ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. – A Northeast Florida gift card company and its owner have been permanently banned from doing business in Florida.
The decision, which was sparked by dozens of consumer complaints, was handed down against Gift Card Deal Marketplace Inc., which operated as giftcarddeal.com, and its owner, after a judge found the company was cheating customers.
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NOTE: News4JAX is not naming the owner because no criminal charges have been filed against them.
According to a lawsuit filed by the Florida Attorney General’s Office, at least 75 consumers reported paying for gift cards through the company’s website but never receiving them, receiving cards worth less than what they paid, or getting cards that were not for the promised retailers.
A St. Johns County circuit judge entered a default final judgment on March 18 against Gift Card Deal Marketplace Inc.
According to the Florida AG’s lawsuit, the office began receiving complaints as early as 2019, alleging the company was scamming customers who purchased gift cards online.
In addition to customers who said they never got what they paid for, other customers said the gift cards were not delivered within the promised timeframe.
Consumers also alleged the company failed to respond to refund requests or denied them altogether.
The Attorney General’s Office argued those practices violated the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act.
In the final judgment, the court agreed, declaring the defendants’ conduct “unfair, deceptive, and/or unconscionable.”
Because the defendants did not respond to the lawsuit, the judge issued a default judgment in favor of the state.
Under the order, the business and its owner are permanently barred from selling, marketing or accepting payment for gift cards in Florida. They are also prohibited from conducting any online sales in the state.
The court ordered the defendants to pay $48,676.04 in restitution to affected consumers.
In addition, the judge imposed $810,000 in civil penalties, bringing the total financial judgment to more than $858,000.
The court also ruled the state is entitled to attorney’s fees and costs, which will be determined at a later hearing.
The defendants, who are based in Ponte Vedra, did not respond to the allegations in court filings. It’s not yet clear how or when affected consumers will receive restitution.
In a separate legal filing by GoDaddy and its payment processing service, the company claims it incurred approximately $2 million in losses from over 1,600 chargebacks tied to the owners of giftcarddeal.com. GoDaddy said it had to reimburse customers for the “bad cards,” but that the gift card site refused to repay GoDaddy.
GoDaddy took the owners of the gift card site to arbitration, arguing in part that the owners “regularly engaged in delay tactics to avoid paying the chargebacks.”
The process resulted in an arbitration award of $2,283,073 in GoDaddy’s favor. GoDaddy then filed a petition in St. Johns County court in 2024 to confirm the award, which a judge agreed to.
Since then, GoDaddy and other parties have pursued multiple garnishment actions. In response, the respondents filed motions to halt those garnishments, arguing the seizures were leaving them unable to cover basic living expenses such as rent and food.
The plaintiffs opposed those requests, and an evidentiary hearing is scheduled for late April.