Green Dot Corporation (NYSE: GDOT) is an American financial technology and bank holding company headquartered in Pasadena, CA. It is the largest prepaid debit card company in the world by market capitalization. Green Dot is also a payment platform company and is a technology platform used by Apple Pay Cash, Uber, and Intuit. The company was founded in 1999 by Steve Streit as a prepaid debit card for teenagers to shop online. In 2001, the company turned to serve a community that "has no bank account" and "underbanked". In 2010, Green Dot Corporation became a public company valued at $ 2 billion. Since its inception, Green Dot has acquired a number of companies in the cellular, financial, and tax industries including Loopt, AccountNow, AchieveCard, UniRush, and TPG.
Green Dot Corporation is a MasterCard and Visa card issuer prepaid in the United States. These products are available in nearly 100,000 retail stores including CVS, Rite Aid, Walgreens, Dollar Tree; as well as discount offers at Meijer and Walmart. Green Dot also transfers individual direct deposit funds (such as Social Security payments) from the US government to a personal bank account. They also provide a co-branded card program to Walmart, Boost Mobile, AT & amp; T and Citibank. In 2007, Green Dot raised $ 20 million in funding, including Sequoia Capital as an investor. In 2008, Green Dot no longer offered prepaid Discover cards.
The cards are normal debit cards, and not credit lines. Purchases are deducted from the balance stored on the card. Users can add more money to the card by paying cash at the point of sale of a retail store, or in certain cases of their salary.
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History
Green Dot Company was founded in 1999 by Steve Streit. Green Dot was formerly known as Next Estate Communications. The first debit card sold was I-GEN in 2000. This card is intended for teenagers and internet users. In 2001, MasterCard I-GEN was first sold on Rite Aid in Virginia. In 2002, the first Green Dot debit card was sold in more Rite Aid stores as well as CVS Pharmacy, and Pantry Convenience stores. In 2003, the I-GEN card was sold in more than 18,000 stores nationwide and directed to adults. In 2004, I-GEN officially renamed Green Dot and started the first cash transfer network to reload debit cards. In 2005, Green Dot made additional debit cards for everyone's needs. Finally, in May 2006, Green Dot sold more than two million cards across the country and opened more retailers to publish more international cards.
On July 22, 2010, Green Dot Corporation became a public company and started trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the stock exchange: GDOT
In early 2012, Green Dot acquired mobile location technology company, Loopt, for $ 43.4 million dollars. Green Dot retains all Loopt employees, who are the team to design and build a Green Dot mobile check phone account brand, GoBank.
In 2013, with the acquisition of Loopt's technology and labor, Green Dot developed GoBank, the first bank account designed to be opened and used from mobile devices. In 2016 GoBank, the platform used by Uber, the travel sharing company, as the primary payment processor of enterprise drivers. Green Dot considers this as their pivot from a prepaid debit card company to a platform company.
In 2014, Green Dot Corporation acquired the Santa Barbara Tax Products Group, the largest tax return processor in America.
Green Dot resumes acquisition of a competitive company in 2015, which offers a customer base or platform with its acquisition with the purchase of Both Now Accounts Inc., and the Reaching Card.
On September 24, 2014, Walmart announced it would partner with Green Dot Bank to begin offering Walmart customer account checks. The account will be provided through GoBank, Green Dot cellular checking service
In 2016, the Green Dot Corporation brand, GoBank, partnered with Uber to launch 'Uber Debit Card' - checking account for Uber drivers to immediately withdraw their travel expenses.
On January 30, 2017, it was reported that UniRush LLC will be sold to Green Dot Corp. in a deal worth approximately $ 147 million. The deal, to close at the end of the quarter, is said to add about 750,000 cardholders to the Green Dot network.
In early December 2017, Green Dot Corporation announced that it is driving Apple's new Pay Cash P2P payment service.
