Choosing where to put your money is almost as difficult as deciding how to spend it. You have more options than ever before, so where should you park your cash? One option to consider is a prepaid Visa® or prepaid Mastercard® card. Below we discuss why you might find them more attractive than other banking options.
According to a 2014 report from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, 40 percent of all consumer transactions is conducted with cash, making it the most commonly-used financial instrument (followed by debit cards at 25 percent and credit cards at 17 percent).
Despite their explosive popularity of late, prepaid debit cards — and the benefits that come with them — are still unfamiliar to a wide swath of the American public.
American consumers loaded approximately $65 billion onto reloadable, prepaid debit cards in 2012—an amount expected to grow by 42% each year.
It was the fees that finally drove Joel Lawton away from his traditional bank account.
A Dallas area mortgage loan officer, Lawton’s income is entirely commission-based, meaning it can vary greatly from month to month and week to week. He makes a good income—around $50,000 total in most years—but the way that most banks determine their fees and billing schedules never really worked for his personal financial situation.
