Comments on: Prepaid Debit Card VS Checking Account

By: Joseph Sullivan

Joseph Sullivan — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 01:17:20 +0000

Here’s my take on Prepaid Debit Cards (payroll cards) based on my own experience:

I used to work at a large national restaurant chain and our card was pretty bad. But, from what I hear, it was typical because most cards either have a monthly fee or pretty limited as to the free items. I have worked at Starbucks for about 7 months now and they allow us to have a card called the Money Manager Card. The choice was pretty simple because there are no monthly fees, I can use it on their network (allpoint atms) free at all times, never any fees to buy things (signing or using my PIN and getting cash back if I want…all without a fee or surcharge), no overdraft. Let’s just say I haven’t paid a fee in the entire time I’ve had the card. It’s pretty simple to use it at no charge and I really don’t have to tip-toe around any limited free items like most other cards I have seen have.

Oh, and don’t lose most payroll cards! If you do, it’ll cost you $$ even to get the replacement sent by the post office. My new card give free replacements when delivered by the post office all of the time. Or, if I want, I can get it delivered by Fedex for $10. Pretty reasonable as I sent something by Fedex a month ago and paid $14!

My point is, if an employer is set on offering its employees a Paycard, it should do both the company and its employees and offer a Paycard that truly costs $0 to use. When I say $0, I mean $0. Not just $0 if you jump through certain hoops, etc.

I should state that Walmart has something that is similar sounding to Money Manager Card. I think it is the Money Card or something like that. That card is definitely not the same.

I did a quick Google search on Money Card when investigating the Starbucks offering and mistakenly clicked on a link to a Money Card “problem” page where people complained about it. Then, I realized that “Money Card” is not “Money Manager Card”.

Thought I would let you know so you don’t make the same mistake and get yourself a card that will end up costing you $$$$.

By: GetDebit

GetDebit — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 20:37:17 +0000

The problem with a straight comparison of checking account fees vs. prepaid debit card fees is that it leaves out the fact that many (tens of millions) of American’s simply can’t get a regular bank account since they are on the ChexSystems list (of people who have misused or overdrawn bank accounts without repaying past due fees). It also leaves out people who can’t afford the $1k to $5k minimum balance requirements of the big banks to qualify for “free” or reduced fee checking accounts. The best option for those people may be a prepaid card account. Luckily, the fees associated with these products have dropped significantly in the past year. Some of the better accounts can be found at http://www.getdebit.com/prepaid-debit-cards/

By: Saint of Bad Credit

Saint of Bad Credit — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 15:31:48 +0000

Pretty hard to say man….but I do believe alot of people who have credit cards don’t actually know how to use them properly. The problem being that I think noone ever gave them any education about finances and how compound interest can make things very hard fif they don’t settle balances swiftly.