ACCRUED EXPENSES

Accrued expenses consisted of the following:



	January 28, 2017		January 30, 2016
	(in thousands)
Gift cards and merchandise credits	$	45,743	$	43,446
Compensation	17,132		8,042
Taxes	21,764		17,004
Customer loyalty program	11,502		10,084
Other⁽¹⁾	34,193		29,224
	$	130,334	$	107,800


(1)	Other is comprised of deferred revenue, sales return allowance, and various other accrued expenses, including amounts owed under our vendor payment program described below.

To better facilitate the processing efficiency of certain vendor payments, during fiscal 2016 we entered into a vendor payment

program with a payment processing intermediary. Under the vendor payment program, the intermediary makes regularly-scheduled payments to participating vendors and we, in turn, settle monthly with the intermediary. The net change in the outstanding balance is reflected as a financing activity in the statements of cash flows.