I was so pleased to receive a $2 gift card, above, from Subway in the mail yesterday. I had signed up for it as part of a lawsuit settlement that said the sandwich chain had to give out 142,000 $2 gift cards to California residents in February.
I’m always skeptical when I sign up for freebies online and the company says they’ll mail me a coupon in a bazillion weeks. By that time, I’ve completely forgotten about it. But Subway proved me wrong.
Then I tried to use the card.
I needed a quick bite on the road later that day so I decided to get a $5 footlong sandwich so I could use my $2 card. But at the register the card rang up empty.
“It says the card is inactive or invalid,” the cashier told me. Since when does a gift card need to be activated? Sigh. Be friendly, I told myself. It’s not her fault that the company she works for is @#&$%!
“Well I just received the card today,” I said, pulling out my letter from Subway that came with the card. Lord knows why I had brought the letter with me, but it certainly helped convince her I was telling the truth. “I’ve only had this card for four hours.”
She inspected the letter and swiped the card a few more times. Nothing. I called the number on the back of the card to see if I could miraculously “activate” it. No luck. We tried calling an alternative customer service number. Closed for the day.
The cashier swiped the card again. Still nada. Her co-worker, who was sweeping the floor this entire time, came over to study the error message. It hadn’t changed.
By this time, we had wasted at least 15 minutes (Hubby says more like 30) discussing $2. I didn’t want to walk out after they had made me a sandwich. But I wasn’t about to pay the full price. The only reason I went to Subway was to use the card. Grrrr!
Should I give in and pay full price? Or stick to my guns and walk out the door? I was stuck between my hardened bargain instincts and compassion for two workers who probably earned minimum wage.
Eventually the sweeper pushed a button on the cash register that somehow showed the card had $2 on it. At the same time he murmured to the cashier, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of the $2.”
I handed over the bills and walked out with my sandwich.
I hope my savings does not come out of this man’s paycheck. Perhaps the employees did figure it out. Perhaps my problematic card was a fluke and the other 141,999 will work perfectly. On the other hand, maybe this is how Subway squeezes profits out of its franchises, which makes me never want to eat there again.
Has anybody else tried to use their $2 Subway gift cards? What happened?
May 29th, 2009 at 11:45 am
I just got my card yesterday. I couldn’t remember why I got it, so I started googling. After coming across your post, I was expecting my card to come up empty, which it did.
May 29th, 2009 at 12:05 pm
See, this is why I enjoy your site (and, basically, you as a person) so much– most people don’t give a crap about where the bargain’s coming from. They wouldn’t agonize about whether the money was coming out of the dude’s paycheck, or anything else, so long as they got their deal.
That is why, Julia, you are an all-around awesome person.
May 29th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Got mine yesterday too. Ran over to subway this morning to get a footlong for breakfast/lunch and the card was empty. I had to pay full price.
Subway jipped us once again.
May 29th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
Brent! You are so sweet. Thank you. I hope the mean streets of LA are being kind to you.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:53 am
I’m stunned to hear this. I too had forgotten about signing up for it and just received it yesterday. The letter says it’s a part of a State of California settlement, adding insult to injury. I eat at Subway a lot, and I can’t believe they would want to alienate their good (any) customers. Who cares if it’s $2, $20 or $200–it’s the principle! When I try to use it at least I’ll be prepared to be disappointed.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:54 am
Same problem with my card. Super frustrating. If you try to register it with mysubwaycard.com it says it’s invalid. BS!
May 30th, 2009 at 9:55 am
I haven’t gotten the Subway card but the exact thing happened to me a couple of years ago with a McDonald’s gift card. It kept coming up as empty. Of course, the employee didn’t care and just shrugged and put out his hand for the full price.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:55 am
Just got my card in the mail and called to confirm there was $2 on the card. It said the card was inactive. I called the phone number on the bottom of the enclosed letter and left my info with customer service. Now I am waiting for someone to get back to me.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:56 am
I just tried to register and verify my card balance online after reading your post. It won’t even accept the card number.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:56 am
Just called my card again to check the balance, now there is $2 on it. If you get your card and it says invalid, call the subway headquarters 1-800-888-4848 and leave your info with customer service. Hopefully they will take care of it for you.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:57 am
I appreciate your steadfast effort to breakdown the bad subway tactics. I do hope that the cashier didn’t have to pay for their company’s error but in the case that they did I hope the next time you go you add something to their tip jar. Working in the food industry myself it makes me upset with my employers when I’m made to look like a fool to a customer, but it’s even worse if I have to pay for their mistake.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:58 am
I signed up for a gift card and never got it. I called them and they never heard of it. So at least you got yours. I would make a fuss if I got one and it didn’t scan.
