Can anyone recommend a decent company I can get a pre pay card from?

Cheers

Linz

Linz

I googled prepaid credit card, these are the first three results: www. virginmoney.com /pay-as-you-go

www. mycashplus. co.uk

www. sterlingcard. co.uk

please read the "loading charges" before you make a choice.remove the spaces when you paste the links on your browser

hope this will help. 

Hiya Linz,

 I can tell you which ones to avoid at all costs! I've used the Titanium Cash Plus card, which seems to be the most popular prepaid Mastercard. It works fine for a while, but they do not handle complaints at all well. I reported unauthorized activity on my card and they told me I'd probably "just forgot" about spending it, and refused to look into it. Updates to your balance can be ridiculously slow. My balance has only just been altered to show a purchase I made over 2 months ago - basically my balance showed that it had been taken out at the time as normal, but it only actually came off the balance yesterday, which made my account go overdrawn, on a card that is not supposed to let you go into credit. They have suspended my card, refuse to ackowledge my complaint, and are now chasing me for the 17 pounds, just as if they were an actual 'credit' card. I was told by the retailer who sold me the card that he's seen it happen before, and that Cash Plus have absolutely terrible customer service.

As a result of the problems above, I was looking at the Prime prepaid mastercard, who charge more fees, and apparently if you lose your card or it's stolen or there is suspicious activity on your card, they charge a whopping 30 pounds 'investigation fee'! Surely that's illegal?! The comparisson page on this site says they charge 10 pounds, but it is infact 30 - it says so on the Prime site and I also contacted them to confirm that. I don't know about any of the others, having not used them, but I'd avoid these 2! Hope that helps you.

 

Hi pgilbert and Linz

Glad to hear you’re interested in prepaid cards.

In reply to your posting on our “investigation fee”, we wanted to explain more fully what this fee is, why it’s used and when it can come in to play. Hopefully, this will allow you to make your decisions with all the information you need. 

IDT Finance do charge a £30 “investigation fee” but this fee is only applied in exceptional circumstances. This fee results from a standard MasterCard process known as ‘Chargeback’, and only occurs in situations when a customer challenges payments incorrectly or is found to be trying to defraud the company (i.e. claiming not to have made a payment when in fact they have). As such, the fee is rarely implemented and users with legitimate enquiries about their account are at little risk of incurring this charge. Any card user whose payments are investigated and is found to be correct in their challenge will not be charged this fee. And obviously, regular enquiries about account balances and transaction history are free by simply visiting your account pages on our website.

We are always pleased to receive customer feedback and always try to adapt the way IDT Finance works to please its customers. Following your posting, we will now update the information on our website to make this a bit clearer.

Please do get back to us if you have any other queries, concerns or questions about the Prime Card and we will endeavour to answer swiftly. Thanks for the post.

Jamie King

Director, IDT Finance

Hello,

 

You can compare the various prepaid cards in the market by visiting the credit card section of the moneysupermarket.com site and searching in the prepaid section.

It is important you consider the purpose of your prepaid card and how you wish to use it, as the various fees and charges can make it compelling to own one for different purposes (e.g. everyday spending, overseas travel etc).

Once you have made up your mind, you can then consider the options using the comparison tables.

As an example, if you are planning to travel around the world, I would look at a MasterCard or Visa (Electron) branded product due to their wider acceptance (You can use a prepaid MasterCard at more than 24 million locations worldwide, and Visa Electron in over 12 million locations), and check the foreign exchange, ATM fees and loading fees that apply to the account to ensure you are getting the best value for money.  If you are travelling in Europe, then Maestro is widely accepted as well (just over 7 million locations worldwide).

Where this is less important, and you are planning for spending in the UK, then any of the cards available should be suitable for your needs, so this is down to simple cost of ownership, and possibly if you like the card design!  Check the combination of initial purchase fee, loading fees, ATM fees, and possibly even individual transaction fees.

 

One particular pre-paid card to avoid is from the Crew Card Network.

I applied for this card as I liked the fact that a secondary card holder can simply be 'text' funds from the primary holder which seemed a nice gimmick for pre-paid card holders.

From the start, I knew there would be issues. Firstly, after waiting 10 days for my card to arrive, I emailed customer services checking the card was on the way. No reply. Then when I did receive the card, I was told to activate it, I couldn't because it already was I as found out later. Tried to call customer services to enquire but when you ring the customer services number off their website I was told my call couldn't be completed as I had insufficient funds in my account. What???

I then called the application line as this was the only other telephone number listed. I assumed this was for new customers to verbally apply for a card but somehow I got through to someone at customer services.???????

I then enquired why I was unable to register my Cashplus mastercard on the website as VISA was the only card tpe accepted, even though they say you can register up to 3 cards of ANY type. ????????

After 4 days I got a call back, from an international number, from the person I did get through to. Apparently there was technical issues on the site and it may get resolved soon.????????

Basically, for a financial services company, their website is 3rd rate, appauling customer services and appearing non-uk based all seems a bit 'dodgy' like some exchange-and-mart offshore company that you can buy for £40 !!!

They specialise in payment cards and you can't even top-up your payment card with a payment card, which is like going into a bank and being told that they don't accept cash.

Also be aware of the loading fees. With minimum charge of £2.50 for transactions, it can work out very expensive just to move money around.

