Hacker News Reader

Comment by uoaei | Hacker News Reader

Our Christmas bonus this year at our small startup was a large Amazon gift card. I'm intensely conflicted on applying it to my account. But that amount of money is not insignificant and I feel almost obligated to use it despite my ethical qualms with Amazon.

How might my fellow HN denizens navigate this situation? I already asked HR and they don't want to exchange it for cash because "we already bought it" and "we don't want the bonus to be taxable income".

View on HN

Gift cards are taxable income, but if you point this out to HR it probably won't make them happier with you.

https://www.shrm.org/ResourcesAndTools/hr-topics/compensatio...

How the hell do I navigate this re: filing taxes? I'm an independent contractor.

Obviously the best answer is "talk to a CPA" but I'm curious if anyone has insight into how to wade through this.

Add it to your income from that employer and pay taxes on it accordingly. Alternately, you could donate it to a non-profit, get a receipt and have it be a net zero on your taxes.

Only if you’re itemizing though.

If the amount is so large that you are actually concerned with someone finding out, and they gave these out to the whole company, perhaps it would be wise to quietly point out the mistake to HR. IANAAccountant, but I would guess they're supposed to report it on your 1099. Normally it would be reported as taxable income on your W2.

You can convert gift cards at a slight markup. You can also buy prepaid Visa gift cards on Amazon. I'd compare those options, see what has a lower transaction cost, and then use that to buy elsewhere. Amazon will still get business as a result, but it's a bit better ethically I think (if you go the Visa gift card route it's a low margin good that's easy to pack and ship, if you trade on an online marketplace presumably the person you trade with might buy a little more because of you but was going to buy on Amazon anyway) plus you avoid the quality issues.

Is there such thing as counterfeit Visa gift cards on the Amazon marketplace?

Never heard about it. Aren't resellers, though, you have to buy from Visa.

Uh, if it's a non-insigninficant amount, then I'd spend it, but make it clear to HR that in future you'd like your bonuses in regular currency.

You could also possibly re-sell the gift card, exchange it for something (I know there's a market for cryptocurrency exchanges for gift cards) or gift it forward to a family member or friend.

It’s certainly better to use it than to just let it sit around, since then you're Just giving the money to Amazon.

Pretty sure there are places online where you can sell/exchange gift cards.

There are online communities where you can exchange gift cards for other cards or for cash - usually with a small fee. You could also use it to buy cryptocurrency peer-to-peer depending on the exchange.

There are sites where people exchange gift cards. You can try trading it for a store you like. You can also sell it for a % of value.

Can you re-sell it for cash at a slight loss?

This is risky, so many stories of scam buyers taking the gift card and running

Paxful does a decent job at this but you are still going to only get like 70% of the value of the card. Definitely a good way for users to launder money too so be wary of that going on.

Try selling it to someone for 5%-10% off.

It’s a one time thing, just do it

Reply on news.ycombinator.com