The complaint has been investigated and
resolved to the customer's satisfactionResolved Meta Bank — money fraud
resolved to the customer's satisfaction
Recently my roommate got a Freedom card prepaid Mastercard from Meta Bank. he then loaded $1, 500 on it for an upcoming vacation. Well what they didn't tell him is they limit you to 10 transactions a month before you can't use it anymore for that period. Then instead of him paying me the rent he offered to just use the checking account part of the account which you can use unlimitedly to pay my months bills online for me. Well big surprise today when I log onto my accounts and see returned payment fees and late charges. He called their support line who said they put a stop payment on all transactions because of suspicious activity that could be related to terrorism. How they got that from paying off a Walmart and Target and JC Penney credit card I'll never know. They told him his account was being sent to their security division for review which would take up to 14 days. They said his funds would be unavailable for that time, unless he wished to close his account which would result in a $5.00 charge for every transaction he made with the card since getting it. Freedom card my eye! They gave the lame excuse that since 9/11 any large deposit on a card and usage is red flagged by them as suspicious. Now they can clearly see what the funds are being used for (credit card payments, grocery shopping, restaurant bills). So all the bills we paid with the card have now been returned along with late fees and returned payment fees. These people are just looking for any way they can squeeze extra money from you DO NOT apply for one of these cards from Meta Bank. All it has given us is headaches and loss of money.
More Meta Bank Complaints & Reviews
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- Metabank Myiadvance - no one can refund me even after almost 2 weeks of trouble tickets
a verified customer
Yo! Guys..after reading all your comments i am not going to deal with them no more..but i just gave them my DOB and my social to activate my card..my card is activated with zero balance in it..i just received the card yesterday, still wondering why.?.but anyways..im fine right??as long as i dont put money on the account?even though they had my social, DOB and phone number, im still good right??even they have those info?please i need answers ASAP.thanks
I got an unsolicited Visa "Reward Card" from MetaBank, via a company called prepaidrewards.com. No idea how/why they sent it to me. It had 100$ on it. There was a note in the letter saying that using it was free to use the card, but they would charge 3$ per month (!) as fee while I am using it ! I called their toll free number to find out what this all was about, and their customer service person said that their 'systems were down', so he could not tell me anything. I asked him if it was a scam, and he telling said that "I cant tell you unless I know more about which bank issued your card". Their website was empty (no information, nothing to click, no place to put in any information. Interestingly enough, the card did hold money (100$). I used it all up, and am not going to do anything more with this card. Thanks everyone for your warnings about this Bank.
a verified customer
Meta bank is now stating they purchased an a commercial insurance finance company and have asked for personal information (social security and DOB) in order to process an unclaimed property refund. Other wise the funds will be escheated to the state of California. Please send it to the state! Not sure if it's real or not but after reading all of your posts, no one in their right mind would want to deal with Meta Bank. Beware!
a verified customer
Recently MetaBank sent me a letter that I had money on a prepaid card that they were going to turn over to Indiana Treasury unless I sent back a letter they sent with my signature, address, email account, birth date and two PHOTO COPIES OF GOVERNMENT ISSUED ID. Government issued ID has Social Security numbers, address etc all identifying, personal information. WHY? If I had an account they would have all the info they needed to send me my money . I NEVER had a prepaid card from MetaBank nor any financial accounts with them. Heck they had my name and address and supposed account number. Why no just verify my address? No, they needed my signature, birth date and social security number to DEFRAUD me.
Dishonest, . most likely. My profession: Security Consultant
Mi elmana Stephanie k. Santana esta
transferando plada de mi Netspend.
Numero [protected].
Steve Santana no le da pelmiso a
nades.
Meta Bank allowed a charge of $1684 at a big box store in Brazil, plus 3 other charges in that country. I had used the card the day before in my hometown, I just had major surgery and am totally disabled. I have possession of the card so it was not stolen. The only funds in the account are direct deposit social security. After calling Meta Bank, they sent me a dispute form, but I filed a police report as fraudulent activity. I did all the research on the internet regarding the companies involved, their line of business, and had to translate all information from Portuguese to English. The only reason we found out about the account being wiped out ($1802) is that the card was denied the next time I tried to use it, which was 13 days later. I called Meta Bank and they said they knew the card had been compromised and had closed it, with just $6 remaining, yet they never notified me. I tried to buy a computer for $1200 at Best Buy a month ago, and Meta Bank denied the charge as they said it was over my daily limit. Yet they approved fraudulent charges of $1684 at one merchant in Brazil. I sent all the information I had gotten to MetaBank, and they said they issued a new card I would be receiving in the next 10 days. I still have not received it. This is the second time in a year my account has been "compromised" but the first time no fraudulent charges were allowed. And this time the "thieves" quit trying to use the card when it got down to $6. How would an ordinary thief know that? I believe this is an "inside job" by Meta Bank employees. I have notified Social Security to send me paper checks, as I do not want any more $ going into the Meta Bank account, if I even have one anymore. All credit card companies insist you notify them before travelling abroad. Why do the same rules not apply to Meta Bank? I'll hold my breath and wait for Meta Bank's response, although I believe I've lost those funds. I am reporting them to the FTC, Department of the Treasury and my State's Attorney General. The laws need to be changed to make these auto deposit accounts liable the same way credit card companies are.
