American Express Gift Cards

[disney minnie]

I was given some American Express gift cards to use towards room. Disney just told me I could use them at 20% reduction in amount. Is this true? Has anyone had any experience?

 

[DisneyMom93]

That doesn't sound right.

I did find this online:

How should the Gift Card be used at restaurants, hair salons or other merchants that may be expecting a gratuity?
We and/or the Select Merchants (e.g. Restaurants, hair salons and some other types of Select Merchants) may obtain an authorization on the Card for an amount up to 20% more than the total service bill to cover any gratuity that may be added. Be sure that the balance on the Card is sufficient to cover the cost of the bill plus any anticipated gratuity. If the Card is declined, ask the Merchant to obtain an authorization for an amount equal to or less than the Available Balance.

https://www.americanexpress.com/us/content/prepaid/gift-cards/terms-and-conditions.html

 

[AngiTN]

Sorta true.
But not exactly.
The issue is the way Disney runs them.
If they try to process the cards at their full amount the system they use will auto add a tip in, which is where the 20% comes from. So to get the approval they have to reduce the amount by 20% or the charge will be declined.
When the final charge is approved it will only go through for the amount given, leaving you with about a 20% balance on each card.
It's just the way the systems work for places that normally include tip, like hotels or restaurants.
It's a PITA. It's why you never use credit gift cards at any place that builds in tips to their authorization like that. They can't "undo" that during authorization.
I'd take the cards and buy a Disney gift card with them. I do it at Target all the time.

 

[AngiTN]

That doesn't sound right.

I did find this online:

How should the Gift Card be used at restaurants, hair salons or other merchants that may be expecting a gratuity?
We and/or the Select Merchants (e.g. Restaurants, hair salons and some other types of Select Merchants) may obtain an authorization on the Card for an amount up to 20% more than the total service bill to cover any gratuity that may be added. Be sure that the balance on the Card is sufficient to cover the cost of the bill plus any anticipated gratuity. If the Card is declined, ask the Merchant to obtain an authorization for an amount equal to or less than the Available Balance.

https://www.americanexpress.com/us/content/prepaid/gift-cards/terms-and-conditions.html

The bold is what OP was told Disney has to do. They have to get it for less than the available balance. So when the final payment goes through, they'll have a balance left on the card.

 

[DisneyMom93]

The bold is what OP was told Disney has to do. They have to get it for less than the available balance. So when the final payment goes through, they'll have a balance left on the card.

That makes more sense. It sounded like Disney was saying their gift cards only have 80% value and they would lose the 20%. I knew that couldn't be right.

 

[disney minnie]

Above makes sense, but not what I was told. The customer service lady didn’t sound “experienced” - she had to put me on hold to ask about all of my questions and I had 3 separate issues- that’s why I wanted to ask here.

I was given the suggestion to use these cards to buy Disney cards at Walmart and that’s what I’m going to do to make life easier.

 

[Happy_2_B]

I was given some American Express gift cards to use towards room. Disney just told me I could use them at 20% reduction in amount. Is this true? Has anyone had any experience?

OP said it was for a room charge- and to me this doesn't make sense for a room charge since there is no gratuity involved- but I have never used anything but Disney GCs at Disney properties. This seems bizarre, but looks like a PP has experience with the exact same situation- so no point in giving an opinion if someone has already dealt with this. We are using AmEx Hilton GCs today over in Lake Buena Vista at the Garden Inn- hope we don't run into this same issue...

 

[AngiTN]

Above makes sense, but not what I was told. The customer service lady didn’t sound “experienced” - she had to put me on hold to ask about all of my questions and I had 3 separate issues- that’s why I wanted to ask here.

I was given the suggestion to use these cards to buy Disney cards at Walmart and that’s what I’m going to do to make life easier.

I'm going to guess something was lost in the translation between what the CM was told and how she explained it to you. I'm sure she probably didn't quite understand the issue and in turn didn't explain the fix well.
Buying Disney gift cards is the easiest fix of all.

 

[AngiTN]

OP said it was for a room charge- and to me this doesn't make sense for a room charge since there is no gratuity involved- but I have never used anything but Disney GCs at Disney properties. This seems bizarre, but looks like a PP has experience with the exact same situation- so no point in giving an opinion if someone has already dealt with this. We are using AmEx Hilton GCs today over in Lake Buena Vista at the Garden Inn- hope we don't run into this same issue...

True but it's because they use the same credit card processing system for the restaurants, where they do add in a gratuity. Since the credit card processing computer doesn't separate out where they do or don't get one added in, the credit card system just adds them in to all charges automatically. It's often how the business is coded with the credit card company. Which is also how you get your % back with cards too, for cards that give those. They assign categories to the business in a blanket to all transactions, not transaction by transaction. At least in my experience.

 

[Fangorn]

True but it's because they use the same credit card processing system for the restaurants, where they do add in a gratuity. Since the credit card processing computer doesn't separate out where they do or don't get one added in, the credit card system just adds them in to all charges automatically. It's often how the business is coded with the credit card company. Which is also how you get your % back with cards too, for cards that give those. They assign categories to the business in a blanket to all transactions, not transaction by transaction. At least in my experience.

THIS!

I had this issue at Coronado Springs a few years back. General Manager apologized, but explained it as above. She suggested we walk over to the gift shop, use the Visa gift card to purchase a Disney gift card then come back to the front desk and use the Disney gift card to pay the room balance. That worked fine, other than being a pain. GM did give us a couple of FPs for our trouble.

Amex/Visa/MC gift cards work OK when used to purchase stuff, but not so much for travel related things.

Steve

 

[gillep]

THIS!

I had this issue at Coronado Springs a few years back. General Manager apologized, but explained it as above. She suggested we walk over to the gift shop, use the Visa gift card to purchase a Disney gift card then come back to the front desk and use the Disney gift card to pay the room balance. That worked fine, other than being a pain. GM did give us a couple of FPs for our trouble.

Amex/Visa/MC gift cards work OK when used to purchase stuff, but not so much for travel related things.

Steve

This, same thing has happened to us, we just had to walk over to the resort gift shop and purchase Disney GCs with our Visa ones.