0 Balance on an unused gift card

[Carmen543]

Hi there,  I received a gift card from my parents for Christmas. I scratched it off and when I went to go check on the balance, it says $0 on a card that is brand new. How can I resolve this? It seems to be a common issue and the part that is the most worrisome is that my parents spent their hard earned money,  I would hate that they got scammed by a company I am loyal to.  

**EDIT for UPDATE: Just as clarification, my mom got this card from Albertsons. I was told by Sephora I would have to go directly through Albertsons. After about a month of "investigation" , Albertsons mentioned that they had been investigating with Sephora and they were not able to access transaction history through Sephora, so Albertsons advised me to call Sephora and try to resolve the issue with them. After once again calling Sephora, they gave me the spiel of "we treat gift cards like cash", advised me that the only transactions they could see was the original load date (which was the date my mom bought it) and the current balance. They could not see when it was used, where it was used, and how much. They told me there was nothing they could do and basically referred me back to Albertsons, which is where I came from. It looks like I'm out of luck and out of $100. My issue then comes in with Sephora, if you know this type of scam is commonplace, WHY allow this distribution of YOUR gift cards at third party vendors and do NOTHING to resolve an issue that your customer faces. I have never received such lackluster customer service from a company (even Amazon has a better customer satisfaction experience) and unfortunately, even as a VIB, I will be discontinuing my business with Sephora. Completely disappointed.

TLDR: If you bought your gift card at a third party vendor, you're SOL. Sephora won't do anything to support a loyal customer.

[CjoyS777]

This happened to me too and my husband purchased the gift card from Kroger! I received a $50 gift card for valentines day and just tried to use it and the cashier said it has a $0 balance. I checked online and it says 0!!! What the heck?! AND the crazy thing is she said yeah I'm sorry this has been happening a lot. Again, what the heck?!

[DaneeBT]

@CjoyS777 Oh no! I'm sending you a PM.

[TeaBea]

Did anyone actually get this resolved? I have this issue too and the response I got didn’t resolve anything. Incredibly frustrating—this is clearly a widespread issue.

[Carmen543]

Hi there, no, I edited my post to update. Basically Sephora left me out in the dark 

[jessh4]

The same issue is happening for me. May I also have assistance whenever it is available? Thank you!

[keelybt]

@Carmen543 I'm sorry to hear that! I will send you a PM. 

[LolaPavey]

same thing is also happening to me at the moment 

[LaurieBT]

Hi @LolaPavey,

I'm sorry to hear this! I'll send you a message.

Best,

Laurie

[clair3g]

I'm having the same issue. May I have assistance whenever it is available? Thank you!

[keelybt]

@clair3g I will send you a PM. 

[beautyartistemm]

What can be done? The same thing happened to me when I bought two 50$ cards for my friends at Albertsons.  When they went to redeem the card tmit had a zero balance.  😞

[LaurieBT]

Hi @beautyartistemm,

My apologies! I'll send you a message.

Best,

Laurie 

[allofthenskeio]

Hi can I get some help with my inquiry? Customer Support is saying my only option is to file a police report. I was given a $50 gift card and when I went to use it, it had $0 balance AFTER the cashier scratched the back of the card. When I called Customer Support to request a card history they said the card was loaded with $50 on Nov 28, 2023 but then the balance shows $0 - they can only transfer me to customer support who cannot help me. This seems like internal scam. 

[ltcgc26]

Same here please, this is an upsetting widespread issue. 

[jennx8]

same thing happened to me unfortunately, such a frustrating situation