So yesterday was the day of the infamous “memo” instructing Target stores to no longer allow credit card loads of the American Express Target Redcard (i.e. #Redbird). Frequent Miler, among others, had the information (as usual for this kind of stuff). I of course had JUST gotten my Redbird a few weeks ago, late to the party as usual, so I was doubly bummed. Triply bummed because I had just signed up for a new credit card churn and had been counting on my 2 Redbirds to help me meet the minimum spending on it. I don’t have the cards yet, so I couldn’t even get one last hurrah in.
Heading to Target this morning
My plan was to just head to Target first thing in the morning and pretend like nothing had happened. Memo? What memo?
I got there right as the store opened at 8 a.m. EDT. I actually didn’t realized that was the store opening time – I just figured they’d be open but I was literally the first person in the store. I stopped at the check lane and asked the cashier to load money on to the card. She said they’d have to do it at Guest Services. While in my mind I thought “whatever….”, since I know they do them at the check lanes as well, I just followed her along.
Credit card load… take 1
I gave her my #Redbird and asked to load $500 on it. She said nothing and just went through the regular loading process. I swiped my American Express Every Day card
We then got the message that is probably going to be famous….
$0 able to be loaded for this tender type
We tried a couple of different times – she was very nice about it.
Credit card load… take 2
Next try – I had a Chase Ink card. In case there was something wrong with American Express cards (due to the relationship that they have with Target / Redcard.
Same message – “$0 able to be loaded for this tender type”
Debit / gift card loads?
I had a couple of $200 Vanilla Visa gift cards in my pocket that I got from the Office Depot / Office Max free money extravaganza that they’re having this week, so I thought I would try those.
I asked to try another card, this time a debit card, for $200. She had no problem with it, so I swiped them, and they came up with the PIN selection screen – I entered my PIN and it worked. I only had 2 Vanilla Visas but they both worked with no problem.
Applying some science
Frequent Miler had another great post today where he talked about his plans for today in trying to figure out what was and was not allowed.
Specifically, he asked
- Is the credit card ban in effect in all Target stores?
- Is the new policy hard coded into the register or left to the cashier to enforce?
- The memo specifically said that no 3rd party credit cards would be accepted. How about 1st party credit cards? Will they work? What are they? Target cards? Amex cards? If Amex cards work, will they earn rewards?
- Can debit cards be used as payment?
- Can Visa/MasterCard gift cards be used for payment? If so, which ones?
I am an engineer by trade, so this kind of “scientific” approach appeals to me. In the hopes of adding more data points, here were my answers:
- Cincinnati – no credit cards were allowed
- Hard coded
- I tried an American Express Every Day and Chase Ink – both did not work
- n/a
- I used a $200 Vanilla Visa (twice) and it worked both times
(UPDATE: I compiled a list of the experiences that people have had trying to load the Target Red Card / Redbird with various types of payment)
Stay tuned as this is a breaking topic! Feel free to share your experiences in the comments
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
In Columbus, Ohio, I did the same the you did only with a mastercard credit card:denied. Ran $2500 worth of Simon Mall visa giftcards thru with PIN, no problem. #PartysOver
Dang 🙁
CC loads still worked for me after 12ET in CA. This is after already meeting the 2500 limit earlier in the day. CSR just asked to see ID, which hasn’t happened before. Glad to see VGCs still worked for you.
Do they ask to see the card when entering debit card?
They did not ask to see the card. I don’t have a ton of experience with Redbird but I believe they only ask to see the card with loads of $1000 or more
Wonder if AMEX gift cards(via Befrugal, TCB etc..) code as credit or debit?
And if we register them and assign a PIN might it work?
I believe those code as credit so they wouldn’t work.
THx. Gonna give it a shot. If it does not work it’s back to Kroger for Vanillas from US Bank.
Grocery points!
Hard coded in Northern Virginia. No credit cards. Did not have debit cards to try.
VGC with pin still working. Did it this morning
VGC with pin is still working
Any idea if the Metabank GCs work with redbird?
I have not heard that yet. My OM (which sells the Metabank cards) was out of $200 when I stopped in last night
Thanks for sharing. How could I get Vanilla Visa GC by paying credit card? I tried Walgreen and Ralph’s nearby my home, It’s debit card purchase only. Thanks for your advice.
The saying is always “All MS is local” so what works for me in my part of town (Ohio) might not work for you. Currently there is a deal at Office Depot and Office Max where you can buy $200 gift cards at a discount. My grocery store will also sell gift cards (even up to $500) with a CC payment.
Thanks for your reply. I bought $500 gift cards in Ralph’s by credit card. But the GIFT CARD sign is huge. does it work for reloading Redcard or must it be specific gift card like prepaid card? Thanks
What kind of gift card did you buy?
It is showing Gift Card on right top corner with Debit and Mastercard below that. on the bottom it is saying ‘ a gift for you’. I dont think it is issued from major bank.
Should I buy something without ‘Gift Card’ sign? just in case target cashier may want to confirm the last 4 digit of the card? Thanks
I am maintaining an up-to-date list of working gift cards for Redbird, as reported on various blogs: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+NoonRadar/posts/QZ1eCSFrdCG
Please let me know if you have tested a different type of gift card from what’s mentioned there. Thank you.
Hi all, I wrote a step by step guide on how to load gift cards to Redbird (REDcard) with the new Target registers, via K8: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+NoonRadar/posts/82eSPgNCGi5
If you’ve loaded with the new POS and experienced something different from what I wrote, please let me know via a comment on my post so I can look into it and update the guide. Thank you.