Detroit Schools Offer Gift Card Incentive

(DON'T FORGET THAT THIS SUNDAY, JUNE 20th, IS FATHER'S DAY! THERE IS STILL TIME TO BUY YOUR DAD A DISCOUNTED GIFT CARD FROM MERCARDI!)


It is a sad fact that our school system in the USA is in bad shape, (Did you know that one in three teens never make it to graduation?) but this story really puts just how bad it is into perspective.

Detroit, Michigan schools are offering parents a total of $25,000 in Target gift cards if they will simply update their students' contact information. The Detroit school district's efforts include leaving a door hanger on the doors of current students, offering gift cards from $25 up to $1000 if the parents will update contact info for students, in a effort to retain the current students they have enrolled.

The nearly 100 comments to the story are just about as interesting as the story itself.

What do you think about this?

Helping Those in Need with Gift Cards

As we move along at breakneck speed, hurrying to our jobs, attending to our children, managing our lives, it is often easy to forget about people who are not so fortunate as us.

Today, take a minute to read the inspiring stories in this link of organizations who make it their business to help those in need. And consider the fact that Mercardi.com has a fundraising program that YOUR ORGANIZATION, family or other group could initiate to help people in need, by collecting unwanted gift cards, as simple as that. There is no cost to get this program started, and we even send you the marketing material that will help make your efforts successful, all at no cost to you.

I have always loved what Ghandi said, "Be the change you want to see in the world." On that note, below are some other great quotations about how we can help each other to ponder over the weekend. Have a great one!

I have found the paradox that if I love until it hurts, then there is no hurt, but only more love. ~Mother Teresa


How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world. ~Anne Frank


Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does. ~William James


Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. ~Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy


The purpose of life is not to be happy - but to matter, to be productive, to be useful, to have it make some difference that you have lived at all. ~Leo Rosten


Live simply that others might simply live. ~Elizabeth Seaton


We can do no great things, only small things with great love. ~Mother Teresa


Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not. ~Dr. Seuss


It seems to me that any full grown, mature adult would have a desire to be responsible, to help where he can in a world that needs so very much, that threatens us so very much. ~Norman Lear


Being good is commendable, but only when it is combined with doing good is it useful. ~Author Unknown


I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world. ~Mother Teresa (Agnes Gonxha Bojarhiu)


I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do. ~Edward Everett Hale


It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do little - do what you can. ~Sydney Smith


Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could only do a little. ~Edmund Burke


If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one. ~Mother Teresa


Wherever a man turns he can find someone who needs him. ~Albert Schweitzer


He who gives when he is asked has waited too long. ~Sunshine Magazine


This is the true joy in life - being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. ~George Bernard Shaw


Nobody can do everything, but everyone can do something. ~Author Unknown


The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit. ~Nelson Henderson


While earning your daily bread, be sure you share a slice with those less fortunate. ~Quoted in P.S. I Love You, compiled by H. Jackson Brown, Jr.


The difference between a helping hand and an outstretched palm is a twist of the wrist. ~Laurence Leamer, King of the Night


No man stands so straight as when he stoops to help a boy. ~Knights of Pythagoras (Thanks, Jim)


Charity sees the need, not the cause. ~German Proverb


In about the same degree as you are helpful, you will be happy. ~Karl Reiland


How far that little candle throws his beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
~William Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice, much later adapted to "So shines a good deed in a weary world" by David Seltzer for the 1971 film Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory


If we could all hear one another's prayers, God might be relieved of some of his burdens. ~Ashleigh Brilliant


Dare to reach out your hand into the darkness, to pull another hand into the light. ~Norman B. Rice


I expect to pass through life but once. If therefore, there be any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again. ~William Penn


Be an opener of doors for such as come after thee, and do not try to make the universe a blind alley. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson


The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches but to reveal to him his own. ~Benjamin Disraeli



We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give. ~Winston Churchill


Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth. ~Mohammed Ali


The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: "If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?" But... the good Samaritan reversed the question: "If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?" ~Martin Luther King, Jr.


Sometime in your life, hope that you might see one starved man, the look on his face when the bread finally arrives. Hope that you might have baked it or bought or even kneaded it yourself. For that look on his face, for your meeting his eyes across a piece of bread, you might be willing to lose a lot, or suffer a lot, or die a little, even. ~Daniel Berrigan


The Lord loveth a cheerful giver. He also accepteth from a grouch. ~Catherine Hall


What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal. ~Albert Pike (Thanks, Carl)


It's easy to make a buck. It's a lot tougher to make a difference. ~Tom Brokaw


God has not called us to see through each other, but to see each other through. ~Author Unknown


Do not commit the error, common among the young, of assuming that if you cannot save the whole of mankind you have failed. ~Jan de Hartog, The Lamb's War


