Here’s a cool feature from Square Cash – the company launched a virtual card product yesterday, which gives every user a virtual Visa debit card number that they can use to spend their balance anywhere that accepts Visa.
This means that you could spend your Square Cash balance on Amazon (or any online shopping site) by simply entering this virtual card number as a payment option. You can also use virtual cards at some in-person stores, but that typically depends on the specific retailer (and how patient your cashier is).
While not game changing, this virtual card is a nifty little feature that could finally give users a reason to use Square Cash over Venmo, its PayPal-owned competitor.
The card will only be available to use with funds already in your Square Cash account, and you can’t spend from your backup funding source. This means that if you only have $50 in your account, that’s all you can spend on the card.
For what it’s worth, a better way to do it would be like PayPal, which just withdraws funds from your attached bank account if you spend more than is available on your PayPal debit card.
Square Cash also adjusted their timetable for balance withdraws to your bank account. Now users can pay a 1% fee for an instant (same-day) withdraw, or wait until the next day for a free transfer. Venmo offers next-day withdraws for free, with no faster paid option.
The prepaid card is now live in the Square Cash App, and all users need to do is enter a billing address they want associated to the card.