Bitcoin Forum

i've always been hesitant to buy Amazon gift cards at a discount, because i don't know what happens if you spend the money and the gift cards come up fraudulent after the fact. anyone know?

i'm tempted by the discounts. :)

I'd like to know the answer to this as well. I use my Amazon account a lot, and I don't want any trouble....

Nothing, The gift card could have come from anywhere. They know about online sales and fraud. I have used many amazon codes I bought online discounted

you can come in hells kitchen
when you redeem too many fraudulant cards on the same amazon account
'worst case' they might shut you down and freezing your amazon ballance

Usually, if the price is too good to be true, it's a scam. Cards from a trusted member, (around the rank of full member or higher) are usually safe. Avoid buying carded gift cards, amazon might catch onto you. Buy at your own risk, hopefully you can get what you are looking for.  :)

This surprisingly hasn't happened to me yet from all the gift cards I've bought before(and no tidus, if you're reading this, I'm not referring to you ;) ) but I would assume that you'd be filed for fraud and the money would be withdrawn from the connected card attached to that account. Once the items have been shipped and the card reflects to be bad then, you would have stolen items.

what? money withdrawn from the card attached to the account? that seems highly unlikely. someone sending you a bad gift card doesn't entitle them to steal money from you.

thanks for the responses.

They'll pretty much just shut down your Amazon account. If the funds haven't been spent, they will revoke the gift card funds, and maybe freeze your account for investigation of sorts. But, if the money is spent, your account is gone.

yes and you need to give back your goods.
its like the police finds out you bought a stolen car.you cant keep it ...even though you bought it^^

Amazon will investigate your account / run an analysis. If there is evidence you are knowingly facilitating fraudulent activities, they won't hesitate to shut down your account. The same way they will shut down your account if they're "losing money" on your account (returns, lost shipments, etc).

How are there so many amazon gift cards going around, and for so cheap? Something is rigged up through Amazon, and someone is making a pretty penny.

I have never heard anyone having to do that. They just shutdown your account or cancel your order if they realize it before that the card was purchased in a fradulent manner. Incase you happen to be questions about it, you could just say you purchased it off ebay or a forum and was being offered at a good price so you bought  it.

That again isn't the best way of analyzing these cards. Someone could offer you a carded gift card for 85% of the cost, and that wouldn't make it legit. The latter part does apply.

What? Never heard of that. That's crazy. The reason online marketplaces allow the buying and selling of gift cards is because it's completely legal and ostensibly legitimate. Do fraudulently acquired cards make their way into that market? You betcha. But that ain't my fault, as a legitimate buyer.

Amazon accepted the payment in the form of gift cards. They can't try to claw back money from you.

If the order has not fully went through yet, then it is cancelled, and the balance is withheld (i believe). 

If the order has already been processed and shipped to your address, then I believe that the cops might actually show up.  It all depends on how amazon wants to deal with it. 
Please correct me if I'm wrong.

The burden would be on Amazon and law enforcement to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you intended to receive stolen goods. Without a very extensive history of using consistently fraudulent gift cards, that's completely impossible, and even then, it probably wouldn't cut the mustard for a prosecutor. The fact that one used a gift card that was fraudulently obtained is absolutely not prima facie evidence of any crime being committed by the gift card holder. There is no proof of engaging in fraud, nor is there proof of intention to receive stolen goods.

The reality is that Amazon is the biggest gift card market in the world. This is a cost of doing business for them. Pursuing customers in every case of gift card fraud 1) isn't going to increase their revenue and 2) is going to lose them every customer they pull this on.

They're just not interested. Do it enough and they will shut down your account and confiscate the balance -- because you are a liability that is costing them money. That's the only reasonable solution from a business perspective.

should not do if you are in doubt, but it is the way their promotions, naturally if everyone interested, the key find someone who has used it may be helpful

I found this after searching for some cases of bad cards.
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1723449

What exactly does "may be repealed" mean? Does "purchases were rescinded" mean items were purchased but not yet shipped, and they cancelled the order? That post is really unclear.

No, you will not get in trouble for using these discounted Amazon gift cards, the worst thing they will do is blacklist your address, and ban your account.

well.... it seems the answer really is not clear. ???

purse.io is really attractive, but i wonder if these claims of law enforcement involvement in these cases are really true. seems a bit over the top. is buying a gift card at a discount really grounds for criminal proceedings? i agree with the person who said, there doesn't seem to be any proof of any wrongdoing there.

Purse.io has a buyer purchase protection policy, they established it this year after law enforcement showed up at one of their buyer's house.

ouch.... so that means that buying gift cards on Purse.io may result in police coming to my house. that doesn't seem ideal. do you have a link to this occurrence? even though i imagine it could be sorted out, this is the type of hassle i am trying to avoid.

Same for me, I like to buy giftcards maybe not Amazon but Starbucks for sure. You have to watch out for those that are illegally obtained and be sure to ask for a warranty return date. Once I PM someone who can sell $100 starbucks gift card for only $20 or less, when I heard it I was excited but later found out they are illegally obtained which means there's a huge chance they won't work, and there's only a 2 day warranty, so I didn't buy it. But not all cards sold on this forum are fraudulent, some must work.

I've read a story here: https://m.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2po40d/since_my_house_is_being_searched_right_now_small/

I can answer . Most of them buy stuff at amazon . so they buy at cheaper rates . And some one also do buy4u services for amazon so they need large amount of giftcards .

Even purse.io isnt safe, it can be so. But at the end buying from trusted member here isn't bad. (when we know the source)

I've sold some gift cards through localbitcoins and one seller had issues with two gift cards I purchased.  They were legit and I had the receipts and everything but amazon.com locked their account after they redeemed them.  I'm not sure why and they are too worried to contact Amazon themselves but I think the guy is in China so that might have set off some red flag.

In my opinion i will suggest not to buy amazon gift cards it may lose you. But someone though had got trusted gift cards and purchased on amazon.

From where you are buying AGCs. If the website has reliable escrow system, you should use that. escrow can check the balance of amazon gift card without redeeming it. It is done by contacting costumer service. You pay your BTC to escrow he verifies the card and transactions are completed.

Other wise don't buy AGCs from any seller you can't trust.

That's pretty solid advice, buying gift cards will get you in trouble otherwise.

You can buy legitimate gift cards from gyft.com with bitcoin. You unfortunately won't get a discount though.

If you cannot trust the seller, don't buy them. These cards can come from everywhere. My friend has dealt twice with these cards which were stolen and after second time, he got his account frozen/limited.

I don't know. This is a fear of mine as well.  Even purse.io it seems could not figure that problem out.  A week ago they announced they would no longer allow people to buy Amazon gift cards for people at a discount.  Those were one of the best items because they sell at face value.  They must have had a lot of scams too.

You have to make sure that the one selling your amazon cards is trustworthy enough.

Usually if it seems too good to be true, then it is.