Reloadable Prepaid Card

Unloading Prepaid Card – Walmart MoneyCard by Green Dot

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I had my Walmart MoneyCard Preferred shut down by Green Dot because they don’t like the way I used it. I can’t reload or pay bills anymore. All I can do is spend the remaining balance. Just before the shut-down, I set up bill pays that could unload almost all the balance. However, they were canceled. So, I need to unload over $2500 by purchasing.

Unloading Visa or MasterCard prepaid cards is easy. Since they have the feature of debit card, you can use at ATM and get cash back at register. But the fastest way to unload is reload BlueBird or Serve with them.

unloading walmart moneycardYou can reload up to $1000 per day and choose any amount (minimum $20.) I went to Walmart twice and made two reloads to finish the Walmart MoneyCard. There is a transfer to Chime card between two reloads. At that time, I found a lot of new Chime offers. I reload Chime card so I can redeem new offers. Chime doesn’t charge a reload fee. As long as I know, the debit card that Chime charges a reload fee is PayPal Business Debit card. I have tested all other debit cards I have (Mango, PayPal Prepaid, Walmart MoneyCard, and Chase,) and none of them are charged a reload fee. (see details here.)

Anyway, my Walmart MoneyCard is completely dead now. It has no money in it, and it can’t be added any money, either. The last transaction (reloading my Serve card at Walmart) is like a funeral for Walmart MoneyCard. So, I chose Walmart for its funeral as a courtesy.

Lots of New Chime Offers! Amazon/Sears/Lowe’s/CVS

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My Chime app on my cell phone had frozen after I received a notification. I opened the app, but the screen was all blank. So I logged in from PC to see what was new. Then I  found a lot of new offers. (Click here to see details of Chime card)

chime offers amazon sears lowes cvs etc

The offers of Amazon, Sears, Lowe’s, and CVS are redeemed by purchasing gift cards. And Amazon’s offer has no minimum purchase requirements. No matter how much you spend, you will receive Chime credit up to $5. If you spend $3 today and $10 tomorrow, you will get back $3 today and $2 tomorrow. But I think this offer is too good to be available for a long time. So, it is better to redeem now by purchasing “Amazon.com Gift Cards – E-mail Delivery.” You can choose an amount between $0.50 and $2000 in any increments. Just buy $5 e-gift card now otherwise the offer may be gone tomorrow.

chime offer amazon

As for Chime app on my cell phone, it works fine after I cleared data and re-entered email address and password. I guess that there are too many new offers for the app to handle.

I may be going to buy Amazon GCs at Sears, Lowe’s and CVS, too. Currently, there are 4th quarter of Chase Freedom, Citi divinded, and Discover credit cards (5% cash back.) Plus, Discover offers another 5% cash back in October and November. I’m very busy to buy a lot of GCs now!

 

Green Dot Shut Down my Walmart Money Card Preferred

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I have Walmart MoneyCard Preferred for several months, but recently it has been shut down. It happened all of a sudden.

I received the following email one morning.

Important Update About Your Walmart MoneyCard

Dear
We have temporarily turned off your card and have an important update regarding your card.

What you need to do:
Call us immediately at the number on the back of your card
Have your card number ready
Choose Option 3 (For Support)
We look forward to speaking with you.

Thanks,
Walmart MoneyCard Customer Service

The day before, I set up three bill-pays for my credit cards. And I had reloaded $2400 in the previous week. I though they didn’t like the way of using the card and would give me a warning over the phone. However, it wasn’t a warning, but a shut-down.

I called the number on the back of the card and followed the instructions of automated voices. I reached another automated voice message and knew that they closed my card. I can use the remaining balance by purchasing, but can’t reload anymore. I can’t pay bills, either. The pending bill pays I set up the day before was canceled.

walmart moneycard shut down

Although the email says, “We look forward to speaking with you,” I never spoke with human from the beginning to the end. The message also said, “You are no longer able to open a new card with us.” I don’t know if “a new card” means only Walmart MoneyCard or includes all Green Dot prepaid cards, such as GoBank. GoBank is the same type of prepaid card (Visa or MasterCard prepaid debit card which is reloadable with gift cards at Walmart for free.) I plan to apply for it, but not so soon.

I learned a lesson. As a rumor says, Green Dot are very happy to shut down their customer’s accounts without giving a single warning. If I get approved GoBank card, I will use the card mainly for a regular purchase. Since it is also a debit card, I can unload more and faster by getting cash back at registers. You can get cash back at self-cashier, too. For example, the maximum amount for cash back at self-cashiers of:

  • Pathmark – $50
  • Stop and Shop – $80
  • CVS – $40
  • Walmart – $100

By using self-cashiers, you don’t feel awkward when you ask a large amount of cash back with a small purchase.

