If you gave or received a gift card for a restaurant that was purchased at Costco, you will want to dig them out.
Costco told members in a letter that if they had purchased Synergy restaurant gift cards from Oct. 27, 2025 and Jan. 26, 2026, they can get a refund for the remaining card balance, Fox Business said.
Synergy World, a gift and loyalty card company, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection and closed in January.
Because of the bankruptcy, the cards, which were managed by Synergy, cannot be used anymore, despite still having a balance on them.
Synergy had initially said they would be good through early February, but changed course when people rushed to use them, Fox Business said.
“It is with a heavy heart that Synergy World has made the difficult decision to discontinue the Synergy Restaurant Gift Card Program,” the company told ABC News in a statement.
The value of all of the unused funds will not be known until the bankruptcy filings are released.
“One of the biggest lessons that people should learn from this is that gift cards should be used sooner rather than later,” Lending Tree’s chief consumer finance analyst, Matt Schulz, said. “That’s especially true if the company involved is on shaky footing. However, with any gift card, you’re better off not letting it gather dust. Otherwise, you risk losing it, forgetting about it or just having it lose value. That’s the last thing anyone needs today.”
Schulz said when you get a gift card, you should keep the receipt until it has all been used and register it so if it gets lost.
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