Terminology

Merchant Return Credit (MRC)

A Merchant Return Credit also is known as a Merchant Return Card is a specific type of gift card that is issued to a customer when they return merchandise back to the store. Instead of getting back cash they get back store credit in the form of the gift card.

This gift card is not a normal gift card. It's a highly restricted gift card that is associated with the customer so that is only usable by that customer.

The problem that the merchants were trying to solve is a fraudster will go into a store and steal a piece of clothing. They would then go back to the store and return the item for a gift card. They would then sell that gift card on the secondary market to a business like GiftDeals to then get cash for that card. MRC Gift Cards are meant to stop that fraudulent activity. So the customer will not be able to sell the card and that customer is the only person that can use it.

You can see an example of this by looking at Target's return policy for gift cards and how restricted they are to use.

For example, they don't allow:

Balance only in-store -- not on the website
You must have a driver's license when using the gift card
You cannot get a refund on the Gift Card

GiftDeals does not accept MRC cards.