Reports are coming in on Flyertalk and other forums that the Stop & Shop and Giant grocery chain is shifting to cash-or-debit-only policy for the purchase of Visa, Mastercard, and Amex prepaid cards.
Update October 2016: Giant/S&S are now accepting credit cards again for Visa/MC/Amex gift card purchases.
My friend Jay took a picture at one Stop & Shop store:
And here’s a picture from Flyertalk:
This is a new change as of today; the memo is said to have come in last night. It’s not clear if it effects all stores. It’s not yet hard-coded according to Flyertalk.
Sometimes there is a sign at the POS, sometimes a sign by the gift card rack, and sometimes it’s just a memo circulated internally.
This is a big hit to manufactured spending for those in the S&S/Giant area. Moreover, S&S/Giant often run bonus fuel points offers on Visa or Mastercard gift cards (including right now, ends today), and those are a lot less lucrative now. For someone with a small tank, these deals may not be worth it at all.
The max amount of value you can get in a lot of areas is $2.20 x 35 gallons, or $77. If you max it out at 35-gallons, it’s a good deal even when paying with cash. But if you only get 10-12 gallons, the value is more like $25 per tank or less, depending on the cost of gas.
RIP 🙁
I saw the news that Giant start allowing CC again for these purchases (your update) but havent tried since then, up until yesterday. I tried some reloadits and a univision card, but the terminal would not allow me to pay the load amount with a cc (it instead just allowed me to pay the fee by cc). Is this an official thing I missed somehow, or should I still be able to buy reloadables somehow at giant?
Yup, it’s clearly advertised in their circulars that you can use cc on Visa/MC/Amex gc. We’ve mentioned it in the gas points posts many times.
Right but thats visa/mc/amex gift cards. Are you of the understanding that reloadable products (i.e. reloadit) should be cc purchasable?
As of 10/1, chips are ready and *s&s are accepting cc again.
Thanks, let me update
http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/04/giant-food-sees-giant-card-fraud-spike/
They claim it’s due to fraud.
its true… they are rejecting credit cards. This is a sad day.. but we will figure out a way t
Went away for a couple of weeks and I come back to this…Sigh.
I tried for a reloadit, hoping they might see it differently. It gave the cashier enough pause that she went back to clarify, but the answer was still ‘no’.
This is a huge hit.
Reloadit are affected by this as well?
Damn it
Damn – did you point out that their signs only indicate, VISA, MasterCard, and AMEX? The Giant I go to sells reloadit cards without the “Cash Only” stamp, so I’ve been very fortunate…haven’t tried since the new policy and I have a ton of minimums to meet. Arg!
I reached out to corporate for comment since I figured it couldn’t hurt. According to them this will be a permanent policy going forward regardless of when EMV actually gets implemented. Hope they change their minds.
Hmm, I’ll have to check. This was one of two chains I was going to go nuts at during discover/chase 5% bonus. :/
Virginia Martins (Giant) all closed down today. Unfortunately I waited till today because I have discounted gas until around April 10 through Kroger. This time stalling was a bad idea – I needed the manufactured spend and love the gas perk.
This place is one of only two MS friendly options in my area until today. I hope it’s a temporary thing until they get their chip readers up and functional.