Why not just buy a product with the maximum number of cards, return said product, accept store credit, and use the remaining cards along with store credit for the actual product you want.

I think the law is the same in California.

California is very strict on gift cards. For example, they are not allowed to expire (unless they were given as a promotion)

Can you go into the store, purchase a $500 gift card" and pay for it with four $125 gift cards? (ie, combine your balance)

I agree that it's kinda dumb that they only take so many gift cards, but that's their choice. The Additional 3 cards are not worthless. They can be used for other purchases. The Website clearly states the rules regarding gift cards and purchases. What good is a complaint to the BBB going to do? Can the cards be used? Yes? Ok. You lose. The complaining to Apple is also unwarranted, beyond simply expressing your displeasure with the policy. Demanding/Expecting an exception is simply unreasonable. They set the rules for a reason (presumably), and if they give you can exception, everyone will want one. They are entirely within their rights to limit the use of multiple cards, and as long as the other cards are still usable in some form or fashion, they've done nothing wrong.

What a stupid policy.

Can you use gift cards to buy more gift cards, i.e. consolidate?!

What is the point of this policy? Sos stupid.

Buy something with two giftcards. Return item. Get the refund in the form of cash or ONE giftcard. Now you have 5 giftcards and some cash or 6 giftcards...

@Pylon83: Except here, everyone should be able to use all of their gift cards for whatever they want.

@Pylon83: "they've done nothing wrong."

Except prevent a customer from using the gift cards that they sold to him/her for money to pay for goods and services.

You can try to argue semantics all you want, but the end result is still the same.

"Wrong" must have a different meaning in your world.

I just can't understand why people purchase gift cards. What exactly is the benefit to the consumer?

@MonkeySeeMonkeyDo: Probably nothing more than to force people to buy higher-margin / low-cost accessories instead of hanging on to gift cards to pay for big money items.

another reason cash is better than cards. tell granma next year just give cash.

@Dooley:

Most gift cards have in the provisions that they cannot be used to purchase gift cards. I doubt Apple gift cards would be any different.

that's pretty scummy of apple. Who cares how many gift card you have as long as they are valid!

I hate the idea of giftcards anyway. Cash is king!

Pylon, you definitely missed the point. Why should something arbitrary like having 5 or 8 cards matter? Apple has the money already. It's a free loan given to Apple in unsecured debt by the person who bought the cards. The only possible limitation would be badly written point of sale software that can't handle all the purchase tenders at once.

I would just use as many as possible and then just return everything. At the very least they will combine the return into a single card for the store credit. I know Home Depot does it that way - your credit is on one card swiped by the customer service rep.

@andrewe: For me it's an easy way to force my wife into buying something she *wants* without worrying about her pocketing cash to pay for necessities (or gifts for me.)

I'm about to buy her a gift card for a purse she's been talking about. I would inevitably buy the wrong size or style so this is an easy way to surprise her.

@Pylon83: But an apple purchase is a large investment. If this person were buying a computer, the totla cost would equal more than the value of the gift cards. Breaking the purchase into multiple transactions would not be feasible.

@Pylon83:

Don't complain? Why on Earth shouldn't you complain? Gift Cards are bought with a reasonable expectation that they can be used like cash at that store.

Rhys or an affiliate purchased these cards and Rhys saved them toward a purchase, only to find amn unexplained policy blocking her from using these gifts. Did Apple spell out this limitation with each gift card purchase?

There is a solution out there, systems limitations are no excuse for bad customer service. Maybe the front-line rep can't help, but there should be some resolution expert somewhere capable and trained to address these issues so that Rhys can spend her $1250 in iBucks (or whatever) before Apple loses her as a customer forever, and then she posts to a website, and the bad service is advertised.

I have always had good service from Apple or good resolution when I haven't.

he found he "could not enter more than half his gift cards" online.
He had 7 cards.
The website lets you use up to 4 at a time.

Is it just me, or last time I checked, was 4 MORE THAN HALF of 7?
Sorry. But, that's math that even I can do.

@Scuba Steve:
They aren't preventing him from using the cards. They are just preventing him from using them all at once. The cards are still valid, and can be used for any other purchase. I'm not sure you have a "right" to use 1000000 gift cards all at once because you have that many. Again, it's dumb, but it's well within Apple's rights.

@Pylon83: Disagreed. Apple's "reason" here is transparent: it hopes to extort more money from you by having you make up the difference on the computer with additional payment, and then use the leftover gift balances on merchandise you wouldn't have bought in the first place.

Apple is using this policy to sequester people's money away in an abusive and self-serving way. That's a lousy business practice, and it might be (or should be) illegal.

I have to agree with you here. Would they tell a customer they can't use 60 twenty dollar bills because it's too much to process? The cards were paid for, Apple got the money, they should honor the gift cards no matter how many you want to use, they've already received the money. The gift cards should be treated as money@Scuba Steve:

@Diet-Orange-Soda: I agree with you also, I love getting gift cards..My father does not give cash, ever. So I just tell him to get me a Target gift card. I go there all the time anyway, and yeah I'm using it on stuff I need more than stuff I want but I'm ok with that. I bought a new non-stick pan I wanted with the one he gave me for Christmas as well as paper towels, bread and toilet paper..win-win.

This garbage is why I hate Apple and will NEVER buy one of their overpriced PC's. I'm proud to say I've never purchased an Apple product in my life. I can operate Windows Vista just fine thank you.

Okay, the way I see it is if you're buying a computer and want to use 7 gift cards, too bad, you're out of luck. But you can use 6 gift cards and use the 7th card to purchase an accessory. Seriously, it evens out if you have to buy something else anyway.

And typically no, you can't use all of your gift cards to purchase one giant gift card.

@andrewe:

I just can't understand why people purchase gift cards. What exactly is the benefit to the consumer?

EXACTLY! Gift cards are a bigger boon to the producer than the consumer. Therefore the producer is a complete and total idiot to limit the use of gift cards in any way because all it does is discourage people from buying them.

Dear Apple: You already got a free $1250 loan on these gift cards in addition to the healthy "look at me" markup on your products. Do you REALLY have to dick your customers in a thinly veiled attempt to triple-dip on the deal by getting the customer to buy TWO items that cost more than the gift cards?

@Pro-Pain: You hate Apple because they have a policy completely unrelated to their computers? Hey, you're the same person that was a giant thorn in everyone's side in another discussion, also involving an Apple computer....wow, things just aren't "turn a frown upside down" for you, are they?

@UpsetPanda: You don't need accessories. Everything you need, especially with the MacBooks, is in the box.

@Pylon83: I guess the people who gave those gift cards then should have consulted with:

-Apple's web site to see what their policy on a recipient using multiple gift cards was;
and
-Rhys to see how many gift cards Rhys already had;
and
-everyone else who was planning on giving Rhys an Apple gift card.

Kinda ruins the concept of these cards being a 'gift' if you have to consult with the recipient before giving one, huh?

A call to one's state Attorney General's office or state division of consumer affairs is in order. Most states recognize a gift card the same as cash, perhaps just with variations on the life of the card from state to state. Forget the BBB, they're powerless.

@Diet-Orange-Soda: Unless you're buying an Air and you want to watch a DVD.

i love apple, but this is just stupid and wrong. it should be illegal. gift cards should be viewed as real money as long as you're shopping at the store where they were purchased.

for some reason stores are treating gift cards like they would coupons. the 'one offer per customer' fine print on a coupon makes sense because the store gives them away for free! but when you use cash to buy a card, it should then be honored as cash to make a purchase.

again - don't buy gift cards as gifts!!

@scoosdad: Don't forget some of those cards could have been purchased before this policy went into effect.

@andrewe:

I can't remember the restaurant, but there's one my sister-in-law goes to where every time you buy a gift card worth $20 or more, you get a free $5 card to go with it. Whenever she goes to the place, she buys a $20 card, gets her $5 card, then will use the $20 to pay for her meal. Every 4th visit nets her a comped 5th meal, basically.

Why does the Rhys have so many gift cards? When I was younger I worked in retail and was taught to be weary of the customer with a lot of gift cards. A lot of fraud is committed using gift cards...

Folks, this might be more of a case of Apple trying to defend itself from Fraud. Most of the time, probably 99% of the time people only get one or two gift cards to use at a place right? So if someone came to you with 7 Giftcards, wouldn't you be a little bit suspicious? It's not like Apple is going out of it's way to be mean to these folks, they are trying to prevent themselves from being ripped off.

