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Money that expires in Belgium: GSM gift cards (belgae.social)
submitted 1 month ago* by to c/Belgium
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cross-posted from: https://belgae.social/post/2046140

What’s the point of allowing money to expire? If you buy a top-up for a GSM account, what legit reason could there be for allowing carriers to screw over consumers on such an arbitrary basis? Indeed, if you buy phone credit in Belgium, it expires. I just bought a top-up card that had already expired because I did not notice the expiration date in tiny print.

Interesting to notice that some US states have banned gift cards that expire.

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[–] 5 points 1 month ago* (8 children)

Why would you want a gift card that is not money?

PlayStation gift card, Nintendo gift card, Spotify gift card, etc. The sky is the limit. You gift it, and people use it! Wow. You don't keep it forever like a gold bar or a bitcoin.

Yes, it's a scam, and it's better to give bills and coins, but it's like buying a cake.

If you can’t spend it, what’s the point?

You cannot spend a cake, it still has a point though (even if it expires, like a gift card).

Edit: "phone credit" Is it a for a real company, or for a burner kind of phone?

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  • [–] [S] -2 points 1 month ago* (7 children)

    PlayStation gift card, Nintendo gift card, Spotify gift card, etc. The sky is the limit.

    That’s money. They exist to buy stuff. And when it expires, it’s money expiring. It’s of course a swindle.

    You cannot spend a cake, it still has a point though.

    indeed, because a cake is not money. Unlike gift cards, which function strictly as money.

    Edit: “phone credit” Is it a for a real company, or for a burner kind of phone?

    Not sure what you’re trying to ask but burner phones were banned in Belgium around ~10 years ago. All GSM cards must be registered to a gov-issued ID.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago (6 children)

    Gift card is not money. It is used to get games and music and stuff from a specific company. I cannot use a Spotify gift card to buy a hamburger. It's still some kind of scam, but it's not forbidden, and it's not money either.

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  • [–] [S] -2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (5 children)

    Of course gift cards are money. You can’t buy a burger in Germany with Mexican pesos either. But Mexican pesos don’t cease to be money on the basis that it’s not usable everywhere for everything.

    Note as well you may be able to buy a burger at the Ikea cafeteria using an Ikea gift card. Haven’t tried it, but nonetheless it would be a shitty test for deciding whether to call it money.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    You can’t buy a burger in Germany with Mexican pesos either

    You can exchange your pesos to euros. Can you do the same with your pokemon cards?

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  • [–] [S] -1 points 1 month ago

    You can exchange your pesos to euros. Can you do the same with your pokemon cards?

    Of course. Just as I bought the gift cards with euros, the person on the other side of the transaction received euros for the gift cards. I could play either role depending on what I am starting with.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (2 children)

    You must be very young, or incredibly nieve to not understand how gift cards function. They're basically IOUs you buy from a company. They are not a form of currency backed by the government.

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  • [–] [S] -1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 child)

    How can you be so naive as to think money in the bank is yours? That’s not /your/ money in the bank. It’s the bank’s money. There is an IOU from the bank to you.

    Same with cash money. It’s no longer backed by gold reserves. It’s backed by nothing. All you have is /trust/; just like gift cards. Have look at what’s printed on US dollar banknotes. It’s spelled out for you.

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