Gift cards and treatment packages: what expires and what doesn't

Gift cards get bought in December and found at the back of a drawer in June. In British Columbia that is usually fine, because the law does not let a monetary gift card run out. A treatment package is a different purchase with different rules, and the difference is worth knowing before you put a card down on the counter.

No, not if the card carries a monetary value. British Columbia's Business Practices and Consumer Protection Act defines a prepaid purchase card as a card, written certificate or other voucher or device with a monetary value, issued or sold in exchange for the future supply of goods or services, and it says the term includes a gift card and a gift certificate. Section 56.2 then tells a supplier not to issue or sell one with an expiry date. Our own gift card page puts it plainly: under BC law, Flourish gift cards don't expire.

Then the date does not count. The same section of the Act handles it: a card issued or sold with an expiry date in contravention of the rule is redeemable as if it had no expiry date, and a card issued or sold without one is valid until it is fully redeemed or replaced. So a date on the back of an old card is not the end of the story. Bring the card in and ask.

Except as may be provided by the regulations under section 56.5, a supplier must not issue or sell a prepaid purchase card that has an expiry date.

Business Practices and Consumer Protection Act, British Columbia, section 56.2 (1)

Three kinds, set out in the Prepaid Purchase Cards Regulation. Its section 2 lifts the no-expiry rule for a prepaid purchase card issued or sold for a specific good or service, for one issued or sold for a charitable purpose, and for one issued or sold for a marketing, advertising or promotional purpose to a person who either provides nothing of value in exchange for it or paid less than its full monetary value. A card that came to you in a draw, in other words, is not the same purchase as a card someone paid full value for.

Only in narrow cases. Section 56.3 of the Act says a supplier must not charge a consumer a fee for anything in relation to a prepaid purchase card except as the regulations permit, and the regulation permits a fee for replacing a lost or stolen card, or to customize one. If you were charged a fee the law does not allow, the Act gives you a year to ask for it back in writing.

Yes, and that is the honest difference. A package here is a set number of sessions of one named treatment, bought upfront and used session by session, rather than an amount of money on a card. Facial packages with Mina Gharnian, Skin Care Practitioner, are valid for 6 months and microneedling packages for 12 months. All other packages, sold as 3, 6 or 10 sessions, expire after 12 months. Each window is printed beside its package on the Packages and Series page, and it is worth reading before you buy a longer series than your year has room for.

Ask for the terms, because the seller has to give them to you. Section 56.4 of the Act requires the supplier, at the time a prepaid purchase card is issued or sold, to provide all restrictions, limitations, terms and conditions imposed on its use, redemption or replacement, including any permitted fee or expiry date, and to describe the way you can get information about the card, including any remaining balance. Those are fair questions to ask at the counter, and a clear answer is a good sign.

• Check whether you are holding a monetary gift card or a package of sessions.
• Read the validity window printed beside a package before you buy it.
• Bring an old gift card in even if it has a date printed on it.
• Ask at the time of sale for the restrictions, any fee and how to check the balance.
• See your family physician first about any new or changing symptom.

Our clinic is on Mainland Street in Yaletown, a short walk from Downtown Vancouver, the West End and False Creek, and the Yaletown page carries the route notes. If you are holding a gift card and are not sure what to spend it on, open Our Treatments and start from whatever is bothering you, or look at the OxyGeneo Facial, which several of our series are built around. Gift cards live on the Gift Cards page, and the current durations and prices for every treatment are on that treatment's own page.