I'm really confused about gift vouchers on ebay

[glenimp617]

I was looking on ebay and came across the gift voucher section.

Personally the only gift vouchers I buy are the universal ones with the picture of the queen on. AFAIK they are the only universal gift vouchers on the market.

In any case, I am confused so I am turning to the OCUK community to answer this question

Why are gift vouchers selling on ebay for more than their face value?

£20 voucher on auction sells for £26.13 why? it can't be because the buyer is an idiot. They nearly always sell for more than their worth. It is a scam I am not aware of?

 

[chris.tarry85]

I was looking on ebay and came across the gift voucher section.

Personally the only gift vouchers I buy are the universal ones with the picture of the queen on. AFAIK they are the only universal gift vouchers on the market.

In any case, I am confused so I am turning to the OCUK community to answer this question

Why are gift vouchers selling on ebay for more than their face value?

£20 voucher on auction sells for £26.13 why? it can't be because the buyer is an idiot. They nearly always sell for more than their worth. It is a scam I am not aware of?

I think in a lot of cases, people buy them to try and avoid paying tax on income from Ebay sales etc.

E.g. If you have several hundred pounds in your Paypal and transfer it to your bank account then if you ever get audited by HMRC they may well pick up on this.

However if you use this to buy vouchers which you then spend the money never actually hits any of your accounts.

Or this could just be another one of those urban myths!

 

[Theophany]

I think in a lot of cases, people buy them to try and avoid paying tax on income from Ebay sales etc.

E.g. If you have several hundred pounds in your Paypal and transfer it to your bank account then if you ever get audited by HMRC they may well pick up on this.

However if you use this to buy vouchers which you then spend the money never actually hits any of your accounts.

Or this could just be another one of those urban myths!

Sounds like an awesome tax dodge if you do all your shopping in Argos.

 

[v0n]

Tax dodging this way is highly unlikely. Paypal payments over 3k get reported, otherwise you can just trickle through week after week, it's free, it's unlikely to get anyone's attention.

There are three reasons why something with £20 gets sold for £26.
One is auction derailing, similar to that observed by many in mobile phone section. Suddenly a fresh buyer bids 5 times over the market value of the phone in every instance, just so 20 bidders get discouraged/run out of time and flee over to 20-30 identical BIN auctions from one and the same company, which was not the cheapest, but at least you won't lose time over and over again. Fresh account that bid in all the auctions will eventually get done for non payments, but by then the company that arranged derailing of all other auctions sold their weekly stock. They will register another account and start derailing again next Monday.

Second reason is because that particular discount card was greatly desired by the Prince George Abdigidigwengo, currently on exile, for his wife, he will gladly overpay and send you a cheque for twice the amount, if you could forward the difference in cash transfer to his shipping agent that he owes some money for previous arrangements. We all know the story there.

Third reason is uncle Engelbert. You see - aunt Gwendolyn wants a Next Voucher for her niece's 15th birthday, but since they live in Llandrovrrr-y-Lellumpollelum and the nearest Next shop is in Wrexham, left by the church, then 57 miles down the single horse tract, and then there is that building site in Cwmystwyth where you have to queue behind chain of lorries and the roadworks that's been going on for a year in Ysbyty Ystwyth with the signal light completely broken, and uncle Englebert knows he would never be back for rugby on Sky Sports, so he will gladly go upstairs, order first one that ends now (god knows he will pay more for fuel and parking in Wrexham than this extra 6 quid on top of value) just so he can yell to aunt Gwendolyn "I got one online honey, Pat will bring it with weekly post on Friday" and be done with it.

 

[checjb]

A genuinely LOL worthy response there, v0n.

 

[Pawnless Endgame]

I've noticed this with Amazon codes. They're used online, they're purchased online, but why are £20 codes selling for £22? Since it's all online, can't you just log into your Amazon and pay £20 for a £20 code?

 

[airwave99]

For some vouchers (e.g. Tesco Clubcard vouchers), they are worth more than their face value when spent on certain items. So if people are wanting to use them for those items, they may be willing to bid above the face value.