Have you heard? “Cash is the new charge”.

It’s always great identifying more ways to fund digital accounts using cash. In this case, locally means Singapore and you can purchase a Cherry Credits prepaid card at 7-11 then shop at their Cherry De Mall and load your online accounts. It’s very convenient so let’s hope and look for this service to spread globally soon.

What are Cherry Credits?

Cherry Credits are prepaid internet units of credit users can buy with cash at specified locations in Singapore. The credits come loaded onto a scratch off plastic card so the purchaser buys a card, scratches and spends the funds online where accepted.

Who accepts them?

Right now, MMORPGs, MMOGs, social networks and others. (Trickster Online, Lineage II, 9Dragons, 2Moons, BOTS!!, Toribash, Stwack, Big 2.5, Match It, Checkmate, MojiKan, Habbo, WhoLivesNearYou, GG Game)

“Cherry Credits Physical Scratch Cards, Cherry Credits empowers Merchants and Consumers with a global transaction alternative to the dominant use of Credit Cards.”

How Does It Work?

1. Login to Cherry Exchange.
2. Click on ‘Cherry De Mall’ and select ‘Trickster Online’[merchant].
3. Select desired denomination of Trickster Points to purchase.
4. Enter your Security PIN to confirm choice.
5. Check your Cherry Messenger for Trickster e-PINs.
6. Log on to [merchant's]Trickster Online’s official website and visit ‘RECHARGE’ section found right of the page.
7. Login to your account and select “Recharge with Prepaid Card” found at bottom of the page.
8. Select Cherry Credits, enter Trickster e-PIN and password to redeem Points instantly!

Need more info? Visit their web site or click here for store locations across Singapore.

Business.Maktoob.com has just announced that cashU, which is now the largest Internet payment system in the Middle East and Africa, has partnered with OneCard a multi-function prepaid card that offers users access to a host of prepaid services in the Saudi market.

Users can now add funds to their cashU account using OneCard, which has over 8,000 retail outlets in Saudi Arabia. Presently, just 5% of Saudi residents hold credit cards. This makes cashU’s prepaid card model essential for ISPs, GSM, telephone, SMS, Stock trading, premium subscriptions and paid content from the Web.

“OneCard is essential for e-commerce websites and premium subscription in this region, as the Saudi market has a large percentage of internet savvy users who are morally opposed to usury, and therefore, credit cards.” says Muhannad Ebwini, GM of OneCard. “OneCard offers convenience, ease of use and zero risk. The customer just buys OneCard prepaid card and fills up his account on the OneCard website to buy from numerous exclusive web services and subscriptions, as well as any other prepaid card of any denomination available in the Saudi market.” He added.

cashU was launched by Maktoob in mid 2002. This is a very successful prepaid Internet payment solution that can be used to purchase products and services anywhere on the Internet safely and anonymously. cashU is currently available in 20 countries around the globe.

cashU addresses the need for an internet payment solution, in markets and demographics where credit cards are not very prevalent. cashU’s prepaid card system enables minors to access and purchase online products and services anywhere on the Internet safely and without worries.

Gold, Silver, and Platinum OneCard account holders can now easily add funds to their cashU accounts. This connection will allow account holders the option to make payments on cashU’s international merchant base. While OneCard’s merchant base specialises in localised services such as ISPs and telephony cards, cashU can be used to buy online gaming subscriptions, fund Webmoney accounts, VoIP services, auction and e-market sites like Souq.com and Amazon.com.

“Saudi Arabia is a key growth market, and OneCard offered us very competitive prices, which are just as good as some of our biggest resellers in the region.” says Martin Waldenstrom, General Manager of cashU.com. “OneCard’s distribution network extends to all the major cities and towns of Saudi Arabia, areas where cashU had a minimal presence.” He added.

While there is no recognized industry push for this type of card evolution, at least one proud individual in a manic burst of thinking, has published his 11 page ’spec’ on how to change the prepaid card industry.

