Debit card from American Express generates credit

Written By Admin on Minggu, 01 April 2012 | 00.35

By Julian Bittenbender


Prepaid debit cards are often criticized for not helping people build credit. Suze Orman has said she's focusing on such an arrangement with her prepaid debit card. However, American Express has beaten her to the punch, as an AmEx program will help prepaid debit customers be eligible for a charge card.

A chief criticism, according to Time magazine, of prepaid debit cards is that they do not help people build a credit rating like credit cards do, which doesn't help the unbanked build credit history. Granted, that's sort of like saying that a Kia is not the very best car to drive because it isn't an airplane. The same also holds true for normal debit cards; the card is tied to a checking account instead of a line of credit.

Super star personal finance woman Suze Orman explained that she just launched a brand new prepaid debit card called the Approved MasterCard. The card give people access to credit monitoring through TransUnion but does not impact credit at the moment, according to MSNBC. She is focusing on a program with TransUnion to help people build credit with it.

BusinessInsider explained how the new program works. It is called Make Your Move. The program gives users a six month trial on a prepaid debit card. They will qualify for an American Express card if they meet a certain list of criteria. After getting the card, a customer can build their credit.

The program is weighted toward regular customers. According to Time, it is encouraged that users load the card frequently with funds and spend regularly using it, like with a normal debit card. Consumers can deposit up to $5,000 per month via direct deposit and withdraw up to $400 per day from an ATM, up from the previous limit of $200 per week.

Prepaid debit cards, according to Daily Finance, were already a $48 billion industry as of 2009, increasing in volume to $65 billion by the end of 2010. American Express was the last of the four big card issuers, besides Discover, Visa and MasterCard, to offer a prepaid debit card, introducing its first in 2011.

American Express is also launching a prepaid card at participating Walmart stores, according to the Wall Street Journal, under the brand name "Bluebird." It is not known if those cards will be eligible for the "Make Your Move" program.




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