Saveya sent out an email to sellers indicating that they’ll be shutting down next month. Sellers will no longer be able to list gift cards after April 26th, and all cards must be sold by May 20th.
After five years in business and careful consideration, SaveYa is closing. We will not accept any new listings after Friday, April 26, 2019. Gift cards listed by Friday, April 26, 2019 will remain for sale on the site until Monday, May 20, 2019.
Payments
Any gift cards sold on SaveYa through Friday, April 26, 2019 will be paid to you as part of our normal payment cycle.Account Access
You will still be able to access your account to review past sales and withdraw funds through Wednesday, June 26, 2019, however, you will not be able to list gift cards for sale.As we close our doors, we want to say thank you for your partnership with SaveYa over the years. If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected].
Myself being in the game for the past 5 years, it’s interesting watching how businesses evolve. Warning: what’s written below may sound like a soap opera.
Saveya started as the spin-off from Giftcards.com where they were going to have a dedicated site, Saveya, for selling second-hand cards. At some point along the way, I believe Saveya was separated ownership from Giftcards.com.
Back in 2011, Blackhawk acquired Cardpool. Then, in 2016, Blackhawk bought Giftcards.com. (Tangentially, in 2017 they bought Cashstar, and in 2018 Blackhawk was acquired by a private equity firm.) The ironic thing is that Blackhawk sold off Cardpool in January of this year.
As of now, Giftcards.com still sells discounted gift cards. And they have a link for users to sell their gift cards which redirects to Cardpool. It’s unclear why Giftcards.com continues to send people to Cardpool being that they no longer are owned by Blackhawk, presumably it’s an advertising agreement between them and Cardpool.
Bottom line is that the second hand gift card business seems to be a tough market. Cardpool was sold off and some people report having issues now with them. Saveya is closing. Giftcardzen sold to Retailemenot and no longer buys gift cards (at least not from ordinary sellers). We all remember when TPM closed. Looking back at the initial guide to gift card reselling back in 2015, only Raise and Cardcash seem to be going strong as before.
Hat tip to my friend Kevin
I purchased over $7000.00 in gift cards from SaveYa and Gift Card Zen. I am responsible for three households and the discounts definitely came in handy. Any suggestions or ideas on how I can get the cards that were in my accounts would be GREATLY appreciated. Hard earned money, very upsetting. Thank you in advance for any suggestions or ideas.
I purchased over $2000.00 from SaveYa and over $5000.00 from Giftcardzen. I was unaware that either had gone out of business and would greatly appreciate any suggestions on how I can get my gift cards? I support three households and these discounts most definitely helped. Now, I need to ask how I can gain access to them? Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
I bought twenty or so gift cards from SaveYa over a few months time and never had a problem. The balances were always correct. Then one day I tried to buy a gift card and they would not let me because of so called “security issues”. I was paying with the same credit card as all the previous orders so that was not the problem. I called them and they said their security is done by a third party and there was nothing they could do about it. So I was banned from SaveYa for no reason. They deserve to go out of business for their stupidity for turning away good customers.
I use Saveya in conjunction with cardkangaroo so this kind of sucks as a bulk seller for me.
Especially since my old company I worked for (I used to bulk buy/sell for a company) fired me for asking for a raise. I went out on my own and did business for 2 years before they signed up on raise.com under my name and social. Now I’m suspended from raise and it’s been 5 months and losing saveya means I’m down to just cardkangaroo.
Any good alternatives for bulk sellers? I’ve tried to apply to cardpool they never responded.
I was doing 6 figures annually with raise alone and now they just won’t even respond to me or take my calls anymore.
If you’re making that much on GCs and you have a SS fraud issue, that sounds like a lawyer’s dream scenario.
OMG that’s insane!
You should definitely talk to a lawyer.
You can use Bargain Gift Card. Great rates and they allow you to sell most anything.
I had a good run selling to them for a few months back in 2016. But when Saveya moved to a listings model it ruined the site and made them unviable from a seller standpoint.
I don’t wish misfortune on them, but I’m not really sad or surprised. From my experience, they were not running a great business. I sold a handful of gift cards with them, and then one day they locked my account for no apparent reason. I reached out a couple times and asked if they could please tell me what’s up so we could resolve it, and they flat out refused and just said they would no longer do business with me. I don’t know if they thought I was a scammer or what, but the few times I did sell a card or two with them, it went fine. Poor customer service, and they lost a legitimate customer.
I’ve been having good experiences with CardCash still, at least.
Always bad to see a sellers site go. I stopped selling gift cards. My last gift card sold was $50 aa from the Amex Aspire credit. Sold it back in early December. I keep checking the balance once in a while. It is now April and the buyer has not used the card.
No tears from me after Saveya gave me hassle trying to sell a fully legit gift card. Only use Card Kangaroo these days.
Amazing that it’s so hard to crack. The bid-ask spread is quite large (10%+) so you’d think someone could do it. My guess is that the capital required is too high for what people bring to the table and they get jammed up when cards sit for months.
Its the ultimate moral hazard problem. Whoever solves this will solve a lot more than second-hand gift card market.