In a normal economy, making payment online should be easy. But when you are a Nigerian, paying a $10 online subscription fee might turn out to be a mini project for you. You might have problems with your naira card, or the payment platform may have trust issues about your identity and more.
And here is where virtual dollar cards in Nigeria come into play.
As a user of Grey for my personal payments, I don’t approach the problem from some abstract perspective. I have my experience using a card, funding it and paying for online services with its help.
But I don’t intend to give you a list of 10-20 dollar cards and label them as the best cards to use in your case. Usually, such lists only confuse people more.
Therefore, I decided to limit myself by three virtual cards to choose from: Grey, Cardtonic and Chipper Cash.
And I am going to tell you everything you need to know about each of them – their price, features, scope and possible disadvantages. Most importantly, I will tell you how to calculate the real cost of a dollar payment.
What Actually Matters When Choosing a Dollar Card
Virtual dollar cards will not help unless it addresses your payment problem. It is the core and most fundamental problem it must solve. All other things are additions.
Then, I am also interested in the process starting from ease of registration, verification, when I fund with my naira, convert to USD, EUR, GBP or more and make the actual payment.
Merchant Acceptance
First of all, would the card work where you intend on using it? Just because the card provider website looks great with well-crafted text on it doesn’t mean it won’t be rejected by the specific website/subscription you have.
Some merchant will specifically tell you, virtual card not supported. In that case, the only saving Grace is your commercial bank domiciliary dollar card (which has its own limitations, more on that later).
The Real Cost
Among virtual dollar card providers operating in this country, majority have hidden cost. They won’t tell you upfront. Those that do will make it subtle that you may not notice at all.
I had a worse experience with one. My God! You need see charges upon charges hidden behind crafty technical and legal names. So worse, that you can’t spend funds to $0. They will always request you leave something in the card. Is it your money?
So, always consider factors other than the card creation cost. Examine the exchange rate, financing fees, transaction fees, and border fees. If a card costs $5, it may not necessarily be affordable due to the added costs of the payment.
Funding and Limits
In case you need to pay for services worth $1200 yearly, having a low spending limit can be problematic very fast.
Some virtual cards are for low earners, some for middle class and some for high income earners. No shades. I am saying this because of restrictions on funding and spending. Some providers say it’s because of security reasons, others say it a policy issue.
On some cards, you can spend more than $1000 at a go, few allow up to $10,000. But this will mostly not be an issue because the average spend at a go may still fall within limits. But it’s still a good thing you should know.
Reliability and Support
Lastly, I care about quick response when something fails. Payments fail. Refunds are delayed. Cards are locked. In such situations, what you need is a customer service that provides real time support (mostly via chats), not AI chat or submitting ticket and pray they reply.
But sadly, majority of tech companies in Nigeria, don’t have 247 live supports. Even the card provider am using. We can say it’s countrywide disease.
Those are the criteria which I am going to apply in my guide. No marketing phrases. No ratings. Only the stuff that really matters when you have to pay a dollar.
The Three Virtual Dollard Cards I’m Looking At
This is going to be short and sweet. There are many virtual dollar cards in Nigeria, but I don’t see why one needs 15 names of providers to choose one.
In this case, I am going to focus on Grey, Cardtonic, and Chipper Cash.
I will speak from my experience of using grey while speaking about it. In the cases of Cardtonic, a friend recommends it. And Chipper Cash, I had work on a company marketing project, where that was the card being used.
These three different products also provide us with a good sample to compare things. We can see the price for getting a card, funding options, fees on payment, spending limits, places where cards can be used, and other issues.
Fees, restrictions, and card policies vary and are likely to change. So, when I provide you with current fees, please regard them as an up-to-date picture, not as a guarantee that the same fees will be in place six months down the road.
Note: Our objective is not to choose a better card out of the three. We are here to guide you in choosing the right one for the payment at hand.
H2: Grey: The Virtual Dollar Card I Actually Use
When it comes to my own personal experience, it would have to be Grey because this is something that I use personally.
I began using Grey because I needed a convenient solution to make dollar online payments using some card other than my Wema domiciliary dollar card.
My Wema dollar card has been great and still great. But because of the government policy where you can’t convert naira to dollar from your bank app, it makes funding hard. While I understand this policy is to protect the naira from weakening, it can make your life slow.
