Gift Vouchers

Lord McNicol of West Kilbride Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Duncan of Springbank]

My noble friend is correct. It is a challenge when we live in an internet age that connects the global marketplace in a competitive sense with smaller businesses on the high street, so we need to be cautious. However, I hope that any rules in this regard would be of the highest possible standard to ensure that people who received gift vouchers did not find themselves penalised by holding them.

[Lord McNicol of West Kilbride (Lab)]

My Lords, I looked in my wallet before coming to this debate and noticed that I had two gift vouchers from Christmas. I am not quite sure what they say about me: one is for Greggs, the bakers, and one is for Waterstones. Nitecrest has estimated that 98.6% of gift vouchers are spent within the first year, but since the market for gift vouchers is worth around £6 billion, that means that about £84 million is not spent within the first year. Do the Government know what proportion of people who fail to spend their gift vouchers come from low-income households? If they have the answer to that, what measures, if any, are they looking to take to help support consumers and customers?

[Lord Duncan of Springbank]

The noble Lord clearly has kind friends who give him Greggs vouchers and Waterstones vouchers: food for the heart and for the mind. At present, some £300 million in gift vouchers per year is unclaimed out of a £6 billion retail offering. Quite often they are lost—they have not been redeemed because they have simply been misplaced. I do not have the figures, and I do not believe the figures have been gathered, on those who come from low-income families, but I recognise that this is still 5% of the overall market, which is way too high. We need to find a way to ensure that the value of these products is not lost, particularly when low-income households are affected.