And I won’t reload more than $1000 per week. I reloaded $2400 to my Walmart MoneyCard in the same week and used almost all of it by paying bills the following week. I guess this series of transactions had pulled the trigger of shut-down. Was the trigger pulled by a human? Or there may be the system that is fully automated (from pulling the trigger, shutting down the card, sending email, setting up answering machine.)

For those who have or plan to have Green Dot prepaid cards for manufactured spending, be careful how to use it. Reload moderately. If it has bill pay feature, use it moderately. You can unload the cards mainly by purchases with cash back at registers.

Changes took effect on Chime Card on Oct 8th

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As all cardholders of both of Chime and PayPal Business Debit (PPBD) card expected, Chime started charging 3% fee for loading Chime card with PPBD card. An email that Chime sent last month says:

“Some” debit card transfers may also incur a fee of up to 3% that will be assessed to yourChime Card account. This will not affect a majority of bank issued debit cards and we will exclude fees on debit cards from “major banks” including; Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, U.S. Bank, Comerica Bank, and USAA.

It turns out that PPBD is one of “Some” debit cards incurred a fee, but I wonder what are “Some” other cards they charge a fee.

chime no fee with debit card transterPPBD is issued by The Bancorp Bank, which is also the issuer of Chime. And I have another card issued by the same bank, PayPal Prepaid MasterCard. I added this card to Chime account and found out that they don’t charge a fee.

Next, I added Mango Money card. And there is no fee. Mango is issued by First Bank & Trust. I believe this isn’t a major bank. I actually added money with two cards and made sure that they didn’t charge a fee.

Is there other card they charge a fee? I guess not (at least not so many.) It seems that purpose of this change is Chime needed to stop manufacture spending with PPBD and its own card. PPBD offers 1% cash back. Every load (add money to Chime with PPBD) is eligible for 1% cash back. If you set PayPal Extras MasterCard (credit card) as back up funding source of PPBD, you can also earn 1X reward points from credit card, which is equivalent to 0.83% cash back. That is why a fee is 3%. (I guess.)

chime reload with debit cardYou can link up to three debit cards. I removed PPBD and linked Walmart Money Card issued by Green Dot Bank. And there is no fee, either.

You won’t be able to use Chime for manufacture spending, but adding money with debit card online is still useful. Mango Money and PayPal Prepaid card have a savings account. I want to withdraw the interest earned every month because they offer lower APY to deposit exceeded $5000. (Read “Mango Money Card Reviews” and “PayPal Prepaid Reviews” for more details.) I don’t have to take the cards out of a drawer to unload the cards. It will be all done in a minute without leaving home.

The rule of a maintenance fee of $5.00 hasn’t changed. It’s charged ONLY AFTER 180 consecutive days of no purchases, withdrawals, or deposits on your account. Chime offers are less frequently updated than before, but I found it still beneficial. So, I will keep the card, check and redeem Chime offers from time to time.

Get $30 or $50 PayPal Credit by Using PayPal Business Debit MasterCard

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paypal business debit card offerToday, I received an email. It is about an offer for PayPal Business Debit MasterCard users. Every signature purchases made between now and November 15th:

  • Earn a $30 PayPal account credit for signature purchases totaling $3,000 or more
  • Earn a $50 PayPal account credit for signature purchases totaling $5,000 or more

Purchases have to be made with a signature, which is also necessary to earn a regular 1% cash back. Purchases with using PIN and cash withdrawals are not counted as a qualified purchase for this offer.

My regular spending

I exclusively use PayPal Business Debit MasterCard for reloading American Express Serve and Chime prepaid card. For AmEx Serve, the limit is $1000 per month. I have already loaded Serve this month. So, I will be able to load $1000 each in Oct and Nov, totaling $2000. For Chime prepaid card, I can load $100 per day until Oct 8th and $200 after Oct 8th. However, after Oct 8th, Chime will start charging a fee for loading the card with some debit cards. PayPal Business Debit MasterCard is probably one of the debit cards that Chime will charge a fee. If so, I’m not going to use PayPal debit card for loading Chime card. I have already loaded today. So, I can load Chime card with PayPal debit card for 15 times (days), totaling $1500. By the date the offer ends, the total of purchases made with my regular spending would be $3500. It qualifies for $30 credit!

Should I do extra work for $50 credit?

You can take either one of $30 or $50 credit, not both of them. And they are both 1% cash back. There is no bonus even if you spend more ($5000). So, it is not necessary to do extra spend to get $50 credit. However, I will have spent $3500 until the offer ends for sure, and it is only $1500 short for $50 credit. So I will probably use PayPal debit card somewhere else to get $50 credit. I should be careful with using the card as Credit, not Debit when I use at stores.

