Review: Mogo Prepaid Visa Card (MogoCard)

SEPT 2021 UPDATE: Almost as quickly as it came, the Mogo 2% cashback in Bitcoin has been nerfed, in favor of planting trees. Sadly this relegates Mogo card back to being a relatively useless card among the visa prepaid cards offered in Canada.

MAY 2021 UPDATE: A lot has changed since this article was written. Mogo Visa Platinum prepaid card now offers 1% cashback in Bitcoin, upgrading this to 2% cashback starting June 1, 2021. This catapults Mogo into being essentially the best-prepaid card in Canada for everyday purchases.

If you follow the financial services industry in Canada at all, you may have noticed the Canadian company Mogo recently advertising their services and features. This is yet another ‘fintech disruptor’, similar to Brightside, a company which comes with a new Visa prepaid card, a fancy-looking mobile application, and polished marketing.

mogo mogospend cash back and carbon offset promo

One of their offerings is called MogoSpend, which is essentially a debit account that you can load and then spend using a physical Visa card. It is a prepaid card. 

There has been a bit more buzz about Mogo lately, so let’s take a deep dive into our Mogo Visa review and compare it against other prepaid credit cards: Stack, Koho, & Revolut.

What is Mogo?

Mogo is a financial services application with several financial products and services bundled together. Through having a Mogo account, you may be eligible to access the following services and products:

  1. Mogo Credit Score
    • A free credit score which is updated monthly and provided by Equifax.
  1. MogoProtect:
    • Very limited credit monitoring service. Mogo monitors your Equifax report daily and alerts you if there are any changes, new accounts or loans opened. 
  1. MogoSpend
    • A digital operating spending account and spending insights/analysis, coupled with a Visa Platinum card. This is not a credit card; the Mogo Visa Platinum prepaid card operates more like a debit card as you are loading and spending your own money. MogoSpend is also marketed as contributing to the reduction of your CO2 carbon footprint (one pound of CO2 for every dollar you spend, through carbon credits purchased by Mogo). 
  1. MogoLoans / MogoMoney
    • Loans are a key component of Mogo’s offerings, and they are described as “nicer than a payday loan lender and friendlier than a bank”. I’ve no experience with them and we won’t discuss them in this article, but at a glance it looks like they are just a slightly more competitive payday lender. 
  1. MogoMortgage
    • Mortgages offered by Mogo. Again, we didn’t do a deep dive into this product. At first glance at the time of writing, the rates do look competitive. There is an AMA from a Mogo specialist on RedFlagDeals which may provide more insight. 
  1. MogoWealth
    • An investment product that is not yet available in-app. 
  1. MogoCrypto
    • Streamlined service for buying/selling and holding cryptocurrency. At the time of writing, only Bitcoin is available on this platform.
mogo corporate office lobby

What is the Use Case for MogoSpend?

MogoSpend functions as a reloadable prepaid card (‘MogoCard’). It operates on the Visa network and can be used to make purchases anywhere Visa is accepted. 

As with other reloadable prepaid credit cards, it may be an option for people who want to spend money on digital transactions, but can’t qualify for a credit card that gives rewards on purchases (such as cash back, points, etc).  

The Mogo Visa Platinum prepaid card has no monthly or annual fee and no upfront cost for the physical card. It also has no premium version of the card with additional features, as many of the other prepaid cards have offered (Koho Premium, Revolut Premium, etc).

When it comes to fees, the MogoCard charges a foreign currency transaction fee of 2.5% and a monthly account inactivity fee of $1.99 if you do not use the card for 365 days. It also has ATM withdrawal fees of $1.50 for domestic and $3.00 for international withdrawals.

How Do You Add Money to the Mogo Visa Platinum Prepaid Card?

Cardholders can add money to the Mogo Visa Platinum Prepaid card in-app, via eTransfer or Visa Debit from your bank account. Visa Debit currently only works with TD, CIBC, RBC, and Scotiabank. You can transfer a maximum of $5,000 CAD in one transfer and $9,900 in 24 hours.

At one point in time, the system was unable to differentiate between credit cards and debit cards which made for some interesting manufactured spending opportunities. This is no longer the case.

How Does Mogo Stack up Against Other Reloadable Prepaid Cards?

The MogoSpend card is best compared to the current prepaid credit card landscape: Stack, Revolut, and Koho. 

