Topic: My First Xapo Bitcoin Debit Card Purchase (Read 1104 times)

Its nice to see that the fees are not as high as some other options within debit card area, but still, when the 0,2% fee is implemented,
many of those cards wont look so appealing.

What i want to know is; are the xapo account,xapo card, and your local currency the same, or were there conversions ?

cheers

What like Hitler, you mean?

Ive made my point. It wasnt for your consumption.

It's a beta rollout, and Xapo doesn't rape you with fees like Bit-X does.

Xapo has a pretty legit background, but I'm still glad to hear that it went okay

He hooked me up with expedited Beta with Xapo...I'm just giving credit where it's due. Also if you dig into anyone's history there are embarrassing, stupid, or even disturbing things. So I'm not sure what your point is. I take people as I find them, and he's only been cool as hell over the time I've known him.

I think it's sad people hold one's past against someone forever, people deserve second chances and the ability to learn and grow. Maybe one day you will mature and learn to be more accepting of people.

Oh dear.  
Its only a matter of time before you regret associating yourself with this expert marketering fantasist, swapman.....or maybe not, if you share his past views regarding white supremacy/Neo-Nazis.
Regardless if you do or dont, seems your young and naive arse, is under this guys spell. He really has you where he wants you, huh.
Check out the last line of the text below, and ask yourself if Adams quote could be you one day.  

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/adam-guerbuez-claims-some-very-big-news-is-coming-for-bitcoin-this-friday-924474

http://www.cauce.org/2008/11/facebook-vs-adam-guerbuez-and-atlantis-blue-capital.html

http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/california/candce/5:2008cv03889/206207/25/
http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/california/candce/5:2008cv03889/206207/14/


http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/news/story.html?id=715018f6-7274-4e95-afc1-650db5b19939.............

"The Montrealer who was sued for $873 million U.S. by social networking giant Facebook was acquitted of lethal assault in 2000, ran a fake online shock-video store and was once a member of a skinhead group.

Adam Guerbuez, 32, of LaSalle was accused in a U.S. federal court of stealing the login credentials of Facebook members and of using their names to send spam messages.

Guerbuez was ordered on Friday to pay $436.6 million in statutory damages and $436.6 million in aggravated statutory damages.

Reached yesterday by telephone, Guerbuez declined to say how he will pay the damages and refused to comment on the case.

Guerbuez said he will provide a comment on his blog, which is at: adamguerbuez.com

He was acquitted in 2003 for an assault that led to the death of a man in 2000. He also ran the website that claimed to sell videos of homeless people being beaten and harassed.

However, he told The Gazette yesterday the site was a media stunt to get free publicity, and it never sold one video.

He was also a leader of the Heritage Front, an extremist group that sought to set up enclaves in Canada for whites of European descent.

Asked about this, Guerbuez said: "That's old news. We all do stupid things when we're young."

Very nice coverage. Thanks for doing this!

I think a lot of btc users dont understand the difference between a prepaid and a real debit card. All the other bitcoin debit cards I've seen require you to sell bitcoins to load the card and usually take 2-4% fee for doing this and have daily limits and delays to load the card with fiat. In my opinoin I do not consider this a debit card, instead it's a prepaid card.

The Xapo card is the only one I've seen that doesnt need you to preload and spends directly.

Agreed, Bit-X verification takes a few hours often.

10 day for verify account and approve a card is very more time.

I'll give you the exact timeline:

Mar 17 - I verify my email, phone

Mar 19 - I wire SEPA to buy some coins.

Mar 20 - I am notified that I get on beta list.

Mar 27 - I get the email that I have been invited to the beta, I fill out my address to have card shipped.

April 6 - I get card in mail.

That's nice, but I still hope that they're going to make this law:

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-15-4585_en.htm

How long did it take to get approved for the card and for them to actually send it to you? How long did the entire operation last?

The folks over at Xapo have been rolling out beta tests for their new and improved Bitcoin debit card. I was fortunate enough to get on the list and received mine recently.

Going into it, I was honestly nervous after hearing all the horror stories of people who used it in last year's rollout. But I was assured by colleagues and friends that they have changed it to a beta system which has greatly improved. Additionally, I've had great support from Xapo as a betatester, particularly from Anni who was so helpful in getting me started.

So, let me tell you how it went:

For my basic first test, I went to Aldi (a supermarket chain) to make a small purchase, just to see how it was.

Here's the receipt from Xapo

Here's the receipt from Aldi

As you can see, the POS purchase price was 18.90 DKK. The amount deducted from the Xapo was 0.011btc.

At the time, 0.011btc was worth $2.83 at BTC/USD market price of $257.34 (on Bitstamp, their liquidity provider), which was equal to 19.22 DKK (using FX wholesale exchange rate). Using this method, the fee for using the Xapo card for purchase above the price of goods was 1.7%

This is actually lower than the amount stated on the Xapo receipt, which says that the fee was 0.45 DKK above the 18.90 purchase price. According to this, the fee was 2.38%.

There was absolutely no problem using the card. I activated it, received a PIN (note: the card has a valid chip, which is needed for most of Europe). I was worried a bit at first that the available balance on the card showed as 0, but that's how this card works since it is not prepaid.

When you are at the POS making the payment, the backend of the system checks your Xapo wallet to see that there is enough BTC to cover the purchase, and then takes deducts it from your Xapo wallet, sells the coin for fiat, and provides the purchase amount for payment, where it is then accepted. Instantly, as the payment is being accepted, the Xapo app pops up to show this activity.

The order of the process seems to be: Insert Card -> Enter PIN -> Xapo Wallet BTC deducted -> Screen Shows Waiting for <5 seconds -> Accepted). Somehow they have managed to connect these debit cards to their own system that is able to sort the cards by users they have with hot wallets, to ensure smooth payment processing. It was truly flawless in its execution.

It was seamless using the card -- no different from my normal bank card. A layperson would be able to use this card as if it were any other card and would be none the wiser that Bitcoin was even involved in the transaction. It really is just a normal VISA debit card.

The fees were very reasonable, considering if you were trying to go from BTC to fiat in traditional way you would pay spot exchange fees, wire fees, and of course time waiting for it to actually hit your account. Xapo seems to have put together a system which allows you to bypass all that and essentially spend bitcoins anywhere in the world that VISA is accepted.

So as I see it: why not have a Xapo debit card? There's no monthly fees, no idle fees, not even a setup fee! There's just a mild and reasonable transaction fee per purchase. It seems to me a no-brainer just to have it around in case you need/want to use it.

This is just my first experience. Over time I will make YouTube videos showing the card in more action, to put the card truly to the test. But I can confidently say after my first purchase: "so far, so good".

Get on the Xapo beta list here -- I only get 50bits from this so I'm not doing it to shill, just to provide the opportunity to you. Go through all the steps of Twitter, Facebook, etc. and you will get in their beta queue.

Big shoutout to my friend and colleague the billion-dollar bitcoin man Adam Guerbuez who was the original guy to post videos of the Xapo debit card in action: 1,2,3, 4,5 and who introduced me to Xapo and has been a wealth of knowledge on trading the bitcoin markets as well. Without him none of this would have been possible!