American Express Serve $25 Bonus offer & $10 Good Faith Credit

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serve get 25 back aug 15 sep 13I received two credits from Serve recently. One is $25, and the other is $10. As for $25, a short description says, “Thanks for Using Your Card.” And here is an email I received earlier. I needed to make 5 transactions of $10 or more to receive the credit. I started using my Serve card on Aug 27th. I believed that was the transaction#1. And I would need 4 more transactions, and I was thinking where to use. But two days later, somehow I already received the $25-credit. I check my transactions since Aug 16th. I made six bill pays and 2 regular purchases. One of them is the purchase of gift cards at Bed Bath and Beyond. The purchase was for Amex Offer “$5 back on $25 or more purchase.” I wasn’t sure if this transaction was eligible for another offer. So I didn’t count as one of five transactions for the new offer. However, the credit was posted, that means I didn’t have to do anything for the new offer. It seems that only regular bill pays meet the requirements to receive the credit.

serve credit 25 10

The other credit is $10 and was posted on Aug 27th. It is described as Good Faith Credit. I had no idea what this credit is for until I received this email today.

At American Express, we are committed to providing you with the best American Express Serve® Account experience possible. We recently fell short on this commitment and experienced an error related to an offer you added to your Serve card. We’d like to take this opportunity to tell you more about this error and how we’ve resolved it.

We offered you a one-time $10 statement credit when you used your enrolled Card to spend a total of $200 or more on American Express Gift Cards. Although you were able to enroll in this offer, your American Express Gift Card order was declined, and you were not able to receive the $10 credit.

To correct this error, we have issued a $10 statement credit to your American Express Serve Account. We would like to offer our sincere apology that you were unable to redeem the offer.

If you have any questions, please call us at 1‑800‑954‑0559 to speak to an American Express Serve Customer Care Professional.

We truly value your membership and will continue working to ensure you have a positive American Express Serve Account experience.

Thanks,

The American Express Serve Team

I remember this. There was Amex Offer, but you couldn’t redeem. I actually synced the offer and tried to make a purchase of AmEx GC. The transaction was declined because they don’t take prepaid or gift cards as payment. (see details here) No big deal, I didn’t care much about it, but American Express took it seriously and resolved generously. American Express issues lots of useful offers and takes good care of their customers.

Chime Card Reviews

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chime cardChime Card is Reloadable Prepaid Debit Card that has a logo of Visa on it. Since it is a debit card, you can withdraw cash at ATM and get cash back with a purchase where available. But, the main feature of the card is that you can earn Instant Cash Back when you make qualifying purchases with the card.

Chime Offer

There are two types of rewards you can earn with Chime card, Earned Credit and Store Credit. Earned Credit is just like Amex Offer. Spend a certain amount at certain store and you will get certain amount credit. This type of offers looks like a left picture. One thing that is different from Amex Offer is you don’t need to sync with offers. As long as you use the card for a purchase that costs more than a requirement, you will get the credit. Store Credit has no minimum requirement and looks like a right picture. No matter how much you spend you will earn the credit. If you spend less than the amount they offer, you will receive the same amount of credit as you spend. The remaining balance of credit is kept for the next purchase.

chime offer earn creditchime offer store credit

How to Add Money

There are three ways to add money to Chime card.

  • Debit Card – $100 $200 per day
  • Bank Transfer – $200 per day
  • Direct Deposit

None of them is charged a fee. Some debit cards are charged up to 3% as a reload fee. Click here to see more details about charges. If you have a reward/point earning debit card, use it. You can do it online or with a mobile app. Money is available in no time. For example, PayPal Business Debit MasterCard offers 1% cash back for every purchase. Transferring money to Chime account is treated as a purchase in PayPal statement. So, you can earn 1% cash back every time you add money to the card.

A limit of $100 per day seems a little, but all Chime offers are mostly less than $50 (e.g., spend $35, get $5). And I have never seen an offer more than $100. When you find a good offer and don’t have enough money in the card. No problem. You can use the internet or smartphone to add money in a minute.

Fees

They charge a fee for the following transactions

  • Domestic Cash Withdrawal Fee: $2.50 per transaction
  • ATM Balance Inquiry Fee: $0.50 per transaction
  • Account Maintenance Fee: $5.00 per month ONLY AFTER 180 consecutive days of no purchases, withdrawals, or deposits on your account.
  • International Transaction Fee: 3% of the total purchase amount
  • International Cash Withdrawal Fee*: $2.50 + 3% of the total withdrawal amount
  • Check Refund Fee: $5.00 per check issued
  • Express Card Replacement Fee: $25.00 per card issued

As long as you use the card for redeeming Chime offers, you won’t get charged any fees. $5 for maintenance fee is avoidable. Any transaction you made waives the fee for 180 days. It is hard to get charged!

What Else?

On the back of the card, at the bottom, it says:

This card is issued by The Bancorp Bank pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A Inc.

