Financial Institute Cuscal has stated on their website that Bopo Prepaid VISA customers will be able access their BOPO funds. The company is working to facilitate customers wishing to withdraw funds from their BOPO accounts, BOPO cardholders are advise customer to do so promptly.
Bopo customers will have received the following letter in the mail, I just received the letter today, explaining the current situation with the Bill Express Ltd and Bopo Customers funds.
If any BOPO cardholders have any enquiries, Cuscal’s has experience support staff on hand to help with any questions regarding your account. Contact Cuscal on 02 8299 9000 between 7:30am and 6:00pm (AEST) Monday to Friday.
I was hoping that I’d be able to transfer my funds to my Paypal account though, it seems I don’t have an option to fund my Paypal account using a credit card. If anyone knows of a way to fund a Paypal account using the BOPO card please leave a comment.
I just checked my BOPO card account to verify the card total so i didn’t look a fool when i buy my happy meal today, unfortunately was unable to access the account. See video below.
I’ll head out to see if i can get the account total via eftpos.
If your unsure what type of BOPO prepaid VISA card you currently, Cuscal has released today another Q and A article for BOPO card holders. Please visit Cuscal website for more information regarding card types.
Last night the Bopo.com.au website has been updated to inform customers that Cuscal will cancel service to BOPO cardholders in 30 days (Aug 15th 2008). BOPO cardholders are advised to withdraw funds by the 15th of Aug. Any withdrawal request after the 15th Aug will have to go through a reimbursement application via Cuscal.
from their website…
As a direct result of the above changes to Bill Express and bopo, effective 30 calendar days from the date of this notice, Cuscal is cancelling services to bopo cardholders as described in the product disclosure statement. Please see your product disclosure statement under “Cancellation of Services”.
What you should do
The money stored on your bopo card will be returned to you. To avoid having to claim a refund you should withdraw your funds via ATM or EFTPOS purchases before the expiry of the 30-day notice period. After this period, any remaining funds on your bopo card will only be accessible through an application for reimbursement to Cuscal.
Visit BOPO site to read the entire notice.
For those of you not familiar with what’s happened with the BOPO Prepaid VISA card company and their Parent company Bill Express, The AGE, BusinessDay has an article on the whole Bill Express fiasco.
The Bill Express is said to owe creditors could be more than $250 million. Debt owed to New agencies across Australia has yet to be included in the debt total.
Optus is owed an estimated $50 million from the supply of prepaid recharge codes to Bill Express, with Vodafone owed $30 million, 3 Mobile up to $20 million and $10 million for Telstra, as well as a smaller amount for smaller companies that provide prepaid overseas telephone credit. Bill Express also owes finance company Asset Secure $13 million, German broker Deutsche Forfait $10 million and $7 million for finance of its electronic terminals.
Source: BusinessDay
While big companies are hit hard, those hit hardest are the employees left without redundancy packages or benefits along side Newsagency ownerw who are now forced into unwanted legal action regarding their Bill Express Contracts. Newsagency owners have expressed their opinions on the Bill Express Fall out on a well known blog - newsagencyblog
BOPO Prepaid visa card holders can breath a sigh of relief, based on a press release from Cuscal Website (The Financial Institute that endorsed the BOPO prepaid VISA cards ) Bopo Customer funds are safe.
Below is an excerpt of the 11th July Press release. Read the entire Cuscal press release here.
Bill Express advised the market on 8 July 2008 that it has been forced to appoint administrators. This situation impacts the bopo Visa card, which is issued by Cuscal but owned by Bill Express (through a subsidiary company called bopo cards (Australia) Pty Ltd).
bopo cardholders are right to be concerned about the Bill Express news, however cardholder funds are being kept safe by Cuscal. It is important to highlight that Cuscal is a separate company to Bill Express. Cuscal is a regulated Authorised Deposit-taking Institution (ADI) with a AA- Standard & Poors’ credit rating. This makes Cuscal as safe as any other Australian bank.
