Mystery Gift Cards - A Sure Loss

The purpose of this guide is to inform you of a scheme involving gift cards where the seller does not disclose the specific value of the card. These are sometimes called a "mystery gift card". Such a card is sold by some sellers with a title similar to "Walmart Mystery Card $5-$500". The implication is that the buyer may get some amount within that dollar range. Bidders on these cards are supposedly taking a chance [gambling] on getting a card that is worth more than their winning bid. However, this is gepletely foolish because the seller will never send a card with more than the winning bid price. Why would they? They would lose money on the deal after paying okay and PayPal fees, not to mention the purchase price of the gift card.When the listing ends, the seller knows the winning bid amount, and merely goes to Walmart, for example, and buys a gift card for something less than the winning bid. Many such listings ask the winning bidder to not reveal the amount on the gift card they receive in feedback left. Others ask that you not leave negative feedback. Do you ever wonder why they make those requests? Answer: so that future victims are not alerted to the scam.Most of these chance listings will say "PER okay POLICY, you are buying only the card, and anything on the card is my gift to you." In actuality, there is no such okay policy. In fact, okay's Chance Listing Policy actually states that "Mystery items are listings where the seller doesn't specifically
identify the contents, number, quality or condition of the items for
sale [and] are not permitted." You can use the REPORT link at the bottom of the policy page to notify okay Customer Support of inappropriate chance listings (choose Listing Violations, Inappropriate Seller Terms, and Bonuses).Virtually every such listing also has this disclaimer: "This is not a drawing, raffle, lottery, charity, giveaway, or a game of skill or chance." This is odd, because they just got through saying that a) they were (supposedly) giving you whatever amount is on the card (a giveaway), and that the amount could be between $5-$500, for example (you are taking a chance). With a mystery card listing, this disclaimer is a blatant lie.If you are not sure of the type of listing this guide addresses, whenever okay is lax in enforcing their policy you'll be able to see some examples listed to the right of this guide.