AN ACT Relating to deterring criminal conduct involving gift cards;
SB 5644 updates Washington’s theft and forgery laws to address criminal conduct involving gift cards and gift card redemption information. The bill adds new definitions for terms such as gift card, open-loop gift card, closed-loop gift card, gift card redemption information, cardholder, card issuer, and gift card seller, and it amends existing theft-related provisions to include gift cards in the valuation rules used to determine offense severity. It also creates new crimes for theft of a gift card, unlawful use of a gift card, gift card fraud, and forgery involving a gift card or gift card redemption information.
Under the bill, taking or retaining a gift card or its redemption information with intent to defraud, using a gift card obtained unlawfully, altering or tampering with a gift card or redemption information, or devising a scheme to obtain gift card information by false pretenses would be punishable as theft, unlawful use, forgery, or gift card fraud. The bill sets felony or gross misdemeanor levels based on the value involved, and it also makes conforming changes to the state’s theft grading and related criminal code provisions so gift card offenses are treated similarly to other property crimes.
The bill would amend multiple sections of Washington’s criminal code, primarily chapter 9A.56 RCW, to expressly cover gift cards and gift card redemption information as property subject to theft, forgery, and fraud offenses. It would also revise valuation rules so the face value or potential value of gift cards can be used to determine the degree of the offense, and it would add gift-card-specific offenses and penalties to the state’s theft and forgery framework. Prosecutors and courts would gain clearer statutory authority to charge and sentence conduct involving stolen, altered, or fraudulently obtained gift cards, while merchants, card issuers, and consumers would be the main affected parties.
The available context shows no recorded committee testimony or vote history, so there is no documented opposition or support in the provided materials. Based on the bill’s title and structure, the measure appears to be a targeted criminal-law update intended to deter a specific form of theft and fraud, suggesting a generally law-enforcement-oriented and consumer-protection rationale. The absence of recorded votes or transcripts means the overall sentiment cannot be measured from the supplied record, but the bill itself is framed as a straightforward anti-fraud measure.
No committee transcript or vote record is provided, so specific points of contention are not documented in the supplied materials. Potential areas of debate, based on the bill text, could include how gift cards are valued for felony grading, whether the new offenses overlap with existing theft and forgery statutes, and whether the bill’s definitions are broad enough to cover digital and open-loop products without unintentionally sweeping in benign conduct. Any disagreement would likely center on enforcement scope, penalty levels, and how to distinguish ordinary possession from fraudulent intent.