Cardholders can be assured that the value stored on bopo cards will be returned to them. However, the administrator now managing Bill Express is following due process and unfortunately this is limiting the services and functionality available to bopo cardholders.
At the time of publication on Friday 11 July 2008, cardholders can still make EFTPOS purchases and ATM withdrawals, but cannot reload money on their cards.
In the event that any cardholders cannot use ATM or EFTPOS purchases to withdraw funds, Cuscal has established a process to facilitate reimbursement of funds stored within bopo card accounts.
Cuscal has offered a chart to help explain how Bopo Cardholders can view card balances and withdraw funds.
View Bopo Card Balance Chart
If your like me, your also one of the thousands of Bopo prepaid card holders left in cold, wondering what’s happening with the available funds within their Bopo prepaid accounts.
As of last week BOPO and all of it’s associated companies are under appointment of an Administrator or in the process of being sold.
From what I’ve gathered online, many Bopo prepaid customers are unable to get in contact with BOPO customer support, this is due to the company being forced into administration. Comments from the Newagencyblog have indicated that BOPO call center staff were let go last Tuesday.
Financial Institiute Cuscal, which handles Authorised Deposit-taking from BOPO has stated that they will provide support for BOPO customers.
Cuscal will work towards meeting its obligations to current bopo cardholders, including of course, ensuring cardholders receive their money. However, the future of the bopo product is likely to be limited. Cuscal has noted that decisions taken by the administrator demonstrate an intention to rapidly cease operational support for the bopo card product.
I suggest those of you with available funds to look into withdrawing funds immediately. I only have very limited funds in my account, grand total of $5 (I think). I’ll be withdrawing mine tomorrow… guess who’s getting a happy meal tomorrow.
With uysthe success of the MTV Bopo card and their support for the Nation Breast Cancer Foundation, Bopo has now aligned itself with another major Australian E-commerce website Buytradesell.com.au. They have become an authorized representative for the Bopo Prepaid Visa Card which now offers their members the opportunity to purchase their own prepaid visa card for use on the buytradesell.com.au website or any other online retailer.
The New Buytradesell Visa Card offers all the great features of the Bopo Visa cards which allows those under 18 to obtain their very own prepaid visa card.
For more information about the Buytradesell Bopo prepaid visa card.
Australian Prepaid Visa Card Company Bopo.com.au (Buy online, Pay Offline) has just released their latest prepaid visa card, The Pink Bopo Card. The Pink Bopo card supports the National Breast Cancer Foundation (NBSF) just by using the pink bopo prepaid visa card for with your everyday purchases.
$5 of the Pink Bopo purchase price goes directly to the National Breast Cancer Foundation. Each Purchase made with the Pink bopo card, 3 cents of the transaction fee will be also go to the National Breast Cancer foundation.
Donations to the National Breast Cancer foundation can also be made via your Pink Bopo card at any time.
The Pink Bopo card is a great idea and great opportunity for you to make a difference. More than 13,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer each year this unique card helps raise vital funds for breast cancer research.
The ‘pink’ bopo is available for $14.95, or $24.95 to create your own picture card.
Open to Victorian Residence only
This another great reason to get your very own Bopo Visa card today!
Apply and pay for a bopo card before September 16 and go into the draw to win one of five family packs of four tickets to the 2007 Toyota AFL Grand Final.
Get more information about the AFL Grand final competition here
With Bopo and MTV joining forces to the promote the prepaid visa card to youth market, we’ll be seeing more youth originated commercials hitting the small screen.
While this ad is cool and generate awareness, I would love to see a more viral focused campaign. Something a little more engaging and a great laugh.
Wanting to gain a more dominate brand within the youth market, Bopo prepaid cards has announces that they have enter in to agreements for MTV to promote and distribute a co-branded Mtv prepaid visa card. The MTV bopo credit card is being promoted using MTV’s television network and website, targeting the youth market. The agreement is for a term of 5 years and is designed to strengthen the appeal of the bopo prepaid Visa card to this demographic.
