PC gamers waited for a long time to hear this news. Finally, our patience paid off. Steam Digital Gift Cards are now available for all of us.
Previously, if players wanted to gift a Steam voucher, they had to do it the old-fashioned way. This meant going to a retailer that offers them, buying a physical card, and actually giving it to a friend. For users in the US and Western Europe that wasn’t much of a problem. However, some areas around the globe had very limited availability, when it came to the gift cards.
Valve have solved the issue now, at least partially. The new Steam Digital Gift Cards are immediately available for all users but come with certain restrictions.
First of all, in order to send a gift card to one of your Steam friends, you have to be on each other’s friend list for at least three days. Additionally, players cannot purchase a Digital Gift Card with the funds in their Steam wallet. This means that users will have to resort to buying via PayPal, Bitcoin, or a credit/debit card.
Do not think that you can transfer as much money you want, though. The Steam Digital Gift Cards come in certain specific values. In Europe, they are 5€, 10€, 25€, 50€, and 100€.
Additionally, if you are gifting the card to someone who might reject it, make sure to use a payment method that supports refunds. Upon rejection, there are two things that might happen. Either Valve will send the money back where it came from, or they will add it to your Steam wallet. The latter will only happen if the refund attempt is unsuccessful.
The Steam Digital Gift Cards are appearing right before the Halloween sale and the upcoming Christmas sale this holiday season. Such a move from Valve is completely understandable. The holiday season is the perfect time of the year to launch such vouchers. We here at Gaming Adept will definitely make good use of them.