It is entitled - Gift Cards, Post-Pay Style aka The End of Trading Money for Nothing - As I commented on his web, “It took a lot of guts to post this…”

“Tie a credit card or checking account to the gift-card, and only charge the account when your friend actually spends the card. Gift cards now become FREE, until they’re actually spent. It’s the American way: why pay now when you can pay later, with no finance charges to boot?”

Download the RTF

“Feed the live Tuna mayonnaise” the world needs idea-men and free thinkers.

This sums it up,

“…there is no supply chain, product chain or merchandise management issue there. It is just cash and digital cash. There’s money to be made in money.”* bbcamerican.blogspot.com

Wal-Mart is the world’s largest retailer. It is also the largest corporation and private employer in the United States. Everyone walking into a Wal-Mart store and every shopper that buys merchandise will now be offered the store chain’s new prepaid card solution. That translates into a LOT of new potential card holders and deposits. This card is not only being heavily marketed in stores but it is also available from the Internet.

“We got these new Wal-Mart MoneyCards at our store this weekend — and they’re insidious. They parked a huge display at the main door — immediately as you enter the store by Register 1 — and small displays in front of every Customer Service register.” * bbcamerican.blogspot.com

This Card is issued by GE Money Bank, pursuant to license from Visa U.S.A., Inc. Card services provided from Green Dot Corporation.

Recently declined for a banking license in the US, Wal-Mart is looking to expand their financial operations beyond no fee ATMs and check cashing. Prepaid cards are a perfect way to capture customer and non-customer deposits. Especially the ‘low end’ of the market, the immigrants…..the unbankable crowd, better known as the Wal-Mart shopper.

Back in early 2005, Wal-Mart was cornered with an application to open a so-called ‘industrial bank’ in of all places Utah. But after much uproar the application was withdrawn. Now, here they are hammering their daily customers for pay check deposits and ATM transactions.

Loading their card can be done in stores using cash or your paycheck. The card is basically identical to the other Green Dots products you may find hanging on a rack in just about any convenient store or grocery in the States. However, considering Wal-Mart’s retail marketing advantage…..their fees are pretty hefty. Paycheck loading will cost you $3.00 per load and cash loads are $4.64 each, but that’s not the half of it, visit the ATM with this card and the card fee is $1.95 per use. You might think Wal-Mart, the largest employer in America, could shrink their card fees down to a nominal amount unlike every other prepaid card thief issuer in the US.

With the offering and marketing of this card, there is no doubt that Wal-Mart is reaching out for customer’s non bank deposits.

“Also, and this is what customers find the most annoying - there is a prompt after cashing EVERY paycheck - “Would you like to load your check onto a Wal-Mart Moneycard?” That’s right - every cashed paycheck. Every time. All day I had to keep telling people “Do you want a MoneyCard? Then hit NO.” * bbcamerican.blogspot.com

There was a big movement 3-4 years back to get local Wal-Marts to happily accept the very Libertarian Silver Liberty Dollars but that faded after an extraordinary effort to penetrate the hard shell of the corporate giant. It is obvious now with the issuing of this card and Wal-Mart’s sneaky attempt at a US banking license the idea of providing value behind their word is already half way down that slippery slope.

Our blogger friends over at Behind The Counter say it best. ….if it looks like a bank, walks like a bank, and quacks like a bank, is it a bank? With the Wal-Mart, you never know.

(Note to readers, I don’t shop at Wal-Mart, not even the ones near by in Costa Rica and Mexico.)

This new account feature makes cashU one of the first Internet payment services in the world to add parental controls for online shopping.

In case you are not familiar with cashU, their business is largely based in the Middle East and Africa. CashU markets prepaid cards in roughly 20 countries throughout the Middle East and Africa. CashU prepaid cards have been selling since July of 2002.