May 30th, 2009 at 9:59 am
This looks like a job for the State Attorney General. This might be considered Bait and Switch…Outright fraud. The company knows if a person orders a sandwich and the card does not work they will pay full price because they came in to get lunch. I applied for the $2 card, the company may well regret this little game if I stop my once a week BLT and chips. thats little over $400 in year.
May 30th, 2009 at 10:00 am
I received my card today at about 11:30 and was going to use it for lunch, but then decided to go there for a quick dinner instead. The card worked just fine, I’m glad I waited!
May 30th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Interesting how my comment from yesterday was deleted. I thought this was an open forum & as long as it was a valid comment, all were welcome. Guess the remark of Bad Press didn’t go well. I would hate to think that you are one sided & not be posting solutions to problems….
May 30th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
John, this is an open forum and all ideas and comments that are respectful and appropriate have a place. We switched servers yesterday and a number of comments got lost in the process. I went back and re-published them. Your comment slipped through the cracks. My apologies. I’ll go back and see if I can find it.
~Julia
aka Bargain Babe
May 30th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
Maybe the best time to use it is when there is a full crowd like at lunchtime when there is a problem that they can’t resolve by bypassing the system, keeping the card, the manager should be called. We should be very outspoken, nothing like a crowd to get results. Bad publicity works wonders.
May 30th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
I just received mine in the mail. After seeing this post with the comments, I checked the website prior to even trying. My card was accepted on the website when I registered it. I’m going to take a printout to the store with me (along with the letter which has the corporate number) the next time I go. Hopefully it works.
May 30th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
My Subway gift card arrived today. I called to verify that the $2 was on there and it is. Whew….
May 30th, 2009 at 6:27 pm
Thanks Julia. I really didn’t think it was out of line, but it did make me wonder. Businesses need good press to survive & when they don’t seem to see the light, they need a bit of pushing to get it fixed without delay.
May 30th, 2009 at 10:07 pm
I just checked my balance and it said there was $2.00. Thanks for all the info so we knew to check.
May 30th, 2009 at 10:40 pm
just got my card and checked my two was there so i guess im lucky but did anyone notice most class action settlements are crap like the one for cell phone insurance i wrote into the court they wanted to give out 5dollar calling cards i said its dumb if you know all those people have cells who is going to use a calling card.well i sold mine on ebay for 3 bucks but most of the time there a ripoff hope this one isant
May 31st, 2009 at 10:31 pm
Went to Subway in West Hills, asked cashier to swipe my $2.00 card expecting to hear I had a O balance but it worked with no problem !
June 1st, 2009 at 9:19 am
I thought it was strange to receive this gift card in the mail and I never requested it, nor do I ever eat at Subway.
June 1st, 2009 at 9:31 am
Wow! I never heard of this $2.00 gift card. I live in Arizona so it wouldn’t apply to me anyway. But this is really an eye-opener! I love Subway but it is so expensive that I rarely go there! Hearing this makes me upset that Subway (or any chain for that matter) would do this! If Subway continues this they will lose their customers. As I said, I love Subway and if this happened to me I would undoubtedly complain. The only way to change things is to make your voice heard loud and clear! That will change their tune in a heartbeat!
June 1st, 2009 at 10:31 am
wow I was going to use my card today. What a rip off. isn’t there somewhere we can complain and they will further be dinged by the courts. This is insanity.
Big Business – sucks. I try not to eat at chain places just to give the mom and pop places my business. This is why.
HMPH!
June 1st, 2009 at 11:09 am
Well, I called the number on the back of my card and it said I had $2. Whew!! Maybe they read your input!!!
June 1st, 2009 at 1:36 pm
I used my card today along with Another friend and both of our cards went through
June 1st, 2009 at 5:49 pm
I emailed and within 24 hours got a very polite return email asking me to forward the card # and PIN and she’d take care of it right away…so everyone should do that!! My card is now fine.
June 4th, 2009 at 9:18 am
with all the highly paid invaluable people that run our companies these days, isn’t it funny that it’s always the sweepers who really know how the companies work.
June 5th, 2009 at 7:03 am
[...] post about the hassle I went through to redeem a $2 gift card from Subway generated a storm of comments, including this one from a reader named Summer Sweetie: I appreciate [...]