There’s seems to be a little confusion over the Bopo Prepaid Visa Card and the Prepaid Visa cards issued by ANZ from their online website prepaidshop.com.au
While there are similarities between the cards there are differences between the Prepaid Visa cards and Prepaid Visa Gift Cards.
Both cards allow:
Cards to be used to make transactions online.
Cards can be worldwide, where Visa is accepted.
This is where the similarities end for the Prepaid Visa Gift Cards.
They’re seems to a few more restrictions on where the Prepaid Visa Gift card can be used.
The Prepaid Visa Gift Cards cannot be used in the following scenarios.
Cannot be used at an ATM
Cannot widthdraw cash from Prepaid Visa Gift Card
Cannot be used for online gambling merchants (Adult ?)
Cannot be used at petrol pumps
Express payment services
Make purchases that exceed the Card Balance.
Just with the restriction alone places the Prepaid Visa Gift cards into niche market. The Prepaid Visa Card services is definitely targeting a different type of consumer and believe it offers a great solution for those last minute shoppers.
Their Corporate services benefit both Company and Employees as Companies are able to have branded Prepaid card created and offer them as incentive rewards to employees who will benefit from the being able to make purchases where Visa is accepted.
I wasn’t able to find information regarding Bopo offering Branded Corporate cards though they do have a facility for Companies to offer employees incentive rewards to employees.
While both cards offer similar services each prepaid visa card provider, Bopo seems to have covered both by having the option of withdrawing funds from an ATM puts the Bopo card ahead.
You can review the PrepaidShop FAQ to get more information about their services.
To review the Bopo credit card fee schedule here
Both Prepaid Visa card services offer great value for their target markets, we’ll be keeping an eye out to see how both services
Websites offering the Prepaid Visa Gift Card
Prepaidshop.com.au
Cometrue.com.au
Another Bopo Prepaid Visa Card TV ad. Haven’t seen any of the ads on TV yet though I believe they’ve been on the MTV. Recently Bopo prepaid card and MTV had enter into agreements that will allow MTV to promote and distribute a co-branded MTV prepaid visa card to the youth market. The MTV prepaid credit card will allow Bopo to reach one of the largest consumer markets in Australia.
These youth focus commercials definitely hit the mark.
Here’s another cool youth oriented Bopo prepaid visa card Ad.
With anyone under 18 being able to apply for their own Bopo prepaid card offers teens the freedom to shop anywhere. Where was Bopo when i was young… I would’ve been to many more concert.
Bopo has released a cool and funky video streaming commercial targeting the young adult market and I personal think it will do well in generating awareness for this lucrative market. Bopo’s reload options offers any tech savvy adult a fast and secure way to send and receive money to family and friends.
Click here to view the Bopo Video
To get more information about Bopo Prepaid VISA Cards visit the website bopo.com.au
Bopo prepaid Visa Card have updated there fee schedules and it’s looking good for us frugal , money conscious denizens. Bopo.com has reduced their over the counter fee from $1.50 to $1. Bpay fee schedule has also been added to the new schedule which is also $1 for any load transactions.
You can review both fee schedules here Bopo Prepaid Visa Card Fees.
One the cool new features added to the Bopo prepaid VISA cards is the option of reloading funds via the Paypal online transaction facilities. Paypal.com, which is an Ebay.com company allows customers to send and recieve money quickly and securely online.
below is an extract from the Paypal website.
PayPal has quickly become a global leader in online payment solutions with 100 million account members worldwide. Available in 190 countries around the world, buyers and sellers on eBay, online retailers, online businesses, as well as traditional offline businesses are transacting with PayPal.
Tapping into a huge market like Paypal Australia would potentially allow Bopo to gain a larger piece of the Prepaid Visa Card market. Hopefully we’ll be able to see a reduction on the cost of purchasing a Prepaid Visa Card as Bopo continues to grow.
