Hi, I have a cousin whos only here for a short while, but hes bought himself one of those prepay debit cards from the postoffice i think he said, he wants to know if he can purchase a phone using it. http://www.idtprime.com/ Its one of those cards seen on that websit. Thanks!

Yes. You can purchase a pay as you go phone with credit cards, prepaid cards, debit cards, cash and so on. Contract phones could be a problem for people who aren't on the electoral register.

If he has enough credit already pre-paid on the card, he can buy whatever he wishes in the same manner as spending the cash, although I think you were already aware of this it is NOT a credit card. !

Yeah but those cards dont have a chip and pin on those?? Seems a bit weird, although it is backed by mastercard.

Are these cards even legit? they look fake :S

If in doubt, leave them out. !

Tell him to only use his cash instead.

Looks as though they are legit, mastercard have them as a recommendation on thier website. But why are they not chip and pin, swipe is like so last centuary

The dodgy bit is the charges. The post office card costs less to use than idtprime's but the fees do still add up so I wouldn't dream of using one myself. I expect that it costs more to produce a chip & pin card so they stick to swipe to keep the costs down as they'll send out dozens to each shop that stocks them. It's not a good idea to trust anything like this with large sums though because, if things go wrong, you've already handed over your money.

I thought all cards were chip and pin nowadays? I find this very odd - seems like (as suggested) they are living on the 90's!