BEWARE….Sephora gift card fraud x2!!!!

[Reneenana28]

So today I was informed that the Sephora gift card I purchased at CVS for $50.00 for my best friend’s daughter (birthday) had a ZERO balance on it!  What was super upsetting was in December I purchased a Sephora gift card from Vons for $35.00 dollars and gave it to my best friend’s daughter for Christmas and was told the same thing happened ZERO balance!  How does this happen. I checked both cards to ensure the PIN number and strip had not been exposed or removed….. I’m out $85.00 dollars and my best friend’s daughter has no Christmas or birthday gift.. Sephora has NO safety guards in place to keep this from happening nor do they investigate to help with the fraud.  Feels like as long as they get “theirs” your money and business they could care less about the consumer! 😡 not good business practices SEPHORA!!! Unhappy about this occurrence TWICE!!! 

[victoriaroyal]

This just happened to me as well. My bf purchased two separate $100 Sephora gift cards. 1 purchased at CVS on Dec 19th and 1 purchased at Target. Customer service for the gift cards is now saying there is nothing they can do and the cards were drained before I even got a chance to use them. This is totally unacceptable that this is STILL happening. 

[victoriaroyal]

I just submitted a complaint with the FTC and BBB. 

[JennyJenn2024]

Same thing happened to me. My children (13 and 7) used their allowance to get me a giftcard ($125, purchased at CVS) for my birthday. Scratched it off yesterday to use (and I NEVER spend money on myself, so it was special). Said there was 0 balance. My husband called Sephora and they offered no help. They said it was used 12/05 but it was given to me 11/27 and literally sat on my self until yesterday. He's disputing it with his bank but I won't be shopping there again. Terrible that they can't do anything to help us. Clearly they had some kind of security breach and in a few years we will MAYBE be offered a few bucks. 

[Jessierose123]

This is crazy. I knew it wasn't just us.

My daughter got a $100 gift card that she couldn't even use- the barcode was unreadable because of how it was printed.

I spent 45 minutes in sephora on the phone with customer service and all I got was, "it's like money, so if it doesn't work there is nothing we can do".

I understand, but there was 0 indication that this card ever worked in the first place. 

The store as well as the customer service department had no idea how to deal with it.

Apparently there is no policy for a badly printed barcode 

I cannot believe how unwilling the company was to help considering how much money we have spent there in the past.

I am so disappointed.

[DaneeBT]

@Jessierose123 I'm sorry to hear about this. I will send you a PM to request for more information. 

[sjp60]

Same thing happened to me. Bought Sephora card from Safeway on May 5th; $100 was loaded (have valid charge receipt),  Went to use the card today, 06/21, in store, customer service rep scraped the number and PIN and she said the card has a zero balance. The CSR also said this has happened several times when a Sephora card was purchased at grocery stores. 

Called Sephora and the fraud rep saw both the purchase of the card for $100 on May 5th and the online sephora.com purchase the next day for $100 (without the card # or PIN). They would not/could not trace the purchase on May 6th to anyone, just said the $100 was spent online. So....NO HELP and that is from the fraud department. Basically said it is cash and I am out the money.

Given this thread, others have experienced this, and I am in IT, I would say Sephora has ANOTHER data breech. In addition to your 2021, 2022 and 2023 breeches (Google them!), you are now experiencing ANOTHER ONE.

Someone needs to do something about it, This post shows replies from Sephora are empty and are not taking accountability.  Any comments Sephora? Actions?? We'll see....

[jojorodrod]

This is also happened to me. I got a $50 graduation gift from my cousin back in June 1st and decided to finally use it today. The lady that was helping me told me that the card a 0$ dollar balance. I called sophora right away and I've me the info on the online transactions that were made in the card that I had not used and zero liability was provided. Their policy is gift cards are used like money therefore they cannot do anything about it. Sophora takes no responsibility or action to stop this from happening to their customers. As a community we need to stop supporting this store as it sounds as this is a common problem and regardless sophora is making their money. This is disgusting and moving forward I will not be purchasing gift cards specifically from this store, since they don't do nothing about it.

[Eireann2727]

Daughter’s friend went to use gift cards today purchased by two different people in two different stores both zero balance.  Won’t be going to Sephora anymore if possible.  Either the kid is out $60 or each kid is out $30.

[dianagarcia79]

THERE ARE HUNDREDS OF US!!
Unused, unscratched Sephora gift cards with $0 balance, fraudulently used online!

Sephora is doing nothing to help us. Let’s report them to the FTC and to the BBB … we don’t deserve to be cheated!
I am all in for a class action lawsuit. 
And let’s take this to Twitter. We’ll make them take responsibility.

[Lesprona]

I’m down! Let’s do it.  We purchased cards from

separate retailers  and both were scams. I think we all need to expose this 

[Stellarbabe82]

Hello,

This has also happened to me, I got a $50 gift card for my Birthday, and just went to use it.  1 cent on it!  I'll be warning people about giving people Sephora Gift Cards going forward!

[CinCin30]

This happened to me also.

I purchased a $50 card for a work colleague and she went to use us it and was at $0

i called Sephora and they were able to tell me it had been used in Ohio. I live in Canada.

No other assistance offered.
Not very good customer relations.

Some way these gift cards are being hacked. The store revealed PIN when it was going to used so how is an hacker able to access this info? 
A very embarrassing situation for myself when it was to be a gift. 

[DaneeBT]

@CinCin30 I'm sorry to hear about this. I will send you a PM. 

[aamax004]

Hi, this happened to me too. My dad purchased a $50 Sephora gift card from the CVS in Los Gatos on April 12. The packaging looked fine. When I tried to use it at the Sephora Los Gatos store, the cashier opened it, I scratched off the pin and when she ran it, she said that it had a zero balance. The cashier tried several times. We then went back to CVS and the cashier said that there was nothing they could do - we had to go back to Sephora. When I called their gift card line, they said that the gift card had been used at around 3am on May 7 and again a few minutes later.

Can someone from Sephora help please? I have the CVS receipts including the activation receipt and the card.

[DaneeBT]

@aamax004 Oh no! I'm sending you a PM. 

[user903]

this happened to me too. I got a $25 sephora gift card for my birthday and when I went to go use it, it said that there was no money on it.!

[LaurieBT]

Hi @user903,

I'm sorry about this! I'll send you a message shortly.

Best regards,

Laurie

[Reneenana28]

Hi Laurie,

 You indicated about a week ago you would send need something shortly regarding the gift card fraud I experienced???

i sent you the gift cards so you could look into the numbers on them??? And never heard back..??

I am curious as to the status, or am I just going to have to resign that I have been victimized by fraud and Sephora could care less if I never see my $$$ again??  

very disappointed and frustrated with the customer service and Sephora business practices ☹️ Renee

[Lesprona]

I think we should all start a lawsuit

[LaurieBT]

@Reneenana28, I have sent you two private messages. To view your messages, please click your Community Profile > Messages.

Best,

Laurie