PayPal announced that it now supports prepaid gift cards in that consumers can use them anywhere that accepts PayPal.

This is just in time for the holidays, when many people will be getting these cards as gifts. As PayPal explains, these gifts often come with a burden attached to them.

“A lot of e-commerce sites can’t or won’t accept it right off the shelf—even if other credit or debit cards of the same card brands are allowed,” says PayPal’s Ed Lee in a blog post. “Many consumers are forced to call the card issuer or go to a special website to register a billing address before trying to pay with the prepaid gift card. It might sound simple, but in PayPal’s recent usability study, it was found that only 1 person out of every 4 was able to register their billing address and complete an online purchase successfully. Thankfully, PayPal has offered a way to resolve the issue. Now, no more of this hassle is required if you use prepaid gift cards through PayPal Checkout.”

“After our customers voiced this particular pain point again and again, we knew we had to fix it once and for all,” he adds. “After months of research and investigations, we discovered a patent-pending and innovative way to allow the usage of prepaid gift cards so that you can seamlessly apply them to the purchase of products and services anywhere PayPal is accepted – just in time for the holidays!”

This goes for cards from Visa, American Express, MasterCard, and Discover.

About a year ago, PayPal began offering its own prepaid cards, but only to those who have credit/debit cards or bank accounts connected to PayPal.

Image: PayPal