CardStackRevolut (Standard/free)Koho (Standard/free)Mogo
NetworkMastercardVisaVisaVisa
Partner BankPeople's TrustBank of LithuaniaPeople's TrustPeople's Trust
Exchange RateInterbank rate (Mastercard)Interbank rate (Visa)Interbank rate (Visa)Interbank rate (Visa)
Currency Exchange Maximumn/a$8,000 per month, then 0.5% feen/an/a
Foreign Transaction Fee2.5%0.0%
(1.0% for THB, RUB and UAH)
1.5%2.5%
Load MethodsEMT, Visa Debit, Interac OnlineVisa Debit, Credit Card (usually codes as cash advance)e-Transfer, Direct Deposit (payroll), EFTe-Transfer, Visa Debit, Canada Post
Credit CheckSoftSoftSoftSoft
ATM Withdrawal Fee$0$0$2-3 (1 free exchange with *premium)$1.50 domestic, $3.00 international
ATM Withdrawal Limits ($CAD)$1000 per day
$2000 per month
$400 per month, then 2% fee$300 per withdraw, $600 per day, $3000 per month$500 per day
Cashback Rate0%0%0.5%2.0% (in bitcoin)
Automatic SavingsYes
(roundups and saving goals)
Yes
(Vaults-roundups, savings goals, recurring payments)
Yes
(roundups and saving goals, full savings account coming)
No
Rewards ProgramYesNoYesNo
Rewards PartnershipsIndigo, Frank&Oak, Caudalie, Maple, Turbotax, Clearly, Prana, willful, Lowe’s, World Remitn/aAltitude Sports, Chef's Plate, Frank and Oak, Greenhouse Juice, Indigo, JJ Bean, Mary Brown's, Pizza Pizza, Pizza 73, Public Mobile, Sunwing, Well.can/a

A quick glance at the chart can tell you that, frankly, the Mogo Visa card is objectively inferior to all other reloadable prepaid visa cards on the market. It has no rewards program or cashback (unlike Stack and the Koho prepaid card), has ATM fees (unlike the Stack Mastercard and Revolut), and has foreign transaction fees higher than Stack, Revolut, and Koho. 

I can’t really see why anyone would opt to get this card over the other prepaid cards, at least for the purpose of making purchases. Stack and Revolut or Stack and Koho will give you Mastercard and Visa network coverage and are much better prepaid credit cards for use abroad with their forex rates, lower ATM fees, and currency conversion service (Revolut).

Conclusion

My harsh sentiment aside, Mogo may still be a company to keep an eye on. They have a larger gamut of products than many other fintech companies in Canada, and the profitability of those may allow them to add more generous features to their MogoCard in the future. After all, they did initially launch this card with 1.5% cash back which apparently they would now rather donate to CO2 offsets. 

In the meantime though, I would pass on this card, at least for its intended and legitimate uses. On the other hand, the Mogo Prepaid card was an excellent tool for manufactured spending for a short period of time – perhaps that will happen again.

If you do decide to sign up for whatever other reason (which I may have hinted at in this article), then consider using the link below to support Frugal Flyer. Cheers!

Frequently Asked Questions

The Mogo Prepaid Visa card does not have annual or monthly fees.

However, it does have a foreign currency transaction fee of 2.5% and a monthly account inactivity fee of $1.99 (if you don’t use the card for 365 days). The card also charges ATM withdrawal fees of $1.50 for domestic withdrawals and $3.00 for international withdrawals.

Cardholders can load funds to their Mogo Visa card through Visa Debit or e-transfer from their bank account. As the Mogo Visa card is a reloadable prepaid Visa card and not a credit card, the card needs to be loaded with funds before it can be used.

The Mogo card has a single transaction limit of $3,000 and a $5,000 limit per 24 hours.

The Mogo card has a maximum withdrawal limit of $500 per transaction, per 24 hours.

No, the Mogo prepaid card has to be pre-loaded with funds prior to spending. There is no credit being given and no hard credit check is required as a result.

Mogo offsets CO2 at 1 lb per dollar spent. CO2 credits are valued at approximately~$13 to $20 CAD per tonne at the time of writing. This puts one lb of CO2 at $0.005 to $0.01  One lb of CO2 is not a lot – young trees absorb about 13 lb per year, up to 48 lb per year for adults. By contrast, the average car emits six tonnes of CO2 per year.

Reed Sutton

Reed Sutton

Founder at Frugal Flyer
Reed is addicted to the art of earning and redeeming travel points, and frequently pairs his trips with his other hobby: photography. Through Frugal Flyer, Reed aims to distill some of the complex and esoteric points strategies into digestible information. Furthermore, he hopes to use his technical expertise to develop invaluable applications and tools for the travel community.

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