BREAD Card - No Longer Best Pre Paid Credit Card

firthm · 2 January 2008 at 3:22PM

Hi Everyone,

There is an article someone on MSE which describes in some details the pros, cons and options concerning prepaid credit cards.

I am an exisiting customer of www.breadcard.com who provided me with (for £10) a Maestro card which only costs 25p to topup (via BACS/S Order) and did not incur any transaction fee's or monthly fee's.

The only charge was £1.50 on cash withdrawals which seemed fair.

Today they sent out a mailshot explaining the following:

"We are very excited to announce the introduction of ‘BREAD CASHBACK SHOPPING’. This is a completely new service for BREAD Cardholders and allows you to earn an extra ‘slice’ of cash when shopping online at over 900 shops featured on www.breadcard.com You can earn up to 10% back in cash at hundreds of leading online shops, including households names such as PC World, Halfords, Boots, Woolworths, JD Sports, and M & S. The cash is rebated back onto your BREAD Card once a month for you to spend. Full terms and conditions can be found on the website along with details of all the shops. All you need to do is sign into your BREAD account on the website, and activate BREAD CASHBACK SHOPPING.

As an overall result of providing this service however, we are introducing a UK transaction fee of 2% to all card purchases to offset the costs of operating the scheme."

Although the 10% cashback is incredibly good, if you mostly want your card to spend in the real world, you are now being charged 2%.

I am incredibly disappointed in this decision and have told Bread of my dismay, I think I may just ditch the idea of a prepaid card and open up a second current account with no overdraft facility and use that as my "spending money" account instead.

Hope this helps some people avoid Bread card if they want to be free of Trans. fees!!

M

duchy · 2 January 2008 at 4:09PM

I wouldn't be happy either. I'm much happier with my cashplus-pay a flat fee each month and know exactly where I stand and no fees to deposit either.

orangemollie · 3 January 2008 at 12:27PM

Thanks for the information. I think you are right. No cashback program can compensate for the "small print" 2% transaction charges. They are clearly not making enough money, which does not surprise me, when you compare their cards with others.

I am with duchy. In my opinion, the cashplus monthly product out performs BREAD in every area (other than cash advances – which are still quite high and I would love to see them come down!!).

It also looks as if they now accept reloads at epay. I have not looked and seen if they charge for this though.

http://www.which-prepaid-card.co.uk/uk-prepaid-cards/cashplus-mastercard-gold.html

Tuxedo look as if they have the lowest cash advance fees if that is what you need.

BeaumontSurMer · 5 January 2008 at 3:40PM

firthm wrote: »

Hi Everyone,

There is an article someone on MSE which describes in some details the pros, cons and options concerning prepaid credit cards.

I am an exisiting customer of www.breadcard.com who provided me with (for £10) a Maestro card which only costs 25p to topup (via BACS/S Order) and did not incur any transaction fee's or monthly fee's.

The only charge was £1.50 on cash withdrawals which seemed fair.

Today they sent out a mailshot explaining the following:

"We are very excited to announce the introduction of ‘BREAD CASHBACK SHOPPING’. This is a completely new service for BREAD Cardholders and allows you to earn an extra ‘slice’ of cash when shopping online at over 900 shops featured on www.breadcard.com You can earn up to 10% back in cash at hundreds of leading online shops, including households names such as PC World, Halfords, Boots, Woolworths, JD Sports, and M & S. The cash is rebated back onto your BREAD Card once a month for you to spend. Full terms and conditions can be found on the website along with details of all the shops. All you need to do is sign into your BREAD account on the website, and activate BREAD CASHBACK SHOPPING.

As an overall result of providing this service however, we are introducing a UK transaction fee of 2% to all card purchases to offset the costs of operating the scheme."

Although the 10% cashback is incredibly good, if you mostly want your card to spend in the real world, you are now being charged 2%.

I am incredibly disappointed in this decision and have told Bread of my dismay, I think I may just ditch the idea of a prepaid card and open up a second current account with no overdraft facility and use that as my "spending money" account instead.

Hope this helps some people avoid Bread card if they want to be free of Trans. fees!!

M

I have complained about this Rip-Off change of Terms & Conditions to Newcaste BS who finance the card - they directed my complaint to Affinity who operate the scheme and I got a very fast rtelephone esponse from them to tell me that the £1 loading fee was just a 'special Offer'!!!! and it had been found to be uneconomic to not charge purchase fees. Beware also the 10% discount offer: Note 'UP TO'. I don't like this kind of teaser rate sales tactic and seldom fall for them - having said that I joined NPower in November! - so have wasted £30 on three cards for my student sons. I informed Which who, creditably, have put up a warning on their site as Bread (Affinity) have not informed them of the changes in T & C.

BeaumontSurMer · 5 January 2008 at 3:51PM

Hi

I have complained about this Rip-Off change of Terms & Conditions to Newcaste BS who finance the card - they directed my complaint to Affinity who operate the scheme and I got a very fast rtelephone esponse from them to tell me that the £1 loading fee was just a 'special Offer'!!!! and it had been found to be uneconomic to not charge purchase fees. Beware also the 10% discount offer: Note 'UP TO'. I don't like this kind of teaser rate sales tactic and seldom fall for them - having said that I joined NPower in November! - so have wasted £30 on three cards for my student sons. I informed Which who, creditably, have put up a warning on their site as Bread (Affinity) have not informed them of the changes in T & C.

All the best

B-sur-M

pfpf · 10 January 2008 at 5:23PM

anyone here ever used an ATM for a withdrawal?

could you say what the daily limit is?

thank you.

firthm · 11 January 2008 at 4:24PM

At least you got responses from Bread, I have had none to my original e-mail.

Will definitely look at some alternatives, and may even just open a new account somewhere with no OD.

Good Luck All....

Mike

redsquirrel80 · 11 February 2008 at 12:06PM

I might be being really daft but can anyone see where to sign up for the Cashback Shopping on the Bread site? Can't find it anywhere!

royfoord · 20 February 2008 at 11:44AM

I have been browsing forums looking for the best Prepaid Credit Card.
I've come across this post which makes me ask if the Bread prepay card is the same as the Bread cashback card. The reason I ask is because of the context of the previous posts, as well as the fact they are represented by two web sites...

www.breadcard.com and www.breadcashback.com

Are they the same card ?
What is the best alternative to the Bread card(s)?

BREAD Card - No Longer Best Pre Paid Credit Card

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