Sometimes, gift cards on eBay are sold at prices more than their face values. You may be wondering why it happens. I am, too. I went online to research and saw lots of discussion in many forums. From them, I learned cash back or promotion can explain some of them. And today, I experienced that myself. I bid at eBay auction and won. The price is more than face value of the gift card, 104.44%. Here is a detail.

The item was $500 Target gift card. It was auction style listing and ending in a few hours when I saw it. Before logging in eBay, I received an email from eBay that notified me about eBay Bucks promotion. It was:

Earn 10% eBay Bucks on every qualifying single item of $250 or more on June 4th to June 5th

I received an email 3 hours before the promotion started. I have seen the same type of eBay Bucks promotions throughout the year (sometimes 4%, qualifying on $50 or more purchases, etc.), but they appear at random. So, you need to keep an eye on your emails.

$250 is not cheap (at least, for me). You shouldn’t buy something expensive just to meet requirements for 10% eBay Bucks. But if you choose gift cards for stores that you regularly shop, it will be fine. So I chose Target gift card and bid at the auction. I won the auction for $522.22, which was my max bid. I will get $52.22 in eBay Bucks. Considering this, I got $500 Target gift card for $470. It is exactly 6% off. According to data at GiftCardGranny.com, 6% discount is more than the average for Target gift cards and 5% REDcard discount as well. It won’t take a month for me to spend $500 at Target, but I can even boost up spending by using this strategy (of course, without frittering away).

6% discount is not only the bargain I got from the transaction. That is because I earned 0.5% cash back ($2.61) from BigCrumbs.com. And I paid with American Express gift card linked to my PayPal account. When I purchased AmEx GC, I earned 4% equivalent reward ($20.88) from Fuel Rewards Network.

This is why I spent more money for a gift card which has less value. However, the money I paid is only 104.44% of actual value of the gift card. I still cannot understand why some gift cards or reload packs are sold at 150% to 200% price. In the forums, people are saying that it’s fraudulent, money laundering, or stupidity. But I feel that there must be a secret, and I hope I will figure it out someday.