Maps Green Dot Corporation
Card
Green Dot debit cards are available in many stores, including CVS Pharmacy, Kmart, 7-Eleven, and Walgreens. This is only a temporary card that does not have the customer's real name on it; but is said to be "Valuable Customer". Temporary card can not be reloaded. However, if a customer chooses to accept personalized cards, which are free of charge, within 7 to 10 business days, the card will be sent by post with his or her name. Personal cards can be reloaded in various ways. There is a monthly fee of $ 7.95, unless the customer makes more than 30 purchases in a month or loads of cards with more than $ 1,000 in that month.
The process of reloading
Personalized cards can be reloaded using MoneyPak, which is available in the same store as GreenDot prepaid. Most stores charge $ 4.95 to reload. Card users can also choose to have their payroll transferred directly to the card via direct deposit and card acting as their checking account. In addition, cards may be reloaded using ACH online transfers directly from a bank account and even from PayPal. PayPal in 2014 does not accept MoneyPak cards due to the high volume of unsatisfactory Green Dot ratings and its products.
Reputation
Starting December 2017, Green Dot has the following rankings:
They are mostly unprofitable results, listed on the above sites and other review sites, complaining about Green Dot limiting access to positive balance in the card, even though the funds have been added to the card by cash purchase. The reviews also underscore the unwillingness or inability of Green Dot's customer service to resolve this issue. The majority of recent positive reviews about Consumer Affairs mention the convenience and speed of automatic direct deposits.
Security worries
While convenient, the Green Dot MoneyPak card does not have security measures like identity verification found on credit cards, limited cardholder liability, and the ability to refute fraudulent allegations so that money lost by fraud can not be recovered.
- In March 2010, Better Business Bureau reported an increase in fraud involving MoneyPak in which unsuspecting victims would pay for the goods by loading a MoneyPak card, sending an email to the "seller" number only to have a "channel" account and never deliver the promised product.
- In June 2011, the Better Business Bureau and the Minnesota Department of Public Security issued a warning about the illegal use of the Green Dot MoneyPak card to deceive consumers.
- In January 2012, New York State Sen. Martin Golden Office issued a warning from Con Edison about various scams, including "Green Dot Fraud."
- In March 2012, the Time magazine reported on how fraud 419 is now being adapted to the relative secrecy of the MoneyPak card. AARP issued a warning about the rise of MoneyPak's fraud in 2012 following the decline of MoneyGram fraud after MoneyGram was fined 18 million dollars "to settle the FTC allegations that allowed the money transfer system to be used for fraud".
- In August 2012, the FBI also issued a warning that scammers are taking advantage of MoneyPak's inability to force victims unintentionally pay "ransom" to unlock their malware-infected computers. AVG Technologies notes that in some cases (such as FBI scams) criminals use malware to trick victims into thinking that their computers have been flagged for serious crimes, then the relatively easy-to-use anonymity of MoneyPak cards to allow "untracked" "blackmail." li>
- Starting in mid-2013, the Green Dot MoneyPak card is used to commit fraud, with the person requesting the caller under the guise of a customer service agent for a utility company such as an electric or gas provider requesting immediate payments under threat of disconnection using a private card or requesting a caller to go to the store selling the Green Dot card and give them the card number where the funds are used.
- In September 2013, several Walgreens and other major chain drug stores through the United States were evacuated because of the threat of bombs being called into stores, with callers demanding 'ransom' from the stores of multiple Green Dot cards with large amounts enabled using the store registers which will then be placed in locations that are not monitored by the offender to be picked up, or numbers read over the phone.
- In 2015, fraudsters take advantage of Green Dot cards when filling out fake income tax returns using compromised Social Security numbers. The criminal opens a Dot Green account with the victim's name, establishing the account as the recipient of the payment for a refund claimed on a fraudulent tax return. SSN stolen is used both to file a fake tax return and to open a Green Dot account, which is emptied if a refund is paid. The victim received an unexpected letter containing a permanent name (embossed under the name of the victim) Green Dot for the account, possibly a compromise indicator of SSN and a fraud trial.
References
External links
- Green Dot Corporation website
- Sequoia Capital fund Green Dot
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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