The Gift-card The gift card & egrave; a prepaid card usually issued by a company or a retailer, to be used, in place of cash, for purchases within a particular store or business; connected to the company or to the retailer themselves. Gift cards, or gift cards, are sometimes offered as a means of promotion, to entice recipients to enter or return to certain shops or commercial networks. Very often the Gift-card is used in place of a gift to a friend, a family member or a relative, & egrave; generally anonymous and lapses on a certain date or when the value of money stored in it is equal; exhausted. Visa and MasterCard, the two

The Gift-card The gift card & egrave; a prepaid card usually issued by a company or a retailer, to be used, in place of cash, for purchases within a particular store or business; connected to the company or to the retailer themselves. Gift cards, or gift cards, are sometimes offered as a means of promotion, to entice recipients to enter or return to certain shops or commercial networks. Very often the Gift-card is used in place of a gift to a friend, a family member or a relative, & egrave; generally anonymous and lapses on a certain date or when the value of money stored in it is equal; exhausted. Visa and MasterCard, the two famous credit card circuits, generate generic gift cards that do not have to be converted into particular stores, and which are widely used for marketing strategies. A feature of these cards is which are generally anonymous and are deleted when the value stored in a card is sold out. In the United States, the Gift Card is very popular, statistically & egrave; valued as the second best gift; desired, while & egrave; the third best gift; appreciated by the French. The reason & egrave; evidently linked to the fact that people's needs have increased and they are disappointed with the gifts they receive. Gift cards have become more and more popular; popular to lighten the responsibility & agrave; of donors. In the United States, gift cards are very popular, in 2006 the Gift card was the second gift was offered, even the best gift; desired by women and the third most important; sought after by males. In 2012, almost 50% of all consumers in the United States said they had bought a gift card to offer as gifts during Christmas and New Year. In the same year in Canada nearly 2 billion dollars were spent and in the United Kingdom almost 3, to buy Gift cards. Historical evolution The Neiman Marcus group , owner of the American chain of luxury goods stores, & egrave; was the first to circulate the Gift-cards in 1994, but the success is it was lukewarm or in any case lower than expected, perhaps because it was no concrete steps have been made to understand their potential. & nbsp; Blockbuster, the international home video chain, since 1995 is a he was the first, true active and dynamic promoter of gift cards in his stores. Probably the idea, to say the least ingenious, & egrave; arose in the minds of some members of the management staff due to a continuous and rampant counterfeiting of their gift certificates, which until then were printed on paper. After Blockbuster, the large chain of Starbucks shops and cafes, introduced in its activity. the Gift card. Among the traders it is; then spread the practice of giving a gift card instead of cash, thus increasing costs; the possibility & agrave; of the return of the customers. Function and types The Gift card can; looks like a credit card and generally has the same size, it's identified by a specific number or code, it is not nominal and therefore can; be used by anyone. All Gift Cards are assisted by an electronic authorization system that is realized via the web, some gift cards can be topped up for a fee and then used more. times. The cards can have a barcode that is read by an electronic machine, most of it has no value until the cash desk operator enters the amount that the customer wishes to put on the card. The amount is reported only in the central data store of the store or chain, it is rarely seen stored on paper, as is used for public transport systems or photocopiers of schools, libraries and universities. To oppose cloning, the data is encrypted and the magnetic stripe is used. also often placed differently than generic credit cards, so as not to be read or written with standard equipment. Other gift cards can have a nominal value and must be activated by calling a specific number and submitting to a series of demonstrations and verifications. & Nbsp;

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