# What is a voucher?

A voucher is something a customer holds and can use at the business that gave it to them. It is the thing in their hand. An offer is what they bought, and a promotion is a rule that fired automatically. Any of those can end up as a voucher.

Source: https://fidella.app/glossary/voucher
Last reviewed: 2026-08-30

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If you remember one distinction from this glossary, make it this one.

## Offer, promotion, voucher

These three words get used interchangeably and they mean quite different things:

- An **offer** is a thing a customer buys. It is merchandise.
- A **promotion** is a rule that fires at scan time, without anyone buying
  anything.
- A **voucher** is the entitlement a customer holds afterwards. It is the
  outcome, not the mechanism.

Buying an offer produces a voucher. So can a promotion, and so can a gift from
another customer. The voucher does not carry a memory of which route produced
it, beyond what its own rules record.

## Redeeming

A voucher is redeemed at the business that published it, under the status,
expiry and usage limits that business set.