Bluebird, REDbird, Serve in-store loads working again

44

Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is happening now! Follow us as Greg, Nick, and Stephen compete to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines before November 23rd. Who will complete the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?

Follow along here!

Note: As of October 13, 2015, the Target REDcard (REDbird) can only be loaded with cash in-store at Target. Gift cards and/or debit cards no longer work to load REDcard. For more info, see: Here is the REDbird memo, “Cash is the only tender guests can use”

As of May 6, 2015, Target no longer accepts credit cards for in-store REDbird reloads. For more information, please see “REDbird Post Memo Answers“, and “REDbird grounded. Now what?

This morning I published a warning that in-store reloads of Bluebird, REDbird (the Target Prepaid REDcard), and Serve cards were not reliably working (view post here).  Most of the day the problems continued, but as of 6pm EST tonight, we started receiving numerous reports of success, and have not heard any more problems.  I believe it is now safe to resume reloading your prepaid cards!

BluebirdServeRedcard

Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

44 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
lvtrader

Update on my 3/1 comment. Today (3/2) went to another Target in Las Vegas to reload Redbird. No problem . But Citi blocked transaction until I called them. I now understand that Citi automatically blocks all transactions of $500 or more until they can verify.

JustSaying

You must be chopped liver….Citi only freezes my transactions “after” the charge………trader you need to step up your game……..

lvtrader

3/1/15. Las Vegas Target store this morning refused to load Redbird with credit card. They said
there has been “trouble” with the prepaid card, and they were only accepting debit cards and cash. The Service desk person checked with her boss, who then called her own boss, so it seems the problem is more than an incorrect individual person.

Racerboy80

Denver, CO: Loaded two cards today with the daily maximums with multiple CCs at two different stores. No problems whatsoever. Various stores seem to be adopting various polices, so it is not system wide.

JustSaying

Does AMEX have any issues when the bill pay account is in a different name than the RedBird account?

Racerboy80

No, all that is required is the company, address (If it is not in their database), zip code, and account number.

They do not care who you pay bills for. I pay family members bills all the time, been doing it for the past year.

justSaying

Thanks for the bill pay advice……..loaded two cards at two different Targets for 1k each………the only one that had any problem was the Citi Fraud department which was easily corrected……….

Joe

Any word if NC is back online?

[…] Bluebird, REDbird, Serve in-store loads working again – Many reports of loads working once again. Find out the latest. […]

Austin

WM at Austin, TX stopped accpeting BB loads via any GC.
It may ending soon store-wide…

Newbie

I have been trying to register a temporary card since yesterday morning and continually receive a “We’re sorry, we cannot process your request at this time” message on the initial registration page. Has anyone been able to register online since yesterday morning? Thanks.

[…] Good morning everyone, dang, I take one day off from blogging to finish my taxes (such a pain in the butt) and I miss out some big miles and points developments.  I guess sometime between Wednesday evening and Thursday morning, there was an issue loading Redbird/Bluebird/Serve Cards and even logging into your account.  I was able to load the last $1,500 onto my Redbird Card last night, so everything seems back to normal.  I looked around my Redbird account and looked for new features, but didn’t see anything new.  Frequent Miler has the latest info. […]

Kate

Above attempt made mid morning Feb. 27.

Kate

Walmart in Fairfax VA refused to load anything onto Bluebird with VGC. Also would not accept VGC for money order. This store already was quite restrictive in refusing to load more than one card per day. Going to try another northern VA Walmart this afternoon. Hope to have better luck there.

Jim

Success loading Bluebird using a prepaid Visa bought at Safeway at 9:30 p.m. Pacific at a WM Neighborhood Market in Oregon.

Kate

I must be missing something. I thought Bluebird only allowed $1000 a day load at Walmart. Am I wrong?

QSR

I have reloaded $2500 in one day at the same time. I asked the cashier is this the limit? She said there’s no limit!

Ken

$2500 day load limit per card (RB, BB or Serve), $5k month.

Jon

The website for BB says $200/day, $1000/month limit. I tried loading $500 to BB the other day and got denied, but $200 worked. How do you get the $2500/day, $5000/month to work for you?

Ken

The $200/day $1k/month is from a CC load. $2500/day $5k/month is cash or debit (CG’s).

ed

Some still reporting errors when attempting loading Red, but it’s not as bad as the other day. Many still waiting for their previous loads to get worked out since many have charges on their cards but still no funds transferred into their Red. It takes a couple days for the system to get the rest of this sorted out.

TIP: Don’t leave the register until you see that the receipt reflects the new Red balance. If the receipt doesn’t show that the Red balance has increased, then you can have the cashier or supervisor void the transaction so you can have a ‘void’ receipt before you leave the store. Since the transaction just took place they can pull it up on the screen to do the ‘return/void’ since they can see the card that was used and the credit adjustment goes back to your card. As with any return or voided transaction it may take a couple days to show back up on your card that you used to make the purchase (load). Debit cards tend to take a bit longer for the credit adjustment than cc, so be patient.

David

Loaded REDbird last night at 8 pm EST using credit card, no issues at all. Did not even know about the earlier issues, so especially glad now it went through fine. I always check the receipt before I walk away from the register, and have not had any discrepancies, but better safe than sorry later.

Frugal man

Understand what you mean but it was not feasible for the Target manager to void the transaction on my Thursday evening load. yes, she tried but the system refused her. Instead, the system printed another error receipt after her void attempt. As I posted above, I loaded twice, one showed up and one never (now two days already. Just checked). Both got no load remind email as in the past. So things are really messy, not rational as you would imagine.

JustSaying

Oh and registered another card for the other son……….easy peasy……….

Steph

Can you get a Redcard for your son or is he over 18?

Steph

Can you get a Redcard for your son or is he over 18?

JustSaying

Son is over 18 but I think just having an ssn is the key determining factor. But the SSN must be tied to a living human being as I tried to get one for my deceased Mom but AMEX wouldn’t go for that even if I am the legal executor of her estate and can legally sign documents as such.

JustSaying

Just confirmed receipt of son’s card…….then to target to load 1k on IHG card…..signup bonus complete……then Barclay’s Arrival……20 minutes patently waiting for fraud control to clear my transaction…….laughing with the customer service agent and loving life as she talked about how West Coast teamsters strike was totally disrupting the inventory of their stores and how customers were yelling at her for not having inventory……..she knew I had waited 20 minutes withBarclay’s to have my 1k transaction clear……it was a precious moment in life and we were laughing all the way to the bank…………