Prepaid Visa Electron

nig3d

Hi

I'd like to have a prepaid visa electron in sterling, the cheapest one. I had a look around, but it seems that visa electron disappeared from the UK. Any clue? Thank you!

izools

Is this perhaps to save the flight booking fee?

tightarsey

The whole Visa Electron 'Scam' issue is currently a mess, and damaging the Visa Brand. Visa International should be enforcing the rules, along with UK Card Payment Services.

Visa Electron is not being discontinued by Visa, as several UK Banks will have you believe. The Visa Electron payment method is also used in many European Countries. I've spoken to Visa International in detail on this issue and they made it very clear the brand is here to stay.

Several Banks have switched the 'backend/system' card processing of the Visa Electron card to appear as Visa Debit Cards by reassigning the 'bin type' (first 4 digits of the card)

Halifax still issue a genuine Visa Electron card (with a Visa Electron logo), which is still processed as Visa Electron.

Cooperative Bank Visa Electron cards / Smile Visa Electron cards (with a Visa Electron logo) are now processed as Visa Debit, so even Customers that have such a card, are charged airline fees (£18 in the case of flybe), even when they select Visa Electron Payment, when they shouldn't be charged a fee at all, and nothing anyone can do about it.

Cooperative generates a large part of their profits from their travel business 'Cooperative Travel' so its in their interest to remove payment methods which don't attract a fee.
Interesting how Thomas Cook who agreed a merger with Cooperative, now charge a debit card fee of £10 per booking.

nig3d

Yes, it's to save the flight fees.
I'm Italian and in Italy visa electron is still the main form of prepaid credit card. I have 2 Italian visa electron, but paying in Euro is not very a sensible thing to do.

izools

You should apply for the following account:

http://www.halifax.co.uk/bankaccounts/other-bank-accounts/easycash/

You get a Visa Electron card, and there are no usage or loading fees because it's just a bank account - so massive savings over paying prepaid card use fees.

Also because it is a basic account they don't care what your credit history is like, if you don't have any UK credit history, if it's bad, etc, so long as you can prove your ID :beer:

nig3d

it says visa debit electron though. Are you sure it's the same thing?

FUNKYDADDIO

nig3d wrote: »

it says visa debit electron though. Are you sure it's the same thing?

Hi, if you are talking about the halifax one I would be really keen to hear if you got an answer as Im going to be booking some flights soon... Thanks

izools

Halifax Easycash account comes with a VISA ELECTRON card.

Of course they term it a debit card - that's what it is! A VISA Electron debit card that won't incur the fee any other card type would :beer: