Whenever I mention Simon Mall gift cards, I get asked about corporate accounts. Simon Mall offers discounts and higher purchase limits for corporate account holders. At my local mall, corporate account holders can buy up to 24 gift cards for $3.95 with a credit card. Those who purchase 24 – 99 gift cards pay a discounted rate of $3.50. These rates used to be a lot lower, but this is what I was quoted recently.
Simon Mall corporate accounts are meant for small and large businesses alike, which offer their employees gift cards as performance incentives. At my local Simon Mall, these tend to be local car dealerships. Not only do they pay a lower fee for large Visa gift card purchases, but they also have larger purchase limits.
So, should we all sign up for corporate accounts to score these discounts and higher purchase limits? No.
I’ve been buying gift cards at my local Simon Mall for over three years now and I’ve built up a friendly rapport with my reps. They know about my blog and even the manager is ok with my gift card purchases. However, early on I was warned against opening a corporate account.
My rep explained that while they’re ok with “gamers” buying up to $10,000 worth of gift cards every day for churning purposes, that is not how they want their corporate accounts to be utilized. In fact, they wanted me pretty early on not to apply for a corporate account because they know I’m merely churning gift cards for miles and that is not the intended use of their discounted gift cards.
This echoes what a reader I met at the Chicago Seminars a few years ago told me. In fact, he heard through a friend of his that Simon Mall’s corporate headquarters is aware of our activities. They’re fine with it as long as we don’t try to take advantage of the corporate discount.
Why? I’m guessing it’s not much of a money-maker for them. Not to mention there are probably compliance issues that arise from these large gift card purchases. So it’s probably why they prefer to keep “gamers” in a separate lane.
Regardless of the reason, I’m going to abide by my local Simon Mall’s request not to take advantage of the corporate Visa gift card discount. Sure, I have an actual business and could justify large gift card purchases. But we all know I’m not buying Visa gift cards for my non-existent employees, so why risk destroying that relationship?
Nowadays, I mostly buy my gift cards online anyway since its cheaper. When Simon Mall has its annual Visa gift card sale, I really take advantage and stock up. Between Visa gift card deals online and at office supply stores, plus the occasional Amex Offers credit, I’m good on MS sources and don’t really need to do more.
So, should you sign up for a Simon Mall corporate account to get discounts on Visa gift cards? I would not recommend it. Simon Mall has been great at tolerating “gamers,” as they call us. Let’s not ruin that relationship by getting into corporate account territory—something they’ve asked us time and again not to do.
I want to hear from you: Do you have a Simon Mall corporate account? Have you received any warnings about using it for manufactured spending?
I have a business and filled out the required paperwork for a corporate account with Simon malls. I was told they do not allow corporate accounts to be paid with by credit cards.
Maybe it varies by location. Mine accepts credit cards, though the cash fee is lower.
Do you only cover malls owned by Simon or also malls managed but not owned by Simon? Example: Galleria in Dallas, TX. They do have different policies on gift cards.
Amex has been cracking down on buying GCs from Simon and other sources, what is the work around or other methods? thanks
AFAIK, there is no work around, it is Simon that’ll shutdown one’s corporate account once it sees the GCs are drained in one transaction.
Grocery stores are a good alternative. Amex has been targeting people with bonus point offers on grocery stores recently.
I’ve had friend’s open corporate accounts. They get shut down pretty quickly if they use the gift cards to buy MO.
Yet another reason not to open a corporate account.
@CHOI, the workaround is to use a non-Amex card (such as Visa) to buy GC.
I tried and was denied for a business Simon account.
lol there’s so much misinformation here. I dunno if it’s by purpose to scare folks away.
Anyways, yep I have a corp acct. like you mentioned it was decent when the fees used to be lower. Not anymore, esp considering shipping AND stupid processing fees they tack on. And the # of cards doesn’t really matter for churners since you’re hard capped at $10k per order. So the max you can order is 19 cards unfortunately won’t be able to take adv of lower fees for upto 99 cards etc. p.s there’s no free shipping option either.
So yeah for most folks buying at the same $3.95 rate at a simon mall location might be preferential. If you wanna order sitting at home, BHN would be a better alt considering portals. Tho that is also capped now.
I guess the only benefit of ordering simon online/corp acct is there’s no limit afaik to how many $10k orders you can make in a given day
Fyi it’s true simon doesn’t care about gamers if you’re just ordering the $500 cards, infact they make more money when you order online considering the extra fees they tack on compared to at the mall. Also not everyone will be eligible to get approved for the higher denom cards simply by getting a corp/biz acct. the simon rep assigned to you will go thru & vet your “business” properly before determining if they’ll allow you into the promised land. Most ppl won’t make the cut aka stuck at square one.
P.p.s. Towards the end of the year they do have some VGC sales that brings the prices/cost more in line w what you pay at the mall. Yes after the discount. And for me that’s p much the only time it’s Worth ordering from simon in PJs.
If you are only buying 10k at a time then you dont have a corp acct. If you buy in vol and liquidate them immedately they will close your corp acct.
What part of this post contains purposeful “misinformation?”
Corporate accounts can sell promotional cards that aren’t covered by the regulations that mandate that gift cards be debit cards with a PIN. And my online corporate account only accepts bank withdrawals. Making MS pointless. (literally)
Visa cards at https://simon.giftcardmall.com/ are cheaper Visa cards at giftcardmall, BUT are excluded from the 1% rebate given at Yazig, etc. making them actually more expensive.