Gift certificates
What is the definition of a gift certificate? What is the difference between a gift certificate and a promotional coupon?
Re: Gift certificates
A gift certificate constitutes value held in trust by the issuer for the beneficiary of a gift certificate. Civil Code section 1749.6(a). Hence, a gift certificate is paper evidence that someone (the donor of the gift) has given a valuable consideration (money) to the merchant who issued the certificate, or his agent.
On the other hand, a promotional coupon gets into the consumer's hands without payment of a consideration to the merchant.
I think that's the fundamental difference; you pay for a gift certificate, but not for a promotional coupon.