Metabank puts blocks on its cards way to fast. I had my check direct deposited on to my card and they blocked the card untill I would send them a photo id my social security card copy and a bill with my name on it. I live in a town that all the mail is picked up at the post office and uses po box numbers for all mail. Even thought my po box is listed with them, they say they need a bill with the street number on it. My funds are still locked up on the card and I have no money to see the doctor for emergency reason heart and blood presure issues.
If anyone is considering doing any kind of business with Metabank I strongly suggest you do your due diligence first. BUYER BE WARE!!! I am disabled and receive SSDI payments monthly from social security. Recently social security required everyone who relieves money from social security must start receiving payment by direct deposit only. No more paper checks as of March 2013. There were two options to continue recieving your money. Either open a checking account at any bank of your choice or you can use the bank the government has chosen for you to have you money direct deposited into. Well Metabank happens to be the bank they use if you can't have a bank account or you choose not to open one with a major chain bank. By the way my check amount i receive isn't enough money for me to get my own place. I am 41 years old and am left to living with my mom and two aunts so every dollar I recieve is very important. The only way you are not charged fees is if you use online banking. I set up online banking when I elected social security to deposit my check onto a Metabank card. Well once the auto deposit started to be added to my account I was not able to access my account info online..I was having problems logging in. So I used the automated phone system and every time you call they charge you .25 cents. I also spoke with a live advisor finally after waiting almost an hour to speak with a live person to help me with the online banking. It took me 4 phone calls in one day and each person I spoke to said the last person I talked to sent me to the wrong login page. I was never told and I never read anywhere that if you talk to a live person you are charged $3.00 each time you call.. And at the end of the day I still was not able to login online and I was not even able to call for help because I no longer had $3.00 in my account for them to take to be able to get my online banking figured out. When there is less then $3.00 in your account it directs you to a voicemail which I left 4 messages on for someone to call me and no one ever did. These people are crooks.. And the amazing thing about this is that our government who doesn't give you enough money to live on as it is uses this bank to deposit your check into so this crooked bank can steal the money you don't have. So now I am negative $5 in this account and want to close it because i decided to go with a bank that doesn't steal your money but can't call anyone to do so because they want to charge $3.00 to talk to them. So anyone considering having anything to do with this company run... Run as fast as you can from them.
I went to the gas station because my car was on empty and I was riding on fumes. I went to the gas station and pressed debit. I put in my PIN number and it would not work . My car was on the verge of cutting off so I had to push charge on the pump. I got 15.00 of gas. When I went to the ATM to get the rest of my money off my card realized the balance was incorrect. I came home to call my card and speak to customer service about what was going on with my card. I found out that they took 120.00 of my hard earned money to hold for a 15.00 gas charge. This is ridiculous and sad because now I have no way of feeding my family and paying my bills. These cards are a rip-off. I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure this never happened again to anybody
else. If there is anyone out there that will help me with this case please please leave a something on this page with info where you can be reached. There are so many people being affected by this.
a verified customer
I do taxes and almost all of my customers have me direct deposit their refunds to a Netspend premier visa card funded by Metabank. Last March 2012, I went to check on balances in my, my husbands and my daughters netspend visa accounts and to my surprise I couldn't access them online so I called customer service and I was notified that not just our accounts but any accounts associated with my address (which some of my clients have used my address to have their cards mailed to), have all been shut down and all money in ALL of those accounts which totaled $17, 526, had been returned to IRS?????!! They said that with so many accounts associated with this address and so many IRS refunds going into them it seemed suspicious to them. I called IRS and they have NEVER heard of such a thing and they have NEVER received any money returned to them from any of those accounts!! I have been calling IRS regularly every 4 weeks since all that money was taken and they still have no money returned to them. They also said that they wouldn't accept any money returned to them from a financial institution that had already been accessed and deposited. The only they would accept returned from a direct deposit is if the account it was deposited into had been closed and then a paper check would have been issued. Metabank insists there was fraud on the accounts and insists the money had been returned to IRS. This wasn't just my family's money but also the money of some of my clients and there is no trace of it. Wherever I call I hit a roadblock. It has been 10 months since all this has happened and no one can tell me where the money is!!!
