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Visa gift cards are some of the more popular gift cards used today because of their flexibility and ease of use. They can be used anywhere that debit cards are used so they can be used at a variety of retail places, used in online shopping and even used to pay bills. However, they are only useable good as long as there is still a dollar amount remaining in the balance. Luckily, there are many ways to reload your Visa gift card with a larger cash balance once you purchase and activate it.

When you "purchase" a Visa gift card, basically 2 things happen; you get a card assigned to an account number, and you load a balance onto the card for the amount you "purchased" it for. So if you buy a gift card, then it has a balance that can be used once it has been activated (which may require a fee). If you want to continue using the card, once all the balance has been used, then you must recharge it, or add more money to the value of the card. Here are the following ways in which as service provider can allow you to add money to the balance of your account:

Tax Refund

You can have your state and federal tax refund directly deposited into your giftcard balance. Through a service provider's direct deposit service, you can direct the IRS to send the funds there. This also works for most types of government benefit checks as well. Like a bank account, you will need to fill out an application to have this done.

Direct Deposit

You can have your payroll checks directly deposited into your giftcard account. This works similar to having your tax refund deposited. You will need to fill out an application, and it must be accepted (it usually is), before the automatic deposits can occur.

Cash Deposit

You can deposit cash directly onto your Visa giftcard through a few different money transfer type services providers. The 3 most well knows providers that are set up to do this are Money Gram, Western Union and Money Pak. There may be a service charge associated with doing it this way however.

Paypal

Yes, you can use Paypal to add money into your account. You will need to set up your Paypal account to add a new "Bank Account". The "Bank Account" is your giftcard service provider and the individual account number of your giftcard. Once Paypal has made verification of this new account, you can add funds to your giftcard at any tome from your Paypal account.

Check or Money Order

Your giftcard service provider will provide you with an address to send your check or money order in order to add funds to your account. Many providers will offer this service for free yet it takes a bit longer for the funds to get added to the account because it has to go through the postal mail.

Bank Transfer

This method of transfer works very similar to the way you would use Paypal to transfer money into your Visa gift card account for any financial institution that allows for electronic funds transfer. You would need to sign into your financial institutions account and set up a new "online payee" and fill in the information that your gift card service provider would supply you in this case. Once your institution verifies the account, you will be good to go.

Using a Visa gift card is very easy, and it is also easy to add money to the account. This is great for those that get in trouble using credit cards, because in the case of gift cards, you can only purchase whatever value is left on the card. They are also great for allowing parents to support their children who are living away from home. It is a good idea to find out all you can about the uses of gift cards so you can see how they can make your life more convenient.