Sam's Club Mastercard Gift Card Orders Cancelled! This is too far even in My Book

Recently, Sam's Club came out with a very lucrative offer of $20 off $20 when you use your American Express card online.

I argued that you should consider buying $50 Mastercard gift cards with 2 American Express gift cards, thereby saving $40.

I even signed up as a new Sam's Club member for this offer.

Sam's Club apparently felt that low cost gift cards were against their best interests so they decided to start charging shipping fees to discourage anyone from buying them (HT Miles to Memories and Travel with Grant)

While I wasn't happy that gift cards were now more expensive, I was ok with what Sam's Club was doing and I even defended it.  They are trying to make sure the promotion is used as they intended, instead of how we want to use them.  They aren't stopping you from buying merchandise and they aren't cancelling old orders.  They were just changing prices going forward.  At least until now.

All my Previous orders for Gift Cards have been Cancelled!

I already pointed out that $20 credits were posting for Mastercard purchases and I was eagerly awaiting mine.  I waited and waited, but it never came.  Finally, tonight, the $20 purchase disappeared from my pending transactions in my AMEX accounts.  That's weird.

I logged into my Sam's Club account and saw this:

Cancelled orders galore!

Here is an example of one of my cancelled orders:

I have to say, I'm a little surprised.  I didn't think this would happen and I think it is pretty bad customer service for them to do it.  I didn't even receive an email saying my orders were cancelled.  It just strikes me that Sam's Club wasn't ready for the ramifications of their offer and are backtracking off everything they can.  

Are they within their rights to do this?  Probably, but I'm still taken aback that they would risk bad publicity like this.  This deal had the possibility of bringing in so many new happy members.  Instead, they are ticking off their new members.

I didn't buy any Sam's Club $20 gift cards so I don't know if those are cancelled as well.  I guess we will see as the reports come in.

Were your orders cancelled?  Comment below