How do you counterfeit gift cards? I could see an employee fraudulently activating a handful of cards but that has to go through their system and the missing funds should be noticed at the end of the day.

@Pylon83: Not when the law means gift cards must be treated as cash. Do they restrict how much cash you can buy something with? No. I can walk in and buy a computer with cash if I want to. Gift cards = cash = I can buy the computer with gift cards if I want.

@rcsfca: I wouldn't consider seven gift cards to be an excessive amount. I could easily see someone asking for gift cards as graduation gifts to help pay for a new computer to be used at college. It wouldn't take many relatives giving a gift card to quickly add up to seven or more.

@Troy F.: Macs don't have a markup on them. That's way out of date. You'll pay the same amount for a decent comparable computer from any other maker. Plus the total cost of ownership is lower. Please stop the FUD.

So if a person comes in with 1000 gift cards, Apple should have to process all of them for 1 transaction? They have to draw the line somewhere, and the fact they chose to do it at 4/6 doesn't make it wrong or illegal. The guy didn't buy them all himself. Presumably, he received them as gifts (hence the name "Gift Card"). The fact 7 people chose to give him an apple Gift Card doesn't change their policy. When each person purcahsed the card, they rightly assumed that the card could be used for a purchase at the store. I think assuming that they could be aggregated to no end is unreasonable. What if I went in and wanted to pay with 7 different credit cards? Again, Apple isn't "right" here, but it's their store and they can set their policies as they please.

Easy enough solution, just ask to consolidate some or all of the cards into one card. I've done this at many other stores both in person and online since I didn't want 3 cards for the same store hanging out in my wallet. Granted, I don't know if Apple does this, but 3 cards -> one card solves the problem.

South Carolina Gift Card Stautes. They say nothing about them being treated as Cash equivalents.

S.C. Code Ann. §39-1-55(A)
"Gift certificate" means a certificate that is issued or sold by a person engaged in the business of offering goods or services for sale at retail and that entitles a recipient of the certificate to the delivery of goods or services from the person who issued or sold the certificate. This term includes a gift card used for the same purpose as a gift certificate.

S.C. Code Ann. §39-1-55(B)
Gift certificates cannot expire before the first anniversary of the date the certificate was sold or issued, unless the expiration date is disclosed as specified.

S.C. Code Ann. §39-1-55(C)
Prohibits any fees unless properly disclosed as specified.

This is why I prefer to get cash, the gift card accepted everywhere :).

I don't "get" Gift Cards. All they are is cash, dessed up like you put effort into a gift. Might as well give cash, which you can use anywhere, it doesn't expire etc.

I really can't see why they can't use >6 cards. I could see difficulty if someone had several dozen cards... but he has 7...

When i bought my plasma tv at Circuit City, I actually paid with 12 gift cards (from reward points). The sales clerk actually had to combine them into one big gift card, because he said the computer would only let him use 5 cards per order.

I guess apple isn't the only one doing things like that.

Apple hasn't done anything illegal here. But it doesn't need to be illegal to be wrong. And what they did wrong (from a business point of view) is alienate people who want to give them money.
Really. If you want to make money, you make it as easy as possible for people to give you that money. No hoops to jump through, no hard times, nothing like that.
Do they have too many customers already? Do they have too much money already? No? then take her freaking money already!

@Buran: If there is not markup on their products, that means they are selling at-cost. Can you prove this statement?

Didn't think so. Better luck next time.

I can understand a limit on online purchases, to reduce the risk of fraud. In the store, where you need the physical card, it doesn't make as much sense. It may take a little longer to process them all, but it would probably still be faster than writing a check at most stores. Some limits are understandable. For instance, a store doesn't have to accept pennies as payment for large amounts, as it places an undue burden on the recipient to count them and transport them. I don't see gift cards being in the same category.

I don't think any Apple store would refuse to take 1000 gift cards though, provided they were all valid, since that would mean a minimum of $25k in sales that day. I think they'd call in extra help to get that done.

@rcsfca:

maybe he just got married or had a birthday or couldnt buy the computer all at once and bought a card every month. please who cares why.