A man got away with a bag full of cell phone chargers and about 30 un-activated gift cards at Safeway near the Sunvalley Mall on Wednesday.
The crime occurred just after 7 p.m.
The man is described as an older white male adult with grey pants and a black shirt.
How dumb do you have to be to think the cards are worth anything? They have to be activated at the register.
Like they’d have thousands of dollars worth of cards just sitting there like cash.
They take them write all the codes down and put them back on the shelf. When another customer purchases it and it gets activated, they are notified and spend it before the customer knows. Essentially customer gives away an empty card
Im am curious, how are they notified it gets activated. I never pay much attention to my gift cards. I will now.
Older white males have never been know for being great criminals. Gift cards not activated… hahahahha
Unactivated gift cards? Wow. I am shocked at the high intellect of criminals these days. I hope they have a wonderful shopping spree with those gift cards!
Lemme teach yall clowns about the “not activated” giftcards….. they steal the gift cards, take them home, carefully open them, then they write down the full card number, expiration, and CVV. Then they scratch off a couple of numbers before carefully sealing them back up and taking them back to a store to put them on the shelves. Then when somebody purchases (activates the giftcard) for 100$ or 200$ the thief then somehow is getting pinged that funds are available on the card and they quickly use up the money on the cards to buy things. I know this because I myself bought a 200$ gift card recently from target and when i opened it, i noticed 2 numbers were scratched off which meant i could not use the card that i just loaded 200$ onto. I was pissed! I grabbed the entire stack of cards at the livermore target and slammed them on the guest services counter and proceeded to rip all of them open in front of the manager. At first, they tried to tell me it was a manufactures defect LOL!!!!!!!! I THINK NOT!!!!!!!! I’m not a clown, so i caught onto it immediately after i opened my gift card and noticed the 2 numbers scratched off. These gift cards need to be locked in a case or something because its truly gotten out of hand and it seems like nobody besides me is catching on!!! YOURE WELCOME!!!!!!!!!
Interesting – I learn something new everyday
Perhaps direct your anger at the people who defrauded you rather than nameless, faceless people on a local blog?
I wish BD’s comment could be pinned to the top of the comments so others don’t get taken. There was a news story, a while back and from an out of state channel, talking about this scam tactic. If thieves would focus their wit in building and not destroying.
He sounds like the guy who shoplifted from Dicks earlier in the week.
Yep…. there are videos on Youtube that tell you how to do it.
Gee thanks Youtube.
Wow, I saw the guy who did it.. I was at self checkout literally one foot away from the chargers he was looking at. They have these chargers in the corner of the self checkout section unlocked.
This is liberal/progressive governance. Keep voting as you are and it will continue.
The gift card scam is real. I had it happen to me weeks ago with Target gift cards purchased in store. Bought for Christmas gifts and when we tried to activate them the money was gone. It’s a known scam. Beware of buying any gift cards in store that aren’t protected behind the register with the cashiers.
Don’t buy gift cards. The entire premise of the idea profits the industry, because a huge percentage of cards go unclaimed. It’s only a profit center. Give a gift, with a gift receipt so that it can be exchanged or refunded.