I have been working freelance offering WordPress and SEO services. In the first week of February, I was shocked to see PayPal outage in which more than $400 were reversed from my account to the sender. Many of my friends also experienced similar problems with PayPal. In less than 5 days, my account balance was reduced to half.
As of this writing, PayPal has offered various explanations but operations have still not returned to normal. Therefore, as a backup plan. I applied for Payoneer DebitMaster Card.
I would like to share my experience with the same from the registering process to the shopping!
Payoneer DebitMaster Card Review
Registration
- The registration process is very straight forward and does not take more than 10 mins.
- Non-US residents can not order a Payoneer card directly
- Non-US residents need to order it via a partner. I got mine from oDesk
- Various partners are varying fees. If you are looking at a PayPal alternative then I would suggest you to get one from 2CheckOut.
- Valid Identity Proof is required to be given at the time of registration. You can choose from :
- Passport Number
- Driving License
- PAN Card
- The application gets approved within 48-72 hours.
- I applied on 5 Feb 2010.
- My card was shipped on the 3rd day of applying and it got approved on 7Feb 2010.
- I received the card after 15 days
Activation and Loading
- I chose a PIN for ATM withdrawals for the card
- I loaded a sum of USD 591 from oDesk into the Payoneer Card (after $2 withdrawal charge).
- You have 2 load options :-
- Normal – 4 days approx ( No Charge)
- Immediate – 2 hours ( USD 2.50 per load)
- I loaded mine using the normal load and the amount was loaded on the estimated date and time.
- I was charged an activation fee of USD 9.95 which on contacting the customer support was refunded back because due to PayPal outage Payoneer had offered free activation for Indian customers.
- I received the full load amount – USD 591 as loaded by oDesk.
Using the Card
- I made 3 transactions after the card was loaded.
- Had no problems with the merchant what so ever and the card was accepted where ever MasterCard was.
- For comparison sake, Rs.920 were charged at $ 20.55
- The conversion rate was pretty reasonable and there was no charge for shopping.
- Haven’t tried the ATM Withdrawl till now but there is a small fee per transaction.
Conclusion
In all, I am very happy with Payoneer DebitMaster Card, its easy and safe way without worrying about money transfer delays and the like. I would recommend the same to my friends and readers. Here is a pic of my card.
- Click for Full size View
What alternative do you use for PayPal. Although PayPal is good but in situations like these, a backup plan is important. Leave your comments and queries below
{ 21 comments… read them below or add one }
Looks good but not for those who occasionally make withdrawal’s. Also, Is there any monthly fee ?
Yes, Under 3 Transactions – $3.
3 and more transactions – $1
Reasonable if you use this shit
A couple of alternatives to Paypal. Don’t know how well they work for Indian customers though.
https://www.obopay.com/
https://www.alertpay.com/
I should also think of an alternative plan. Too much dependence on one thing is ALWAYS a bad idea. Nice review
Thanks for the appreciation, Arun
Nice review, most of my queries are solved now.
Well, I will always go for withdrawal instead of shopping and so, I need to worry about withdrawing fees here.
How much fees did oDesk charge you for registration? I am trying to get one via Infolinks. they too are waiving the initial $9.95 activation fee but don’t know, will I have to pay anything for ordering?
You can order it for free. They did charge the activation fee but were prompt in reversing it back when I called them up.
I have the same!
Nice review. Didn’t know about the normal load option.
My card was approved in about 12 hrs, but took 31 days to deliver. Ordered mine on march 25, received yesterday. I’m also only interested in withdrawing, lets see.
Hi Aamnah
I happened to make 2 ATM withdraws and maybe you benefit from this information :
It deducted $2.5 per transaction irrespective of the amount
Money was converted to the current rate Forex.
So, When I did a Rs.1000 withdrawal, I was charged an equivalent of Rs.1120 from Payoneer. When I did a R.2000 withdrawal, I was charged at 2122.
So, as you can see. Irrespective of the amount. I had to pay Rs.120 / transaction for the ATM fees.
Did you try it for online transaction? Was it accepted? If yes, which option did you choose? CC or DC?
I tried it to pay Telephone , Electricity Bills and Mobile recharge but the card was not accepted.
The transactions you made were in retail stores? I am still not sure whether it will work there or not.
Till now my card has been accepted at all the retail stores I have shopped and even online merchant websites.
However, I have heard some Indian Gateways give problems because of the Secure3D Secure PIN that was recently launched from 1 Aug 2010.
Rest all the online merchants I have used this card with – HostGator, Basecamp and other things work. As for retail outlets and ATMs Payoneer has been AWESOME.
I have used to successfully at restaurants, shopping malls, Petrol Pumps. You name it!
However, I didn’t try it with other online merchants but will do it soon with Hostgator.
And yes, Petrol Pump transaction took extra 0.12$ for my transaction of 200 INR. On most of Indian Debit Cards too, it is written about extra charges and so applicable with Payoneer too I think.
On other retail stores and Restaurant, it works like charm.
plizzz help me out i did registr on 2nd june and still havnt got any reply from the site i used adult friend finders affilate program to order from payoneer and i stay in nigeria any help?plizzz
I got hit with over $15 for one ATM withdrawl and payoneer cannot give me any explanation as why.
If you have a problem customer service really sucks – they simply do not reply.
I have experienced that their customer support via email is a little unresponsive however all my support calls on Phone were answered properly and to my satisfaction.
Try giving them a call and talk to an customer support guy.
hi thanks for information i am a freelancer and i want to order it through scriptlance and i use freelnacer and odesk too can i use a single card to all these sites.
thanks
Yes you can, I got my Payoneer card from Utest, and now I associated my Odesk account and another particular client to it, it’s rather simple and every company that offers this card, also offers to associate the account to the existing card.
Best regards.
I have heard that conversion rate for dollar to local currency in paypal is lower. what about from atm? they do use current exchange rate?
Thanks
The Payoneer conversion rate is governed by the day-to-day exchange rates at MasterCard. They are good enough and are higher than what PayPal offers.
Payoneer worries me- first they get dropped by their issuing bank, Metabank. Now all of their cards are backed by Choice Bank Ltd which is based out of Belize (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=229961). All of this was caused by their alleged association with the Hamas assassination carried out earlier this year that included the use of their prepaid cards by IDF agents, and the CEO has ties to Israeli Special forces:
http://wakeupfromyourslumber.com/blog/poseidon/payoneer-cto-covers-colleagues-special-forces-experience