These are prepaid cards which anyone can purchase using cash. Consequently, this product allows minors and anyone else who buys one to securely and anonymously shop online. Similar products are sold in the United States but require a legal US address for proper registration and use.

cashU prepaid cards offer payment solutions to my favorite online crowd (the ‘unbankable’) and these cards are heavily marketed in places around the globe where credit cards are not popular. I’m a big fan of any company which makes online shopping and spending available to those without a bank account or wallet full of plastic.

The company’s largest group of users is between the ages 15-30. Naturally, with this demographic, their most aggressive online spending occurs at gaming web sites and MMORPGs. Purchasing game merchandise in Second Life or World of Warcraft is a very popular way to drain a cashU prepaid card.

Fortunately for parents, when a son or daughter uses a cashU card, their online spending is limited to the value on the card and the prepaid cards do not expose any of the users private financial data like his bank account information. This card is widely popular with gamers in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Like many successful online products marketing to this age group, their growth in sales and online use has been mainly fueled by word of mouth.

The shopping block or filtering process for parents, takes just a few minutes. It allows the parent units to effectively control the amount spent online and essentially where their son or daughter is spending those hard earned bucks. At the same time cashU cards offer the opportunity for many Internet users to spend online who may not have otherwise had the ability to obtain a credit card.

prepaid cards

2/21/2007 - Its official, the wildly popular Graphcard will be back online offering virtual prepaid credit cards in about 72 hrs. They have signed an agreement with a new prepaid card provider and are in the process of updating their web. The transition should take another 2 days so look for sales to begin early next week.

I’m am a big fan and supporter of online payment methods which allow those people without a credit card to shop and spend online.

Graphcard is this kind of platform. Its free to join and they offer multiple account payment methods (including e-gold). To assist overseas shoppers, they were even offering postal addresses in the US.

Graphcard is targeting a very large global market of Internet users who don’t have a credit card. Their e-commerce platform was originally developed to enable local and remote Internet users without cards to equally participate in global e-commerce.

Targeting the under served countries of the world, Graphcard is surely to experience more success in the coming years. If you are an Internet user without a credit card, you will want to check out Graphcard. I have enjoyed using their product very much over the last few year.

Here is the latest news from BestGoldCard as of Tuesday January 30th, 2007: (1) Refunds via cheque. For those cardholders who have a BGC debit card issued by “NYCCU” and wish to be issued a refund of their card balance via ** CHEQUE ** please email BGC Support at:

help@bestgoldcard.com

for further instructions. Said refund would be supplied directly by the network. The refund cheque would be denominated in USD and would come from Canada. It would be sent to your official address of record with BGC and only to that address. Please note that it is impossible to change your postal address of record. Any request to have your address changed will be ignored. Unfortunately it is unclear how long it would take for such a cheque to be issued and sent.

(2) Refunds via your DGC. BGC is continuing to push for the ability for our cardholders to refund their card balance through BGC via their DGC account (e-gold(TM) or 1MDC(TM)). We should have more news about this possibility next week.

(3) New cards. BGC considered launching a new card that would function on the STAR network. Though these cards work well enough we didn’t ultimately feel it was a good fit for BGC or our customers. The STAR network is considerably smaller than alternate networks (particularly internationally) and generally has much higher fees. For these reasons we have rejected the STAR card for our purposes.

(4) New cards — again. BGC is pleased to announce that we have new cards in the works. It is possible that these new cards will be available for sale as early as next week. We should have a more definitive date shortly and will make an announcement regarding the cards and their availability ASAP.

Thank you for choosing BestGoldCard,

BestGoldCard Support

http://www.bestgoldcard.com/

Prepaid debit cards are a very popular method for digital money users to exchange their digital currency into green cash. In case you need cash right away, debit cards are cheap and handy to have around. Cards can be reloaded, so anyone can own one or two cards and continually use them to access the value in their digital currency accounts.

During the past 4-5 years, there have been many cards, many companies and many problems. The two biggest problems, were the changing laws in the US and the appearances of so many different small companies & cards.