One must be poor to know the luxury of giving! ~George Eliot


He has the right to criticize who has the heart to help. ~Abraham Lincoln


If you have no will to change it, you have no right to criticize it. ~Author Unknown


Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity. ~Horace Mann


When you dig another out of their troubles, you find a place to bury your own. ~Author Unknown


The only gift is a portion of thyself. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson


Love the earth and sun and animals,
Despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks,
Stand up for the stupid and crazy,
Devote your income and labor to others...
And your very flesh shall be a great poem.
~Walt Whitman


Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do. ~John Wooden, They Call Me Coach


Trees outstrip most people in the extent and depth of their work for the public good. ~Sara Ebenreck, American Forests


Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared. ~Buddha


Things of the spirit differ from things material in that the more you give the more you have. ~Christopher Morley


Not only must we be good, but we must also be good for something. ~Henry David Thoreau


True generosity consists precisely in fighting to destroy the causes which nourish false charity. ~Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 1970


Past the seeker as he prayed came the crippled and the beggar and the beaten. And seeing them... he cried, "Great God, how is it that a loving creator can see such things and yet do nothing about them?" God said, "I did do something. I made you." ~Author Unknown


Find a need and fill it. ~Ruth Stafford Peale


In giving you are throwing a bridge across the chasm of your solitude. ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Wisdom of the Sands, translated from French by Stuart Gilbert


Sometimes a man imagines that he will lose himself if he gives himself, and keep himself if he hides himself. But the contrary takes place with terrible exactitude. ~Ernest Hello


You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give. ~Kahlil Gibran


Love never reasons but profusely gives; gives, like a thoughtless prodigal, its all, and trembles lest it has done too little. ~Hannah More


If you have much, give of your wealth; if you have little, give of your heart. ~Arabian Proverb


Bread for myself is a material question. Bread for my neighbor is a spiritual one. ~Nicholas Berdyaev


A bone to the dog is not charity. Charity is the bone shared with the dog, when you are just as hungry as the dog. ~Jack London


If I thought I was going to die tomorrow, I should nevertheless plant a tree today. ~Stephan Girard


I've seen and met angels wearing the disguise of ordinary people living ordinary lives. ~Tracy Chapman


The vicious count their years; virtuous, their acts. ~Samuel Johnson


Look around the habitable world: how few
Know their own good, or knowing it, pursue.
~Juvenal, Satires


The deed is everything, the glory naught. ~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe


The great use of life is to spend it for something that outlasts it. ~William James


I've learned that you shouldn't go through life with a catchers mitt on both hands. You need to be able to throw something back. ~Maya Angelou


The race advances only by the extra achievements of the individual. You are the individual. ~Charles Towne


Generosity is not giving me that which I need more than you do, but it is giving me that which you need more than I do. ~Kahlil Gibran

Great Gift Card Deals for Wednesday, June 9, 2010

After scanning Google (thank you for following Bing's example and offering up to date search results!) for the latest in gift card deals, here are what we consider the best for today, June 9, 2010. Some of these are time sensitive, so be sure and get there to take advantage of each gift card deal asap. Enjoy!

I really like this site, Totally Target. It list the latest gift card deals exclusively from Target, some great stuff there!

This site, Gift Card Discount, makes it their business to list the latest gift card deals online. Very good info and savings regularly.

Engineer a Debt Free Life has some awesome gift card giveaways in the month of June. For example, they have a $100 Target gift card and a $50 Walmart gift card up for grabs right now! Check out the giveaway list here.

Deal Seeking Mom has a great Win it Wednesday going on every week, and today is WEDNESDAY! The gift card up for grabs right now is a $100 Borders gift card, which I am definitely after! Here is the link, be sure to pass it along!

Dealighted has great deals on gift cards all the time. Today there is a $15 gift card from Auto Zone for every $100 spent online.

Yahoo Deals posted this deal today for a Norelco razor from Walmart for $35 with a $5 free egift card.

What Will You Get Dear Old Dad?

Father's Day is just around the corner. It is Sunday, June 20th this year, so right now is the perfect time to choose a deeply-discounted gift card from the over 200 retailers serviced by Mercardi.com.

Does dear old Dad need some new golf balls? Mercardi.com has that covered, with discounted gift cards from retailers such as Big 5 or Dick's Sporting Goods.

Or how about giving your father a night on the town by getting him gift cards, beginning with dinner at Chili's and topping the night off with tickets to the movies? You will find discounted gift cards at Mercardi.com to make both things happen while saving yourself a boatload of money.

The possibilities for gift ideas are huge, but the time is NOW! Get over to Mercardi.com and pick out the perfect gift card for your dear old dad.

(Just for fun, here is a link to famous quotes about Dad, the history of Father's Day, and links to interesting facts and sites pertaining to fathers. Enjoy!)

