The COVID era eGift Cards went POOF!

TL:DR; The eGift Cards became inactive after 5 years and lost about $200.

So I was ready to finally pull the trigger on a Milwaukee power tool at Home Depot using the COVID era eGift Cards that was part of the "11% Home Depot Rebates to compete with Menards during the pandemic!" campaign.

During that time, HD sent out URLs that lead to three different eGift processors:

1. You had to print out a physical barcode
2. You could add the eGift Card to your Android/Google Wallet
3. You could add the eGift Card to your Android /Google Wallet OR Apple Wallet

I had no problem redeeming (3) through my iPhone, and used (2) online on HomeDepot.com. I used a few of the (1) printed ones, but I was saving about $200 of gift cards for a big purchase.

I tried using them the other day and they have disappeared from the system. $200... gone. The store wouldn't do anything as I had cut the top half of the e-mail to wallet size, I'll have to go home an re-print the whole page with fine-print.

The way I understand them, the 11% Rebates were not HD Gift Cards. They are issued as Store Credit/Refund on non-reloadable card numbers. So, they are not really HD giving me their money, it's my money HD gave back to me... $200 of refunds gone.

Yeah, yeah. I would've spent THOUSANDS of dollars at HD anyways and loyal customers like me were not the target for the 11% rebate. It was for the people who suddenly had extra time at home to do some repair work and the 11% rebate at Menards looked good - and they sell milk and real food too!

Anyways, happy shopping!