Ending My CardCash Relationship

How It All Started

I wanted to expand into another exchange to see if I could sell for higher rates. In the June of 2015, I reached out to CardCash to sell gift cards asking them about their bulk program. It took a lot of follow up from me before an account manager reached out to me. Each week for about 4 weeks I had to follow up with them to see what the status was. This should have been a red flag to me that the CardCash operation was not exactly on top of everything.

The Beginning To The End

I absolutely hated and still hate their website. The website functionality and usefulness is atrocious. One of the things that the account rep that was assigned to me was how “we like to make things easy for everyone.” If they had a working website, they wouldn’t need to offer a process outside the system to “make things easy.”

For anyone who has asked me to help them in selling gift cards, I train everyone when they mail in gift cards to package them something like this:

All the gift cards are sealed in an envelope with the count and denomination. The extra effort is done because CardCash knows how many and what to expect. Was it a surprise to me that I received an email to say that they didn’t receive a card? Hardly. But I was miffed. They have some nerve to tell me to double check if I mailed in the card or not. I’ve mailed over $100,000 worth of gift cards in the mail and never forgot to mail a card, but this is CardCash. It didn’t surprise me that they would be the one to lose a card. Unfortunately for me, they never found the card unlike the reader who emailed me.

Those are the two strikes already.

The Hook

Some time in September, my account manager calls me to tell me about a bonus for selling cards. At this point I’ve had two months working with him and know he is awful at following up. He will call me for everything so I made him email me and put it in writing about this bonus. The execution of it was asinine.

Basically, what they did was lower the payout rate and then add your bonus. If you had 92% on gas gift cards with a 5% bonus, they would pay you out 88% today and you would expect the 5% bonus at the end promotional period for a total of 93%.

I told a few people about what is happening with CardCash about this promo and we went to town with it. I kept telling myself, finish this promo and be done with CardCash because there was too many problems. The amount of work required was not worth it.

The Tipping Point

In mid December, I was tipped off about an incredibly good gift card deal that varied by region. Huge money making opportunity. The first person sold $20,000 as soon as the promo went live. CardCash paid out on it. I called as a courtesy to CardCash that I was about to sell $30,000 in the next round. All of a sudden, the rate was changed from 90% to mid 80%, effectively immediately. No notice, no one time exception. I am 100% sure if I did not say anything about selling $30,000, I would have gotten the higher rate because the CardCash operation is so operationally deficient. I asked to escalate to his supervisor and his supervisor “doesn’t talk to customers.” More BS.

At this point, I was furious. To add more fuel to the fire he added some crap like take it or leave it. I checked in with my buyer and he was OK with the latest rates and we moved forward, but I would not forget this incident. I remember everything.

More Lack Of Communication

At the end of 2015, I wrote about my beef with CardCash and it piqued the interest of some “Director” in CardCash. Unsolicited, he approached me asking for my opinion on how they could help with the user experience. It was during the holidays and made scheduling difficult, but we agreed to a time to a conference call. He blew me off. I send a follow up email and nothing. I should have known that this was typical.

Even More Lack Of Communication

What do you do when you send a question and it goes unanswered? You follow up, right? I have lost the number of times I had to follow up on the bonus. December 31, 2015 was the last day any cards sold would be eligible for the bonus. About 10 days into January, I asked about the bonus. No response. 3 days later, another follow up email. Still nothing. 7 days later, sent another follow up. It took 11 days to hear a response of “I am working on it.” Well for FFS, you couldn’t tell me that on the first day I asked you?

Due to various circumstances with a particular gift card brand, we unloaded close to $70,000 worth and mid stream that brand changed policy whereby electronic gift card redemptions were no longer allowed and only physical cards can be used.

From February to March was completely sideways. It was the same message that the gift cards were “bad,” and we kept providing evidence that they were used and no further action was needed. Two months this went on.

A very big, huge thanks to an anonymous reader for sending me contact information to a different rep that he knows. Unfortunately, this second rep is like my current rep. None of the people at CardCash know how to effectively communicate. He would forward all my requests to my rep. Dammit, if I email you and you are forwarding it back to my rep at least copy me on the email so I know what’s going on.

I’m completely fed up with the situation and take a different game plan. At the end of March, we created a timeline for response and action. What was their response? Silence. More of the same February to March sideways action goes by again for a week. See a pattern? They don’t want to fix the situation.

We are in mid April now and I was “promised” an update. I follow up, nothing. I forward my request to rep2. Radio silence. 4 days later another follow up to rep2. More silence. 7 days later, another follow up. More silence. 8 days after that I receive an email with the final list. On my side, it took a couple of days, but that was quickly resolved and shot off an email about moving forward with a payment and just accepting the loss.

Take a guess what happens next! Silence.

The Resolution

I called rep2, left him a voicemail and my rep gave me a call and I gave him a reaming. I wound up hanging up on him because I no longer wanted to deal with him. My account manager called me back in the afternoon and told me I’d be receiving a check within the same week with priority mail.

It Never Arrived

After my account manager claimed the check was in the mail and was processed, I received another email from someone asking about other gift cards. I ignored it because a promise of delivery was told. Then at the end of the week, when i did not receive the check I asked what’s going on? I was told that the check was held until I answered his email.

How frustrating that not a single soul could have given me some kind clarity.

Finally!

After reviewing their list for the nth time, we were able to square it away and I have the check in hand. It literally took 6 months to get this bonus check. I hope they enjoyed the 6 month interest free loan from me because I will never, ever, ever sell to them again. In fact, after this entire ordeal, I will never buy anything from them either.

For those who sell with Cardcash, or anyone for that matter, keep excellent written records.