Theft or Just Poor Judgement?

When I read this morning that The University System of Maryland is investigating where $40,700 in gift cards intended for needy families were distributed by University of Maryland-Baltimore's School of Social Work staff and students, my first reaction was that this was just an error in judgement. I like to think that people are basically good, so I would like to believe that this was simply a matter of poor judgement and a lack of record keeping.

Here are a few of the details of what happened and the official take on what was and would be done:

"A state audit found university officials "could not document who received the gift cards or what was purchased with the gift cards," which were paid for by a federally funded program. The Office of Legislative Audits' February report said records were not maintained about how the gift cards were dispensed."

"We said they should go back with their auditors and determine if the cards were used properly and kind of account for the $40,000," legislative auditor Bruce Myers said. "They just didn't have any documentation to show it was distributed the way it was supposed to be."

As far as what will be done about this gigantic deal, Myers said if they can't document how the gift cards were used, they could be asked to repay the money. The gift card purchases were made by a University of Maryland-Baltimore employee with a corporate purchasing card between July 2006 and June 2008.

"The employee who purchased the gift cards advised us that these gift cards were distributed to various staff and students of UMB's School of Social Work to purchase items for needy families," the February audit said. "We contacted several staff and students of the School and were advised that the aforementioned employee had provided them with a number of gift cards."

University system officials agreed to conduct an internal audit in their response to the report and say they'll take corrective action.

Mike Lurie, the media relations manager for the University System of Maryland, said the internal audit is a routine response to concerns raised by the state's review.

"The University System of Maryland internal audit staff is following up on the findings in the Office of Legislative Affairs audit," Lurie said. "It is University System of Maryland policy not to comment further in matters like this one."

It does seem pretty stupid that these people did not foresee having to account for where the gift cards went, at least! All they would have had to do is write down who they gave them to, the name of the families, etc. It does make you wonder if there was fraud involved, but as I said, I would like to think that somebody just had their head in the clouds.

What do you think?

New Gift Card Law Needs Tweeking

The CARD Act went into effect in February and was designed to protect consumers from egregious practices by gift card issuers, such as early expiration dates and "dormancy" fees.

The new rules takes effect in August, 2010 and are great for consumers, requiring more disclosure about fees and expiration dates, but there remain plenty of loopholes for card-issuers.

For instance, the new rules don’t adopt several provisions requested by a coalition of consumer groups, including Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports. Among them are a caps on fees, a strict prohibition on card-expiration dates shorter than five years, and a requirement that issuers provide one free replacement of a lost or stolen card.

Although it's great to have new laws that protect consumers using gift cards, there are tweeks that need to be set into place. For instance, currently restrictions on fees and expiration dates don’t apply to cards issued as part of loyalty, award, or promotional programs, or to “reloadable” cards not labeled or marketed as a “gift card” or “gift certificate.”

Another drawback is that these new rules don’t protect consumers if an issuer files for bankruptcy protection or goes out of business.

In conclusion, although we in the gift card industry are happy about these new rules, we hope that before they go into place there will be several major adjustments.

10 Hot Vacation Gift Card Deals

It's June 1st, the true beginning of the summer vacation season, so in that vein, below are ten totally sizzling vacation gift card deals to start your summer off with a bang! Each of these hot vacation gift card deals or offers have been created by the listed sites within the last few days, sometimes even the last few hours. That means this is the perfect time to secure your vacation deal while they last, (pass the word along.)

We'd love to hear about your summer vacation plans or experiences. Why not take a minute and leave a comment, telling us about your plans and/or experiences, or turn our readers on to fantastic vacation gift card deals that we might have missed?

It's summertime, and the living truly is easy!

1. $100 shopping gift card w/stay on Catalina Island

2. $750 Disney Gift Card with 5 night stay

3. Give the gift of a bed and breakfast get away.

4. Get a $50 Best Western gift card when you stay two nights at Best Western, Stuttgart, Germany.

5. Book a weekend at the Marriott and get a $20 Target gift card from Orbitz.

6. SIZZLE ALERT!--$99 vacation package to Williamsburg, Virginia includes two nights, 3 day stay in hotel and $50 Visa gift card to spend at shops, or two tickets to Busch Gardens! (this site also has deals just like this one to other destinations.)

7. Receive a $2500 Visa gift card when you book select Cruise West Europe World cruises and pay in full.

8. A great list of Scottsdale, Arizona gift cards, coupons and credits for staying at the Marriott.

9. A totally frugal cruise using gift cards, coupons, and deals.

10. Last but certainly not least is mercardi.com, where you will find deeply discounted gift cards for American Airlines, Best Western, and Choice Hotels, along with over 200 other restaurants, shops, and specialties for your vacation savings!