Cardpool Alternative: What to Use Now That Cardpool Has Closed

If you’re searching for Cardpool, here’s the key fact first: Cardpool shut down. Its parent company, Blackhawk Network, closed the Cardpool gift-card exchange permanently in early 2021. It no longer buys gift cards, sells discounted cards, or honors its former guarantee. So the real question isn’t "Cardpool vs the rest" — it’s what to use instead. This page lays out the options honestly, including FlipGift’s escrow model.

What happened to Cardpool

• Permanently closed in early 2021. Blackhawk Network wound down Cardpool along with its other gift-card exchange operations.
• No current service. You can’t sell a card to Cardpool or buy discounted cards from it today.
• Old Cardpool cards: if you still hold a card bought from Cardpool, use it sooner rather than later — the Cardpool guarantee no longer applies.

Your options now

Broadly, there are two routes for an unwanted gift card:

• Resale for cash (at a discount). Sites like CardCash and GiftCash buy your card and pay cash, and marketplaces like Raise let you list it for buyers. All of them pay a percentage of face value, and all require handing over the card’s code before you’re finally paid. See our CardCash, GiftCash, and Raise comparisons.
• Escrow sale (cash, code never shared). On FlipGift you keep the card and its code, use the card yourself to fulfil a real buyer’s order, and are paid from escrow on confirmed delivery — typically netting 78–89% of face value. How it works.

How FlipGift works as a Cardpool replacement

FlipGift is a peer-to-peer escrow marketplace: buyers pre-pay below-retail prices for goods from ~198 supported stores, and sellers fulfil those orders with gift cards that never leave their own hands.

• The code never changes hands — you redeem your own card to place the buyer’s order; FlipGift stores no card numbers or PINs at all.
• Money held in escrow — the buyer pays up front; you’re paid on confirmed delivery, not after surrendering anything.
• Flat 2.5% fee, split between both sides — no opaque resale margin.
• Typical seller net: 78–89% of face value — you set the discount that attracts a buyer.

Worth knowing: FlipGift also ran a card-for-card swap and retired it permanently in July 2026 — in any code-for-code trade the previous owner still knows the number and PIN and can drain the card later, and no platform can prevent that. Why we closed it. We’d rather practice what we preach about code safety.

Cash sites vs FlipGift

When a resale site is the better choice

If you need cash immediately and your brand draws a strong instant offer, a buy-back site is faster — there’s no waiting for a buyer’s order to match your store. You accept the discount and the code handoff in exchange for speed. If you can wait for a match, escrow typically nets more and never exposes the code.

How a FlipGift escrow sale works

1. List your card’s value — store and balance; the code stays with you and is never uploaded.
2. A buyer’s pre-paid order matches your store — their money is locked in escrow.
3. You place the order with your own card and ship it to the buyer’s verified address.
4. Delivery confirms — escrow releases your money, minus your half of the flat 2.5% fee.

Sell without sharing the code