Plastk Visa Credit card holders are out thousands of dollars | Credit card reward programs | Discussion forum

A sad story indeed. Now that the EQ bank card is available, would using such a card serve the same function that this poor woman was trying to achieve by dealing with Plastik?

EQ seems a much more reliable way to have a credit-like card tied to one's savings in real time.

Secured credit cards are a dreadful deal - they charge the client interest on month-end balances even as they hold the money to pay the bills, without paying any interest on the secured deposit!

Given how easy it is to get a low-limit Canadian Tire or similar card, one would have to be a seriously bad risk and desperate to get a secured card. A debit card lets one earn a few pennies of interest and pay no interest, as well as preventing excess debt buildup.
RetirEd

I'm not sure why the owner of Plastk is claiming to CBC Marketplace that it's Digital Commerce Bank that holds the customers' secured credit card deposits. It's true that Digital Commerce Bank provides credit card issuance and fulfillment services to Plastk, but part of the confusion here seems to be customers believing their cash security is held as a secured balance on their credit card. If it were, my understanding is it would be protected by CDIC, since CDIC protects credit card credit balances (whether regular or prepaid credit cards), but that is not the case because the cash security is held separately by the credit card company / credit card issuer.

Someone is lying here, and I doubt it's Digital Commerce Bank.

Either that or that someone is completely incompetent in thinking Digital Commerce Bank holds the deposits.

Cheers,
Doug

n.b. Digital Commerce Bank used to be DirectCash Bank. It was bought by Cardtronics a few years ago, and Cardtronics was bought last year by ATM manufacturer NCR Corp.