I would personally recommend Cashplus Gold account, not so much the Titanium card they do, as I and other users of this forum have had trouble with that, but the gold account I have as been excellent, especially when I needed medical expenses funds when abroad in Crete, I was able to withdraw local currency within 30 mins of my partner credited my account at a local Money Shop in London. The only cost to me is the initial £10 for the card and £5 admin fee which gives you unlimited free reloads and free website access.

So, to summarise, don't become part of the Crew Card Network and go for gold instead.

So Mrtwitch found the Crew unreliable? Lucky him, at least he got a card. I fell at the first hurdle! I too phoned to join up and got automatically put through to Customer Support, who do not handle sign-ups. A frustrating few minutes ascertained that I was an undesirable, as I did not possess a passport. No other form of ID would do, indeed the charming lady said surely everyone is meant to have a passport? What planet is she on, I thought ID cards had not come into force yet.

The card looks good value but clearly a Brit who has survived the last 40 years without feeling the need to skip off abroad is a bad risk. No folks, it's this Crew Card that's the bad risk. There's plenty more to choose from.

pauledg

Pauledg,

I think you'll find all financial institutions use passports as ID these days due to money laundering legislation.

One trick I used for a friend was to start up another new CashPlus account with a new card and as my friend had no ID like yourself, I applied for a secondary card in his name and then gave him both in order that I couldn't use any funds he loads onto his card as they share the same 'pot of money' so to speak.

As it was all pre-paid I was at no risk with bad debt etc. You just need to find a good friend with a passsport.

I got one of these cards in December 2007,,i paid the upgrade fee and also a £6.95 fee for a card which was in my husbands name.The new card arrived and i sent a copy of my passport to IDT so i could have a higher limit of £1500 usage a year.The idea of this card was to pay household bills etc.My husband tried to load £160 onto the card and it was declined he stood in the shop and contacted IDT who would give him no information at all,,he asked if he should try putting it on in smaller amounts " you could try " was the answer.My husband managed to load £50 onto the card it wouldnt take the rest.I contacted IDT who told me i only had a £1500 limit,,when i told them i sent a copy of my passport they replied we havnt got it..I askedf if i could get the £50 transferred onto another card as the bill i had to pay was immediate they told me NO.Now i have £50 sitting on a card that i cant use it will take 7days to issue a cheque IF ITS AUTHORISED and into the bargain thery have lost passport information.I have been 5 hrs trying to sort it out..BRICK WALL AND SCRIPTED ANSWERS come to mind.I have contacted my passport office who are quite disturbed that this vital information is lost but as they have told me my passport information can be checked just by confirming the digital read out number.Why they require a copy is beyond them.I now have an alert put on my passport just incase someone trys to get a copy.This is more inconvience to me as now if i have to renew or i lose my passport i have to gop in person for a new one..STAY CLEAR OF IDT unless u want an enormous headache,,or someone runniing around with your identity and passport.

Karenblyth,

It appears now that a lot of these pre-paid card companies are a shambles and shouldn't be allowed to trade in the financial market.

If you still feel the need for a pre-paid card then I still recommend Cashplus by Broadcastle bank who operate through the 'Money Shop', previous known as 'cash-a-cheque' I believe, retail outlets.

I often load £200-£500 in cash through their local branch onto my card and it is available for payments within 20-30 mins without fail so far and I have had a card with them for nearly 2 years now.

If you read my previous post after my similar experience to yours with crewcard, then you can see how well I have got on with cashplus so far in comparison.

Applications can be made on line without the need for any postal/fax etc documentation to be sent as, like the passport office said, your identitiy can be confirmed purely through the passport number. This was how I applied and had my card up-and-running within 10 days and used it the same afternoon I received it.

I have been looking into getting a Mastercard Prime, primarily so I can buy things online with peace of mind that, if anything goes wrong, I'd only be losing the money currently on the card. I'd be getting items costing not much more than £40 mostly and would therefore probably load only the money required onto the card and make my purchase, meaning that it is unlikely for there to be more than £40 on the card at any one time. I have thoroughly investigated the card and am well aware of the transaction fee and the reload fee, I find them to be reasonable, adding £1 to each transaction for example will still save me tons compared to buying from stores. There is also a dormancy fee of £2.95 if you don't buy something every month (or three months, still awaiting clarification), but this is no problem for me, as I easily buy at least one item a month, even if it is a £5 DVD!! Taking into account my needs for the card, would it be a good choice? Has anyone here got one of these cards and isn't experiencing problems?

Any replies would be much appreciated!

If anything goes wrong?

What would be the difference if fraud is committed on a Prime card as compared to a regular credit card?

Hello? If someone gets hold of your main credit card details, then they have access to all your finances! If they get hold of your Prime details, all they can get is what's on the card and if you've any sense, you won't put too much on it at any one time. And if something does go wrong, all you need to do is get a new Prime card and therefore a new account number!

Think before answering.

All your finances? How so? I dont see why that would necessarily be the case. I would think the vast majority of the time they would only have access to the credit card details itself, and even then thats the banks money not yours, so they foot the bill. I dont think a Prime card is in any way safer than a credit card.

Eco-warrior,

Have you ever tried to get your money bank from a credit card company? The process is long winded and potentially could be thousands of available balance is 'in limbo'.

If there's only £40 on a prime card then surely that's all that is at risk!