Gift Cards: Issue, Sell and Redeem

Overview

A gift card is a code with a balance. Shoppers spend it at checkout on your storefront, and your cashiers apply it at the till. Catalog → Gift cards lists every card with what was issued and what is left. The list shows each card by the last 4 characters of its code, for example ••••-7KQ2. Search by those 4 characters or by the recipient's email; pasting a full code finds its card too.

Gift cards are on the Growth plan and above.

Issue a gift card

1. Go to Catalog → Gift cards and click Issue gift card.
2. Enter the Amount.
3. Optionally add a Recipient email and an Expires date. A recipient email links the card to that customer's account when they have one.
4. Click Create gift card, then copy the code from the banner at the top of the page.

The banner is the only place the full code is shown. Once you leave or refresh the page, the list shows only its last 4 characters, and nobody on your team can look the full code up again, because the code is the money. If a code is lost before it reaches its owner, void the card and issue a new one.

Issuing a card here does not email it. Send the code to the person yourself. A shopper who has an account on your store still sees the full code of every card linked to them in their account.

Selling gift cards online

To sell gift cards on your storefront, add a gift card product:

1. Go to Catalog → Products and click Add product.
2. Set Product type to Gift card.
3. Under Amounts buyers can choose, enter whole amounts separated by commas, for example 25, 50, 100. You can offer up to 12. Leave it empty to let buyers type any amount from 5 to 1,000 in your store's currency.
4. Add a name, category and photo, confirm the listing and save.

The product is listed at its smallest amount. A gift card has no stock, shipping, gift wrap or variants, so the editor leaves those sections out, and discount codes, sales and offers never apply to it.

How the gift arrives. At checkout the buyer picks an amount and enters the recipient's email, with an optional name, message and delivery date up to a year ahead. When the payment goes through, each card gets its own code and is emailed to the recipient, straight away or on the chosen date. Buying three cards makes three codes. Every card sold appears on this page with the rest, and a refund that takes the money back voids it.

Changing the type. You can turn a product into a gift card, or a gift card into another type, on its edit page until it has been ordered. After that the type is locked, because past orders keep pointing at the product: a shipped item read as a gift card would drop out of shipping, and a sold gift card would look like something to ship. Add a new product instead and archive the old one when you stop selling it.

On a draft order. A gift card product can also go on a draft order, at one of the amounts it offers. Enter the email address it goes to, with an optional name and message, or leave the address blank to send it to the customer. When the customer pays, through the payment link or because you marked the draft paid, each card is issued with its own code and emailed to its recipient, the same email a card bought at checkout gets, and it appears on this page. A gift card on a draft is never discounted or taxed, and takes no stock.

Gift card products are sold online and on draft orders. A gift card sold at the till is issued from this page.

Redeeming

• Online: the shopper enters the code at checkout and clicks Apply. The card is checked straight away and its balance is shown, then taken off the order. A code that cannot pay is refused with the reason instead of being left off the order: a card that does not exist, has expired, was voided or has not been delivered yet gets one answer, and a used-up card says it has no balance left.
• On the payment step the card is fixed, because the payment was set up for that total. Change details or codes takes the shopper back a step to change it; nothing is charged and the card's balance is not touched.
• At the till: choose Gift card and enter the code. See Point of sale.
• Shoppers can check a card's balance on your storefront. Every code your store issues is accepted there, including refund and store-credit codes, which can contain - and _.

Void a card

Open the card and click Void. The customer can no longer use the code, and the list keeps the card for your records.

Good to know

• The page shows Cards issued, Total value issued and Balance remaining across all your cards.