You will need to go get the physical dollar notes at the current black market exchange rate or someone abroad credits you directly into the dollar account before you can spend.
My Experience with Grey
Back to Grey…
The thing that I really appreciate about Grey is the ease. Though at the beginning, I had experienced some charges that made me furious. But upon verification, I realized it’s a mandatory fee for all virtual card providers.
Speaking on ease, before on Grey app, you have to manually fund your virtual card from your dollar account before use (this is after converting your naira to dollar).
Let me explain better. For example, you have $500 in your Grey dollar account but have $200 in your grey virtual card. You make a purchase of $300; the merchant platform will decline the card due to insufficient fund. And that’s because you only have $200 in your card.
The problem with that is your card will always go on freeze.
Grey then they introduced the Visa virtual dollar card where you can spend directly from your dollar account. Now, no separation of the main dollar account and virtual dollar account. With your Visa virtual card, it deducts straight from your Grey dollar account.
Please do not think that my experience becomes your conclusion because a card which suits me perfectly well may be inappropriate for your payment.
Grey Today: Pricing, Limits and Where It Works
Currently, Grey provides online Visa and Mastercard. There is an issuing fee for the card, while other fees are transaction specific.
Limits and fees of Grey may vary, so it is better to find out the current values before creating and funding the card. Same applies to merchant support. Availability of a particular card on one online platform does not guarantee its availability elsewhere.
This point is important to me, because “Can I use this card?” sounds better than “Is this a good dollar card?”.
Cardtonic Virtual Dollar Card: What You Should Know
Another virtual dollar card that you may want to consider in Nigeria is Cardtonic. While Grey is an actual product that I have used before in making my payments, I will limit myself in this case to just what my friend says and information available about Cardtonic.
Current Pricing, Limits and How It Works
Cardtonic provides online Visa and Mastercard dollar cards. The company currently offers the following pricing scheme: $1.50 card creation fee for Regular and $5 card creation fee for Platinum.
In addition, there is 2% funding fee and other possible fees depending on the transaction you make. The fees and limits offered by Cardtonic are available in the help center of the company.
The main principle is quite straightforward. You create the card, fund it, and then use dollars to pay for supported services online.
What I Like and What I’d Watch Out For
While it might be tempting to go ahead with the lower card issuance fee, however, I believe that the 2% funding fee and additional fees can play a more significant role when you begin paying for your purchases.
Therefore, before funding your card, you should find out how much your payment will cost.
Chipper Cash Virtual Card: What You Should Know
Earlier, I told you how I got to know about Chipper cash
Another means Nigerians could employ to get a virtual USD card is through Chipper Cash. As I have not tried the card, just like I have never tried the Cardtonic card, I would limit myself to the information available on the Chipper card.
While their card may be effective, I noticed their fee is high overtime.
Current Pricing, Limits and How It Works
The USD Chipper card of the Nigerian kind is a virtual card that is prepaid and reloadable. You simply deposit funds to your Chipper Wallet and then spend the funds on the allowed transactions.
Chipper currently charges $5 for making the card, $1 per month as maintenance fee, and $0.90 per transaction. They even state the amount of the limit on spending and funding.
The mentioned amounts might be altered, so you better check it with Chipper.
What I Like and What I’d Watch Out For
The most crucial aspect will be an examination of how the fees associated with the transaction may impact my actual payments made. The card may seem inexpensive from the outset of its creation, but it will turn out more costly if used frequently.
I would like to see what kind of service can accept Chipper’s card and whether my intended payment will stay under the established threshold.
This will be of particular importance when considering using the virtual dollar card for several subscription payments or payments related to business.
Which Card Makes Sense for You?
There is no universal virtual dollar card that will work for everyone. You have to first identify what you would like to buy.
| If you want to… | Pay attention to… |
|---|---|
| Shop online | Merchant acceptance and total cost |
| Pay subscriptions | Recurring payments and balance |
| Pay for AI or software tools | Merchant acceptance and payment fees |
| Pay as a student | Low overall cost and easy funding |
| Pay for business tools or ads | Spending limits, reliability and fees |
As an example, if all you have to pay is one single $10 service, then I would be really paying attention to how much it would cost to do that one-time transaction.
In case you have multiple subscriptions and regular payments on your monthly list, recurring payments, transaction fees and card limits become very important.