Walgreens recently announced that it is involuntarily requiring all of its employees who like to receive their wages as paper paychecks (even in states where employees have a state right to prefer this method of wages payment) to be paid electronically via payroll cards. Guess who the the issuer of the paycards is... that's right sports fans... MetaBank!!!
The payroll card is a PaychekPLUS Elite Visa Payroll Card issued by MetaBank pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A. Inc. . Can you imagine relying on MetaBank to credit your payroll card for your only source of income? Many Walgreens employees will have to do just that. And when the wages are accidentally not credited to an employee's card, or if the wages' amounts are in error, what do those poor people do?
On top of that, both Walgreens and Visa have shown within the last six months that they are ill-prepared to protect the private and personal electronic data of those in their charge. Both companies have experienced massive electronic data breaches. Now, the two of them are teaming up with MetaBank to create electronic payroll subaccounts on which thousands of people will be forced to depend.
I am writing today with hopes I can read some feedback on the BankFreedom card from MetaBank. I am a single mom with 4 children. I had excellent credit and lost everything I had with the economy and real estate investments... so I am starting over. I need to have a credit card to function. My credit is shot - so a pre-paid is my only option. I work 7 days a week 15 hours a day and I can not afford to lose a dime. Please help me by providing quality and accurate information. I have signed up for this card but have not had any money deposited into the card as of yet. After reading about MetaBank and am very nervous. Thank you in advance for your help. mominneed
Seriously, so you want to blame THIS on GWB too? You just lost your credibility and the hurt the viability of legitimate claims against Meta Bank. Stay home.
Just to set the record straight here is the best known facts of the IAdvance shut down and Meta Bank:
The Office of Thrift Supervision issued a supervisory directive to MetaBank earlier this month that ordered it to stop originating loans through the program by Oct. 13, according to a report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The iAdvance program offers short-term loans on its prepaid credit cards through sister-company Meta Payment Systems. The MetaBank iAdvance line of credit was available to people who have income or benefits directly deposited to a prepaid card. The advances cost $2.50 per $20 borrowed and are repaid automatically with the next direct deposit.(* A special note here: that repayment was taken on ANY deposit or recharge of any means after 48 hours) The minimum APR is 120 percent, but if the loan is taken out a week or less before payday, the loans would cost at least 650 percent APR, according to the National Consumer Law Center.
Other banks, including Wells Fargo and US Bank, have similar products, according to the National Consumer Law Center.
The directive has led to a class-action lawsuit filed against MetaBank's holding company, Meta Financial Group, and several executives, which claims that the company violated federal securities laws by knowingly publishing a series of false and misleading statements leading up to the October announcement that the iAdvance program would be discontinued.
When the company announced the cease and desist order, it also disclosed that discontinuance of the iAdvance program and potential discontinuance of the tax-related programs will eliminate a substantial portion of Meta Payment System's gross profit and elevated rates of nonpayment on outstanding iAdvance loans. The company also is awaiting word regarding possible reimbursement to borrowers.
"By improperly characterizing the company's financial results and misrepresenting its prospects, the defendants presented a misleading image of Meta Financial business and future growth prospects, " the lawsuit states.
As you can see from the above the OTS has ordered Meta Financial Group, not MetaBank as it is only a holding of Meta Financial Group to cease all originating loans on the IAdvance from the bank. Also this was brought about by the bond holders, not the people holding these preditory loans. They are claiming that these loans caused the company the ability to inflate thier books and therefor defrauded them into buying the bonds. (SEC)
Conspiracy theorys and bad information will only serve to misinform those that have a valid complaint. Google IAdvance or MetaBank in the news section and follow the links for what actually is happening.
A reply to Teeessa meza. What Meta Bank is doing is definitly Bull s**t. However I have to tell you that it is a very small bank out of Iowa. I personnally know the people at the very top. They may be crooks, but they are not affilliated with George Bush or his administration in any way. They may wish they knew George Bush, but they don't. So get off your young stupid liberal high horse and quit trying to blame the republicans. I would suggest that you quit making false accusations about things that you know nothing about. If you ever become a lawyer, god help us.
My comment is this, surprise surprise. This Bank is X -President George Bush Bank Affiliate. This Meta Bank is a conspiracy. The bank has at least a dozen pre-paid cards sending out to seniors and retired people and even students. They say the security is there really isn't any check envolved so there never is an NSF charged. However, even if you make a direct deposit the affiliate (i.e., Acct. Now, Vision, Access, Netspend Premier etc.) through Metabank gets about $10 dollars per month, $2.50 for pulling out money from ATMs besides the $3.00 the other bank charges. And, .50 cent for every transaction made with the ATM besides (Arco .45 or 76, 1.00) So you got $2.50 +$3/00 to get $300/limit from Wells Fargo ATM, and .50 cents on atm charges, plus $2.00 when you call into the affilite that has sent you the card. A whole charge of $15.50 + per month to use the card. Plus Metabank has it all planned out, you are only allowed to borrow money from them if you have a direct deposit only. If you are using their lending system its $60 for first time users no matter how long your direct deposit is there.
