Frequently Asked Questions

Using AvantCard is simple. Either add the service to a gift card you've already purchased, or buy a card from us directly. Once registered, your AvantCard recipient can choose to come to our site and exchange the card for a different one, by mailing us the old one with a special label.

They won't be charged any fee for redeeming, so they can keep the full face value of the gift card you bought.

Over twenty percent of gift cards go unredeemed, so there's a pretty good chance that your recipient might not want to shop at the store you bought a gift card to. These unwanted cards get sold on eBay and other marketplaces at 80% of face value, or sit in drawers collecting dust. What a waste! AvantCard protects you and lets them get the gift they want, every time.

Recipients never pay a dime for AvantCard. When you buy an AvantCard or upgrade an existing gift card, you pay a small fee for the service.

A team of passionate gifters who were unhappy with gift card exchanges. Learn more about us here.

You can reach us on live chat, by phone (424-260-3716), e-mail (hi@avantcard.mailgun.org), or snail mail if you so desire. We also love Twitter (@getAvantCard). Get all of our contact information.

Absolutely! We can upgrade any supported card to an AvantCard. Click here to upgrade yours.

We support gift cards for over 100 retailers. Click here to see our options.

AvantCard is currently supporting only the top most requested gift cards. We apologize if yours isn't available yet. Please do tell us which card you'd like to see by contacting us!

We currently only support gift cards in commonly-purchased denominations, so we can be sure someone else will want it. We're thinking of supporting other values eventually. Please do let us know you'd like to see this feature by contacting us.

We currently only support gift cards above $20 so we can ensure we cover the costs of offering AvantCard service to our customers. We may choose to support smaller denominations later on. Thanks for bearing with us in the meantime!

AvantCards can be purchased in any denomination up to $1,000. We monitor any high value cards for potential fraud, which is why we need to use a maximum for now. We'll support higher denomination cards eventually. Please let us know if this is a feature you'd like to see.

We'd be happy to process your bulk order to make it easy for you. Just shoot us an e-mail or call/text us and we'll get back to you soon.

AvantCard is currently supporting only the top most requested gift cards. We apologize if yours isn't available yet. Please do tell us which card you'd like to see by contacting us!

Orders are shipped from our location in Seattle, Washington. More information about shipping times is here.

Orders are shipped via USPS first class mail, so you should see it within about three days of shipping. Orders are processed within one business day of submission.

We also will always notify you when items have shipped, but if you are curious anyways feel free to contact us and ask us what's up.

We ship your AvantCard via USPS first class mail.

USPS first class mail takes two to three days on average. It takes us one day to process your order, so you should receive it within 4 business days. If you need it sooner, please let us know and we can ship up to overnight.

None whatsoever. We don't support any gift cards that expire, and your AvantCard protection is good as long as your gift card hasn't been used. We don't charge any recurring fees; you just pay a small one-time fee to register with us.

Nope, we don't charge any state sales tax on orders.

Shipping is free via USPS first class mail. If you want any special shipping options, please let us know.

At this time, all AvantCard sales are final and not refundable. If you ordered by mistake, please contact us within a day of ordering and we'll handle it.

When you buy an AvantCard directly from us, we include a sticker telling the recipient about AvantCard and a custom handwritten card. You can also add AvantCard to a gift card you've already purchased, and you can print out an information page for your recipient.

AvantCard service currently costs $3 if the card has under $50 in value, or $5 if the card has over $50 in value, and 10% of the card value if it is over $100. This is comparable to or better than the price of gift cards issued by credit card companies (e.g. American Express, Visa, and MasterCard).

Just go to our redemption page, enter your gift card brand and number, and you'll be prompted to select a new gift card for the exchange.

Once you have chosen the new gift card type you want, we'll have to get your information so we know where to ship the new card. And finally, you simply print out a packing slip, put it in an envelope to send off to us, send it, and get your new card in a couple days!

We will of course notify you the second we receive your card, verify the balance, and then when we ship out your new card as well.

You can switch out your AvantCard one time. We allow for you to change your mind and switch it back to the old one again at no charge. If you need to exchange more than once, please contact us.

USPS first class mail takes two to three days on average. It takes us one day to process your order, so you should receive it within 4 business days of us receiving your order, or within 7 days total. If you need it sooner, please let us know and we can ship overnight.

At the moment, we don't support cards that have been partially spent. Please do let us know if this is a feature you'd like to see supported in the future.

You can mail the card to us using USPS first class mail, to the address on your packing slip.

That shouldn't happen, and we're sorry if it is. Please contact us and we'll fix it right away.

We ensure that all transactions completed through AvantCard are 100% safe through using our own SSL connection and never storing any of your personal credit card data in our database. We use industry standard 256-bit encryption and payment services from Stripe.

We accept all major credit cards. If you don't see your favorite payment method, click here to contact us.

Your e-mail address is used to send you a verification e-mail and to contact you in the case of any issues with your order.

Creating an account is easy -- just add a password during your checkout process. Once you hae an account, we can learn about your preferences and help you find the best gifts. And it makes checkout a breeze in the future.

Your account information, minus any payment information, is stored on our servers. Payment information is stored by Stripe on their secure servers.