If you are paying for various business tools, advertisements, etc., then you should take into consideration not only card creation fees but reliability and sufficient credit limit as well.
It means very clearly that first comes payment, and after that, you choose the most suitable card.
What you shouldn’t do is start with the card provider and find an excuse to use it.
A Simple $20 Example
For instance, when I want to make a subscription of $20 online.
It is not enough to only consider whether there are enough dollars in the card to cover the $20 charge. The exchange rate, cost of funding and even the cost of the transaction itself comes into play.
If the cost of getting sufficient balance for the purpose of paying that $20 is ₦30,000, then ₦30,000 is my concern and not the $20 charged on the website.
This is the criterion I would consider: What would be the cost of making this payment in its entirety?
Considering this prior to funding the card will help avoid several of the surprises associated with dollar payments.
Your Card Was Declined. What Now?
Failure to pay doesn’t necessarily indicate that there is something wrong with your virtual dollar card. At times, the problem can be very simple.
Check These First
Check your balance first. It should be sufficient for both payment and potential fees.
Then, check your card limit. Your payment can exceed your daily/monthly/transaction limit.
Check the merchant as well. Not all merchants accept all virtual cards. Some websites might not accept prepaid cards or specific country cards.
Also, if the website requires a billing address, check yours. Use the details provided by your card company. The incorrect billing address might cause failure of your payment.
For a subscription, check if your card allows recurring payments at the specific merchant.
If It Still Fails
Do not continue to try paying. It may result in declined transaction fees or further security checks based on the specific payment gateway being used.
Look up the reason within the application or help center of your payment service provider. In case that does not work, contact the support team with the name of the merchant, the amount and the time of the unsuccessful payment.
In addition, having a backup plan in case of an urgent payment is quite relieving.
The main idea is to first identify the reason behind the payment failure.
How to Use a Virtual Dollar Card Safely
The virtual dollar card is a payment card. You should take as much care of it as you do with your regular bank card.
Keep Your Card Details Private
Create and manage your card only using the app or the website of the card issuing company. Never give your card number, CVV, password or OTP to anyone claiming that he needs to help you with your card.
You don’t require any other individual to issue you a dollar card.
Don’t Keep More Money Than You Need
It is advisable to retain only the necessary amount of money on the card, particularly when one uses the new service.
Virtual dollar card platforms are not where you save your entire life savings. Only keep what you need for transactions
If you need to pay $20, there is no need to leave $500 on the card unless you have some good reasons for doing so.
Watch Your Transactions
After making the payment, review the card transactions, and if there is any suspicious transaction, take immediate action. Freeze or block the card using the card control of the provider if such an option is provided, and contact customer support.
Remember that you should never give the OTP under any circumstance claiming to be from the card provider.
It may prevent you from suffering a lot in the future.
My Final Take on Virtual Dollar Cards in Nigeria
Having considered all three options, my strategy remains quite straightforward.
It is easier for me to write about Grey since I understand the process of creating this card, its funding and further using it for making online payments.
However, I don’t recommend choosing this virtual dollar card solely on account of my personal experience.
There could be some other factors you will have to take into account when choosing a card such as paying for only one subscription or for several software packages per month, funding, transaction fees, spending limits or the merchants’ preferences.
Find out what kind of fees do you have to pay for it now; what kinds of limits there are; whether the merchant accepts this particular card and what the total amount in naira will be.
This change of your approach towards this issue will help you to save lots of money and even more frustration.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a virtual dollar card?
It is a digital payment card that lets you make payments in US dollars online without using a physical card.
Can I use a virtual dollar card for subscriptions?
Yes, many virtual dollar cards can work for subscriptions, but it depends on the card provider and the merchant. Always check before funding the card.
Can I use a virtual dollar card for international websites?
You can utilize one through supported international sites. Yet, some merchants might not accept virtual, prepaid, or cards from specific countries.
How do I fund a virtual dollar card in Nigeria?
This is dependent on the provider. Some allow you to add money to your wallet/card using the Nigerian bank account, and the money will be converted to dollars.
Why was my virtual dollar card declined?
Some common causes include inadequate funds, limits on the card, merchant restrictions, incorrect billing address, or security issues.
Are virtual dollar cards safe?
They can be safe when you use a legitimate provider and protect your card details. Never share your CVV, password or OTP with another person.