No lending loan, online or otherwise will lend you any money if you have a pre-paid visa/mastercard affiliated ONLY to METABANK. This is unconstitutional because they fixed it so you only borrow money out of MetaBank./MiAdvance... They are in control and that my dear is monopolizing. George Bush Conspiracy or Metabank Conspiracy should be in there hidden but its there he is affiliated and generating from poor folk's money. Someone has got to do something to stop this. I am a law student and dam I wish I could find the amendment to put this mad man down I swear, no fear I would sue him for millions. No wonder the Arab Diplomate threw the shoe at him, that should have hit him in the heard.. So don't deal with METABANK and if so get out, I did. teresa77
For the person whose money was being held up, you are allowed to have up to $5, 000 dollars in your atm//visa etc. (only $300 to $500 access per day) read their terms and conditions. By the way the key is to make those documents so long and time wise so you don't read the terms. The other thing, if you close that account and this bank refusses to let you have your money, call the police because the law says you are to have access of your money once you close your account. Unless their is an economomical crisis such as the one 2 years ago with the stock market, ira;s etc. Now banks only allow $250, 000 dollars in savings, trust funds, etc.. That 911 excuse to hold back your money is [censor]. Whatever happened to all the money held by the Government during Bush Administration when all the Saudi and Arabics Bank accounts were close. Ask Federal Reserve, FOLKS ITS MILLIONS TIED UP. No one ever talked about that?????
yes I think the OTS and Meta-bank should be held accountable for the lack of notification to the customers. The OTS is suppose to be there to help protect people. The OTS ordered to shutdown of the I Advance there should of been some kind of consideration of the impact, damages or hardships this is creating on the customers. At the very least adequate and timely notification should of been provided. I think both The Office of Thrift Supervision and Meta-Bank are and should be held responsible to all the customers for damages.
a verified customer
The Federal Government has just ordered IAdvance a loan division of Metabank to desist all loan advance acctivities which has caused many consumers financial distraught due to the lack of consideration for the Metabank customers. Netspend, another debit card issuing company, one of many owned by Metabank, has customer service representatives who deny having prior knowledge of this government order to desist all of it's loan operations. IAdvance customers are now in a financial dilemma. Do you think the government (Office of Thrift Supervision) - Customer Complaints and Inquireries should assist the affected customers with recovery for the lacking of notification prior to the shutdown of IAdvance? Do you hold IAdvance responsible for the inconvienience and or dammages that created hardships for their customers? Do you think Metabank should be the responsible party insuring adequate and timely notification and financial recovery of it's customers? Is the government agency considered immune to penalties and not responsible in the matter of due consideration. Please continue to follow and post your opinions.
I also have a issue withMeta Bank, I recently recieved money from the IRS and then I loaded it on to a Jackson Hewitt Ipower pre-paid card that is als through Metaback. The next day they shut my card completetly off and I had no access to my funds. I called Metabank and they said that they blocked my card due to large amount of money loaded on my card. I have never heard of this in my life, then they started asking me for all kinds of documents to send to them documents that I don't even think concerns them. But in order to get my money back I had to send them all these documents. MetaBack is full of s---- and someone need to do something about them.
You should also contact your state legislators and your national legislators asking for better banking regulations so that the public is protected better. Yes, banks, especially ones like Meta Bank will complain about their rights of free enterprise being limited, but they have already shown that they do not respect the rights of others within the free enterprise system. They do not understand the concept of honesty and personal integrity.
There needs to be more regulation of banks and over sight of their internal practices so that they cannot tell you ridiculous stories like the one you have mentioned above. You should be able to access your own money at any time. I experienced the same thing with Meta Bank. They told me that they didn't know if my card had been stolen or not; I had never reported the card as being stolen. They spent a large amount of time trying to blame their decisions on me their customer. It is not enough to warn other people not to use Meta Bank. Banking Laws need to regulate institutions like this one so they can't keep taking advantage of the general public.
Please send you story to the proper authorities and then ask them to make the changes in the laws so that this will never happen to another person again.
If only someone had done this for us, we would not be writing in to this website now.
I had a similar nightmare with Meta Bank where they changed the rules, prevented me from having access to my own money when I needed it the most, and then tried to blame me for causing all of the problems. Please report your experience to the Attorney General in the state where you live and to the Better Business Bureau in Des Moines, Iowa which is the state where Meta Bank is located, only so BBB will have a record of your complaint. Then please write a letter of complaint about the customer service you have received from Meta Bank to
Office of Thrift Supervision
Department of the Treasury
Consumer Affairs Division
1700 G Street, NW
Washington, DC 20552