THE Senate on Monday, Aug. 14, passed on third and final reading a bill seeking to prohibit expiry dates on gift checks, certificates or cards. A statement by the Senate quoted Senator Juan Miguel F. Zubiri as saying: “A gift certificate, check or card is, for all intents and purposes, good as cash. It is purchased with money and money having no expiry date, it follows that gift checks must bear no expiry date.” Mr. Zubiri is the chairman of the Senate committee on trade, commerce, and entrepreneurship and author of Senate Bill No. 1466, under which commercial establishments are prohibited from issuing gift checks bearing expiry dates.

“It is also deemed unlawful to impose an expiry date on the stored value, credit, or balance of the gift check. Further, the proposed law prohibits merchants from refusing to honor the unused value, credit or balance stored in the gift check,” the statement said.

Under the measure, sellers are prohibited from issuing a gift check that bears an expiry date. It is also deemed unlawful to impose an expiry date on the stored value, credit, or balance of the gift check. Further, the proposed law prohibits merchants from refusing to honor the unused value, credit or balance stored in the gift check.

Violators of the proposed measure, once enacted into law, shall upon conviction be subject to a fine of not less than P50,000 but not more than P1 million.

The bill defined gift checks as “any instrument issued to any person, natural or juridical, for monetary consideration, honored upon presentation at a single merchant or an affiliated group of merchants as payment for consumer goods or services. The instrument may be in the form of paper, card, code, or other device.”

Mr. Zubiri noted, however, that coupons or vouchers are not covered by the bill’s provisions.A coupon or voucher is defined by the bill as “any instrument issued to any person, natural or juridical, for monetary consideration or otherwise, that entitles the holder to a discount off a particular good or service, or that may be exchanged for a pre-identified good or service specified on the instrument.”Excluded too from the provisions of the measure are gift checks issued to customers “under loyalty, rewards or promotional programs, as determined by the Department of Trade and Industry.”

“Once enacted, this will firm up the gains of consumers, both buyers and recipients of gift checks,” Mr. Zubiri said in the statement.

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