because I just don't shop at that store or website.
Now there's a way you can trade that card for one you might actually use. Go online and check out one of the many gift card exchanges that have sprouted up ready to swap your unwanted card with one you would want for a fee.
PlasticJungle.com and Cardpool.com will buy your unwanted card and then give you cash either through a check, PayPal deposit or Amazon.com gift card. They'll take a cut for themselves of course, but then you can then buy the card you want, choosing from the sites' inventories.
For example, with PlasticJungle.com, if you sell a $50 gift card to Sports Authority, the site will pay you $37.50 in cash or send you a $39.38 gift card to Amazon.com. Then, if you want to buy a new gift card, those are sold at a discount, meaning the card will be loaded with more money than you actually spend buying it.
Let's say you take your $37.50 in earnings from the Sports Authority card, you could then buy a Target card with a value of $38.51 for discounted $37.36. The transaction would have cost almost $11, but you'd at least have a card you would use.
Giftcardswapping.com is one of the rare sites that lets you exchange your gift card for another card of the same value. But there are a limited number of cards available -- currently only eight cards are eligible for swapping and nine are available to buy -- and customers must mail their card to the company and pay a $3.99 fee. They have to make money somehow. CardHub.com, a credit-card comparison website, is taking the concept of a gift card exchange to the next level. The company launched a social networking gift exchange using Facebook that allows consumers to buy, sell and exchange gift cards. Here's how that works. If you have an unwanted card, go to CardHub's site and look for a card you want.
Like other gift card exchanges, you can sell your card directly to CardHub and then buy discounted cards. Or you can connect to your friends, colleagues and people nearby using Facebook so that you can buy, sell and trade cards with the community of your choice.With CardHub you have the option of selling your card to Cardhub or to list it for free and negotiate directly with other consumers. The caveat is that you have to list your gift card on the exchange for up to one dollar below the full value. That means a $100 card can be listed for as much as $99. It's then up to the people in the network to negotiate the final price.
CardHub's exchange currently offers more than 200 gift card options and the company estimates that the site will bring in 30,000 users this month. When using any of these card swap sites, make sure to check the issue date on the card you're getting.
Retailers used to be able to decide when a card would expire and could charge inactivity fees. But new federal rules require gift cards issued on or after August 22, 2010 to be valid for five years and ban inactivity fees during the first year. So double-check when a card was issued to make sure the one you get is current and not from a couple years ago and under the old rules.
