Control Prepaid Mastercard Review
The Control Prepaid Mastercard is feature-rich. It offers high-interest savings, budgeting features, check deposits and more. But you have to watch the ATM fees.
Control Prepaid Mastercard At-a-Glance
Pros
- High-Interest Savings Account
- Budgeting Features
Cons
- Non-waivable monthly fee
- ATM Fees
Features
The Control Prepaid Mastercard is a feature-rich prepaid card. As a Netspend-managed card, it offers many of the same features as the more well-known Netspend® Visa® Prepaid Card. For example, it offers the same optional high-interest savings account, one of the better features of the Netspend card. You can set up a savings account connected to your Control card and earn a 5% APY up to a $1,000 balance.
And because it’s one of the Netspend family of cards, you can transfer money between the Control card and any other Netspend card, such as the Brink's Prepaid Mastercard® or PayPal Prepaid Mastercard® cards at no charge.
The Control Prepaid Mastercard also offers budgeting features. Through the online portal, you can set spending limits by category, see how much you’ve spent for the month, and get alerts to keep you on target.
Fees
The Control card has a simple fee structure. The basic plan charges $7.95 per month with no transaction or purchase fees. And there’s no activation or purchase fee if you order the card online. The monthly fee drops to $5 with the discounted fee plan if you use direct deposit to load $500 or more to the card in the prior month.
Control Prepaid Mastercard® not what you are looking for? Check out other options in our Best Prepaid Debit Cards list.
The only other fee to use the card is the ATM fee. Withdrawals cost $2.50 plus the ATM owner’s fee. ATM fees can be avoided pretty easily by using the card to get cash back at the register at many grocery stores and other retailers.
The Control card does have some other one-time fees. The Control card allows you to customize your card, for instance. It costs $4.95. It also costs $4.95 to get an additional companion card.
The Bottom Line
For direct deposit users looking to use their prepaid card to control spending, the Control Prepaid Mastercard is competitive. However, some prepaid cards charge no monthly fee.
If you’ll use some of the additional features of the card, such as the savings account and card-to-card transfers, the Control Prepaid card may be worth the additional cost.
Best For: Those wanting budgeting and savings features in their prepaid card
Not So Good For: Those looking for the lowest monthly fee card without the features