> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.sable.salon/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Gift cards

> Sell digital gift cards at the desk and on your booking site, deliver them by email on the day you choose, and let clients check their balance anytime.

A Sable gift card is a digital card with a code. The person who receives it
gets an email with the card on it, and anyone holding the code can spend it at
your checkout, in any amount, until it runs out or reaches its chosen expiration
date. Every card can have an optional expiration date and never carries a fee.

Each card belongs to the business that sold it. A salon card is spent on the
salon's services and retail; a booth renter's card is spent only with her.

## Turn on gift cards

Owners set gift cards up in **Settings**, **Payments**, **Gift Cards**:

* **On or off.** Turning gift cards off stops new sales. Cards already sold
  keep working and keep their balances.
* **Preset amounts.** Up to six amounts your gift page and new sale offer as
  one-tap choices.
* **Minimum and maximum.** Any amount in between can be typed in. A single card
  can be up to \$500.
* **Tips from the balance.** On by default. When it is off, a tip moves to the
  other payment on the ticket.
* **Issuer legal name.** Printed on every card as "issued by".
* **Online cards expire after · days.** Optional. Leave blank for no expiration.
  You choose this policy; buyers see the exact date before payment.
* **Gift page link.** Your online gift page, ready to share.

## Design your card

The **Design & email** tab sets how your cards look and what the recipient's
email says. The preview beside it switches between the card and the email and
updates as you type.

* **Logo.** Upload a PNG, JPEG, WebP or SVG. It sits on a white plate on the
  card, in place of your initials.
* **Card colour.** Pick Sage, Rose, Taupe or Midnight, or type any colour code.
* **Match email colours.** On by default: the email's button and links use the
  card colour.
* **Email wording.** The subject, introduction, button label and footer. Insert
  the recipient's name, the sender's name, your business name or the amount
  with the chips above the fields.

The code, the amount, the buyer's message and the card's terms are always in
the email. **Send test email** sends a sample to your own address before you
save. A booth renter designs her own cards from her own settings.

## Sell a gift card online

Your gift page lives on your booking site at
`your-salon.sable.salon/book/gift`. Share the link from your bio, your website
or a holiday post.

The buyer:

1. Chooses who it is for (someone else, or themselves) and an amount.
2. Enters the recipient's name and email and their own, with an optional
   message, and picks when it should arrive: now, or on a date. Cards for a
   date go out at 9:00 AM your time that morning.
3. Pays by card.

The confirmation shows when the card arrives and gives the buyer a share link
to hand the card over themselves. The buyer also gets an emailed receipt.

Online gift card purchases are protected for you: every purchase is checked by
the buyer's bank, one card can be at most $500, and one email can buy at most
$1,000 a day from your business. If a card's bank later warns that the
purchase looks fraudulent, the card is placed on hold so it can't be delivered
or spent until you decide.

The money from an online sale lands in your payout account like any other card
payment, with the normal Sable card fee.

## Sell a gift card at the desk

Open **Transactions**, choose **new sale**, and add a **gift card** to the
ticket. Choose who it is for, the amount, the recipient's name and email, who
it is from and an optional message. It sends right away, or on a date you
choose.

Turn on **For the buyer** to send the card to the buyer instead of a separate
recipient. The optional message field adds a personal note to the email.

A gift card is not revenue when it is sold: it carries no tax, no discount and
no commission. Revenue, tax and commission are counted when the card is spent,
on the services and products it pays for.

## Issue a complimentary card

In **Transactions**, **gift cards**, choose **issue or transfer a gift card**,
then **complimentary**. Enter the amount, recipient, reason and an optional
expiration date. Choose whether to email the card, then select **issue gift card**.
No payment is collected. The card is marked **complimentary**, and its value
is kept separate from paid gift card sales. If you leave email off, open the
card afterward and choose **send gift card** when you are ready to hand it over.

## Transfer existing balances

Choose **issue or transfer a gift card**, then **transfer balances**. Enter the
source platform and reason, and upload or paste a CSV with these columns:
`sourceReference,code,amount,recipientName,recipientEmail,expiresOn`.
Amounts are dollars. The email and expiration columns may be blank.

Select **preview balances**, review each source reference, recipient, balance
and expiration date, then choose **transfer reviewed balances**. The original
codes keep working. Transfers collect no payment and send no emails. A source
reference identifies one balance on the old platform, so repeating the same
transfer preserves the existing card instead of adding its value again.

## Expiration dates

Purchased, complimentary and transferred cards may have an optional expiration
date. A card remains valid through that whole date in your business's time
zone. Leave the date blank for no expiration. For online purchases, set the
number of days in General settings; the date is that many local calendar days
after purchase. Buyers see the date before paying and do not choose it. The
date also appears in the email and on the card's detail and balance pages.

An expired card keeps its balance and history, and checkout refuses it. Refunds
still return gift-funded value to its original card. Expiration does not erase
or remove value from the ledger.

## Gift card purchases are final

A gift card can't be refunded once it is bought, online or at the desk. Every
card and email says so in its terms. The other items on the same ticket refund
as usual.

## Refunds of items paid by gift card

When you refund a service or product a gift card paid for, its gift card share
goes back on the same card and the rest goes back to the original payment. The
tip works the same way. The refund window shows both amounts before you
confirm, and the card's history shows the value coming back.

On a ticket shared between the salon and a booth renter, each card gets back
only what it paid on the refunded items.

## Delivery

The recipient's email shows the gift card itself: your logo or name and your
colour, the amount, the full code and who it is for, with the code also written out so it
can be copied. It links to booking and to the card's balance.

Gift cards are delivered by email only.

### When an email bounces

If a gift card email can't be delivered, the card is marked **bounced**. The
buyer gets an email telling them to contact you, and your owners and front
desk get an alert with the card's details. The card is safe the whole time.

To fix it, open the card from **Transactions**, **gift cards**:

* **Edit the email.** Owners and admins can change the recipient's address.
  The card is sent again to the new address, and the change is recorded on the
  card.
* **Resend.** Anyone who can sell gift cards can send a delivered or bounced
  card again to the address already on it.

## Check a balance

Every gift card email has a **check balance** link. It opens the card's balance
page on your booking site: what's left, the original amount, the last four
characters of the code and the card's history. A correction made by your team
shows as "balance corrected"; the reason stays private to your team.

A client who only has the code can check it at
`your-salon.sable.salon/book/gift/balance`.

## Booth renters

A booth renter can sell her own gift cards. She turns them on in her own
**Settings**, **Gift Cards** once her payout account is set up. Her cards are
issued in her legal name, the money goes to her payout account, and she has
her own gift page at `your-salon.sable.salon/book/her-handle/gift`. Her cards
follow the salon's preset amounts, minimum, maximum and tips setting.

The salon never sees a renter's cards or balances, and a renter never sees the
salon's. If one of her card emails bounces, the alert goes to her.


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