First, the big changes in US law occurred with the passing of the Patriot Act. In the United States, prepaid debit cards or any financial product a terrorist could use to move money — became much more restrictive to issue and own.

Second, so many dozens of small companies were issuing prepaid debit cards with different names, rates & terms that no one company offered consistent service.

A new card issue may have been great when it first came out and then just a few months later disappeared along with your balance. Some companies started out doing sincere excellent business and the scammers drove them out of business with fraudulent or illegal deposits. Other operators closed because of inexperience or the authorities.

Several smaller companies just offered really bad options, no customer service, no email responses and the time from loading to having cash available on the card was anywhere between 1 hour and 1 week. It really was a ‘coin toss’ to see if you could find a new card about every few months. Some of the time it was not the operators fault, but we all know that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

In just the past several years, one financial institution had corrected both of these problems and just about about everyone using a digital currency debit card has some company’s branded version of their cards. (myself included) The company brands included:

• BestGoldCard
• IGEcard
• IMTcard
• Agronex jCard
• Bluebanking
• GoldtoCard
• ROBOXchange
• gCard
• Evergreen Cards
• and probably some more we just missed here…

Great Card & No Problems

North York Credit Union, the issuing institution, is located in Canada so their cards could be issued worldwide and were not regulated under any new rules. Canada is considered “offshore” in the US. Also, new cards offered a digital currency loading solution to resellers which integrated digital currency into the instant card loading process. In other words, the moment you sold your e-gold or other digital currency the balance (minus fees) would instantly appear on your ATM card. No more waiting!

The card company also incorporated ACH payments into their loading. If you are using any one of several particular card brands (each offers different services) you could receive payments from PayPal, Adwords and other ACH type online systems. These are very handy cards to have and this issue was like a real card miracle.

Later the BestGoldCard added icing to the cake, by integrating their cards directly into the 1MDC platform so all 1MDC users can load funds directly from their account or from any e-gold account. BestGoldCard also automatically accepts and exchanges Pecunix, so the issuance of their card really opened a floodgate of options for digital currency users. They quickly became a leader in the industry. Financial backing, experience, customer service, BGC has it all.

Additionally, ROBOXchange integrated Webmoney into their instant loading card.(well done) All of these companies provide good customer service and it seemed, for a few years at least, the debit card industry was shaping up. Well, as of yesterday, all of these North York Credit Union cards are dead.

Users must also understand, it is through no fault of the brand companies, this is just a case of very bad luck with the platform.

What does the future hold?

New cards of course. Knowing the history of a changing industry, experienced and well financed operators have been expecting ’some’ type of problems down the road and rest assured they already have replacement card plans in action. Rumor has it that BestGoldCard has been working for some months now on a backup card and IGEcard seems to be about 30 days away from a replacement. It is a sure bet that GoldtoCard and gCard also are working closely with issuers to remedy the problem. So stay tuned, it appears help is ‘in the cards’.

Let us hope there are will be more cards on the way in just a few weeks or sooner.

**Please note that there are NO problems with North York Credit Union, the hick-up came from an associated company by the name of CU-Connect and only the card platform was affected. This is the part of the card network which delivers the switching and transaction processing service through the Interac / Cirrus / Maestro networks for credit union. It absolutely — has nothing to do with North York Community Credit Union itself where the customer funds are held safe and sound.

WebMoney is a well known and popular online digital currency. WebMoney Transfer enables worldwide users to conduct secure online transactions in real time. The transactions are not reversible so there is no chargeback risk to merchants. The company has well over a million users at this time.

It is free to set up as many accounts as you like. Simply download their free software package and you can begin creating accounts and transacting business in WebMoney. The WM software and the web sites are available in both English and Russian. Online currency units are also available in Russian Roubles and USD. No ID is required to open an account.

