Selling and redeeming gift cards

A gift card is a prepaid balance a customer buys (or you issue), which can be redeemed toward a booking at checkout. Until it's redeemed, that money is a liability: your business is holding cash it still owes as a rental.

Where to find it

Open Pricing in the sidebar, then Gift cards. It opens the Gift cards tab of the pricing page (the tab bar is also there if you start from Price rules). The tab only shows for staff who are allowed to view payments.

How it works

At the top, Outstanding gift card balance is what you still owe against active gift cards, across the cards that still carry a balance. Some of that may have been paid for and some may have been given away free; the Paid column on each card shows which. Under it are four totals: Sold, all time, Redeemed, Returned to cards, and Written off.

The list has these columns: Code, Balance, Face value, Paid, Recipient, Issued, and Status. Outstanding / Active / Voided / All buttons filter it.

To create a card, click Issue a gift card:

• Amount (USD), plus an optional Recipient name and Recipient email.
• Purchaser (optional, but required if you take payment by card).
• Payment: Cash, Other (bank transfer, cheque, terms), Comp — free giveaway, or Credit card. For cash or other you enter the Amount collected. A comp records no money and does not count as revenue. A credit card payment shows the gift card value and a processing fee before you charge it.
• An optional Internal note, then Issue card.

The new code is shown once right after you issue it, and you can always find it again in the list. Cards you issue never expire, because several US states restrict or ban expiry dates on gift cards.

On each card's row:

• Send (or Resend if it was already sent) emails the code to the recipient. It only appears when the card has a recipient email.
• Void asks for a reason, which is kept with the card's history, and writes off whatever balance is left.

Customers redeem a card at checkout, in the Have a gift card? box on the payment page. Your storefront also has a gift card purchase page where customers can buy one themselves.

Example

You issue a $200 gift card. A customer redeems $75 of it on a booking, leaving $125. The card keeps a $125 balance until it's fully used or you void it.

Good to know

• Voiding does not refund money to the customer. It writes the remaining balance off, so it leaves your outstanding total and shows under Written off. Handle any real refund separately.
• For why the balance counts as a liability, see Why gift cards show up as a liability.