It reminds me of something. The Bancorp Bank also issues Visa gift cards. Vanilla, OneVanilla, and Target Visa gift cards are all issued by the same bank. Since Walmart updated POS system, these gift cards can’t be used for reloading American Express BlueBird, Serve, or other reloadable prepaid cards (see details here.) Apparently, the problem is that these gift cards can’t be registered (or attached your name and billing address) because of their feature. However, Chime card is personalized. Your name and address are surely attached to the card so you can make online orders. And your name is also on the card. There is nothing shady to use the card for reloading BlueBird/Serve at Walmart.

So, I went to Walmart Kiosk and added $100 to my Serve card with Chime card. The transaction went through, and here is how it looks like in Chime history.

walmart swipe reload with chime card

This is great! When I add money to Chime with PayPal debit card, I got 1% cash back from PayPal. But you can bring money back to PayPal through Serve and Bank account. You can load Serve or Bluebird with PayPal debit card directly, in the same way, at Walmart, but this transaction is a PIN-used purchase which PayPal doesn’t offer 1% cash back.

I also shopped at grocery stores. I used self-checkout cashiers and got $50 (Pathmark) and $80 (Stop and Shop) cash back. ($50 and $80 are the maximum amounts for cash back allowed by self-checkout cashiers)

Aside from Chime Offer, the card can also be used for manufactured spending if you have a point/reward earning debit card. I wrote “there is nothing shady” earlier, but I think you should do these kinds of things moderately. Check all Chime Offers every week and redeem them from time to time, and reload BlueBird/Serve between these transactions.The history of Chime card shouldn’t be only Walmart and Debit Card Transfer.

Summery

Chime Offer is very good for money savings. You can see new offers every week. Each offer has a limited number, but it doesn’t fly away so quickly at least for now. As long as you use the card for redeeming Chime Offers, you won’t get charged any fee if you make any transaction within 180 days. If you add money to the card with point/reward earning debit cards, you can boost up the earning by reloading BlueBird/Serve or get cash back at registers.

You can only apply the card online. Please click here to get started.

Walmart MoneyCard Reviews

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Walmart MoneyCard is reloadable prepaid card that has Visa or MasterCard logo on it. You can use it just like as a debit card. For standard debit cards issued by U.S. major banks, you have to have enough money in your bank accounts to make a purchase with the cards. For reloadable prepaid cards, you need to add money to your card’s account. (It is also like a bank account, but it exists online only.) As its name shows, Walmart MoneyCard has benefits for people who visit Walmart often.

walmart moneycard preferred no fee for reload

Load with Visa/MasterCard Gift Card

You can load the card with Visa or MasterCard gift cards at Walmart ATM. Once money is loaded, you can make a purchase in stores and online anywhere Visa or MasterCard is accepted. Depending on stores, you can get cash back at the register. By using self-checkout cashiers, you don’t have to feel awkward when you get a large amount of cash back with a small purchase. The card does a great job for liquidating Visa/MasterCard GCs.

Pay Bills

You can pay credit cards’ bills. The single transaction is limited $1000. It is not a lot, but if you have another prepaid card that have a bill-pay feature (for myself, AmEx Serve), pay bills with both cards in turn. Paying large bills and paying too frequently with the same card are red flag, anyway. Using multiple prepaid cards to pay bills helps each payment smaller and interval between payments with the same card longer.

Basic / Plus / Specialty / Preferred

which walmart moneycard is right for you

There are four versions of Walmart MoneyCard, but I recommend only one “Preferred”. That’s because “Preferred” is the only version that offers $0 reload fee at Walmart ATM. The others charge $3 for every swipe reloads.

About Fee

monthly fee waiver optionThere is no fee when you load at Walmart ATM, make a purchase in stores, get cash back with purchases and pay bills. The card costs $4 (one-time payment for a personalized card), and monthly service fee is $3. The monthly service fee is waived if you load $500 or more in a calendar month. You can withdraw money at MoneyPass ATMs with no surcharge, but ATM owner fee would be charged. So, I’ve never withdrawn money at ATMs. Just make a small purchase and get as much cash back as possible.

Summery

Walmart MoneyCard Preferred is a great tool to liquidate Visa/MasterCard gift cards. There is no fee to load with GCs at Walmart. And the money in the card can be quickly unloaded by getting cash back with a purchase at stores. And paying bills of your credit cards boosts up your manufactured spending. You can choose between Visa and MasterCard when you apply the card. You can also add a favorite photo to your personalized card for free.

The features I described in this page are only ones I usually use. This is how I use my Walmart MoneyCard. There are more ways to load and unload. For more details, please visit https://www.walmartmoneycard.com/Walmart

Please note that Green Dot is very strict and shutting down account without a notice. To avoid getting shut down, read the post “Green Dot Shut Down my Walmart Money Card Preferred.”