If you take a close look at WebMoney, this currency provides a very useful online financial service for a large population of users who may not have bank accounts or credit cards. Using Webmoney these people are able to easily and locally convert cash into digital currency then pay bills online, shop or transfer funds to others worldwide at an extremely low fee. No bank account verification or transfers and no credit rating is required, just a quick cash conversion to digital currency.

WebMoney is a digital currency solution which, because of its users, heavily focuses on a particular geographic region. The retail services offers by the currency vendors are filling a great need. A similar situation can now be found in the United States as financial institutions scramble to create products for the massive population of Spanish speaking unbankable immigrants from Mexico, Centeral and South America. The SiGo MasterCard is a great example. There is a recent article in the NYTimes that further explains this point. Because the demand exists for a cash to digital exchange, companies in the US are now seeing this as a great opportunity to expand their client base. Financial companies are creating products like prepaid Mastercards and catering to non English speaking customers.

WebMoney Transfer has a verification system which any account holder can use. This system asks that the user provide basic identification and information about himself. That user is then ‘verified’ and known to other users. PayPal has a very similar policy, however, WebMoney does not require a user to become verified. A WebMoney account can be used instantly after opening. Each user has a WebMoney passport. This passport is a digital certificate based on personal data provided by a WebMoney member.

WebMoney is sold through an independent network of agents mainly located in Russia and the Ukraine. However, there are WebMoney agents to facilitate a currency exchange in over 2500 cities in 40 countries around the world including the US & Canada. Much like e-gold, these agents maintain a digital inventory of WebMoney which they can exchange to retail clients for cash, bank wires, Western Union and a long list of assorted other payment methods. Agents can set their own fees for each transaction and anyone can become an agent.

One of the most convenient features of WebMoney is the prepaid WM card. WebMoney is available on a prepaid card. Users can purchase these cards locally using cash, take them home and fund their account instantly. A network of vending machines in Russia also distributes these cards making WebMoney even more available and easy to purchase.

The important information to know about WebMoney is that the digital currency is very integrated into the everyday physical brick and mortar business, in that part of the world. Thanks to businesses like ROBOXchange, you can pay everyday bills and buy important items using WebMoney. Person’s living in Russia, Ukraine and the surrounding areas can pay their local phone bills, cell phone bills, digital TV bill, local Internet service provider and even purchase virtual gaming currency using WebMoney. The digital currency is integrated into local daily life due to the wide use of cash and lack of adequate banking or credit facilities.

Services such as ROBOX Cash Register, which is similar to Gold-Cart, are the equivaltant to a digital currency merchant account. These services allow an online seller’s web site to accept a variety of digital currency types from the customer at checkout and then automatically converts their payment into one currency which the seller has previously requested. Just like a merchant accepting Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Discover, online checks, ACH, etc. and settlement is then made to the merchant - ROBOX Cash Register accepts over two dozen different currency types (mostly local to that region).

WebMoney is also easily converted into other digital currencies including e-gold, Pecunix, e-Bullion, Yandex, imoney, MoneyMail, INOCard, RuPay, InterBill RUR & UkrMoney (mostly local Russian money). The point here being….if you have Webmoney and you need to pay an online bill in another digital currency, there are many agents who will exchange your WM for the currency of your choice. The value of using WebMoney extends way beyond their network of WM retailers. As a digital currency, WebMoney can be easily converted into another digital currency anytime. This is simply not possible with PayPal or everyday online banking. There is an extensive network of reliable web sites that will even automatically convert WebMoney into another digital currency for a small fee. The transaction is instant and a majority of these webs are fully automated. It is a very convenient service.

The ‘terms of use’ allow WebMoney to be used at online casinos and sports books plus adult websites. Finally, WebMoney, unlike PayPal is never “hacked”. You will never get a WM phishing email. Since users must download the secure WM software and extensive security is used on both ends of the online transaction, WebMoney has a great reputation as a secure digital currency. There are also many ATM debit cards that accept WebMoney making it very liquid in just about any country around the globe.