Millions of Dine and Discover vouchers still need to be used

If you haven’t yet taken advantage of the NSW government’s freebie scheme, you better get to it, because it expires tonight.

If you have an unused Dine and Discover voucher and have been itching to watch Top Gun: Maverick or head out to a club with friends, you better get to it.

The vouchers are due to expire at 11.59pm today, meaning your chance to take up the NSW Government’s offer to eat or watch a movie for free, will soon be over.

The government handed out 32 million vouchers, which you can access via the Service NSW app, under a program launched in March 2021 to help local businesses stay afloat during the Covid pandemic.

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There’s still millions of unused Dine & Discover vouchers – and you have until 11.59pm June 30 to use it. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jeremy Piper

As of June 26, $820 million has been spent on people eating and going out. But there’s still about 12 million vouchers that remain unused.

If you’re hoping the government will extend the scheme, they won’t.

“The scheme won’t be extended, it has already been extended … so this is the last extension. If they’re not used by June the 30th, they expire,” NSW Minister Customer Service Victor Dominello told the ABC.

The NSW government handed out 32 million vouchers under a program launched in March 2021 to help local businesses stay afloat during the Covid pandemic. Picture NCA Newswire/ Gaye Gerard.

The vouchers can be used at bars, clubs and restaurants or at the movies and museums.

“But there’s some novel businesses in the charity sector that set up a framework where you can pay it forward, and I encourage people to do that.”

He explained the scheme is not designed so everybody must spend the vouchers, adding “it’s an opt-in scheme”.

Some people experienced technical difficulties when trying to use their voucher on Wednesday. Picture: Twitter

“But five-and-a-half million people, out of an adult population of about six million, have actually registered to receive the vouchers, which is just extraordinary,” he said.

“And the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive with satisfaction scores above 90 per cent.”

However, if you plan on using it today, expect some technical difficulties.

Went to use our dine and discover voucher before they expires tomorrow. @ServiceNSW owes me a pizza. pic.twitter.com/1giLoswaez

— Addie (Rade) (@Gamer_Rade) June 29, 2022

It comes after consumers tried to pay for meals and activities on Wednesday were left disappointed when the Service NSW’s app displayed an error message in place of the $25 vouchers.

“Something went wrong. We’re unable to load your vouchers. Try again later,” the message read.

Many claimed they went out with the specific intention of spending their vouchers only to be left having to dig into their own pockets when it came time to pay.

A Service NSW spokesperson told 7 News Wednesday evening the issue had been resolved, however many residents continued to report problems.

“The Service NSW vouchers database experienced an outage at 5.01pm. Service NSW investigated and resolved the issue by 6pm,” they said.

Some discovered a nifty workaround which involved logging into the Service NSW website instead of the app, and finding the code for the voucher that needed to be used.

Eligible businesses should be able to accept the codes when the app’s barcode feature is down.