Thought Id help all you fellow PS3 Owners out in regards to purchasing games from the US PS Store. There has been a lot of disgruntled PS3 owners about complaining about the lack of games on the Euro PS3 Store with good reason too! So i thought Id share with you what I have done to be able to add funds to my US Wallet.
Why it works is that the Virtual Visa card does not hold your own information on it as such. The card has a number Security code Expiry date that increments each month, but it does not use your name and most importantly Your Address. This means you can enter any address you want ideally the one you used to set up your US account. Helped a couple of people a week or so ago with it not sure how well it went, but feed back if i make any mistakes would help.
Sorry if it a bit long but it doesnt take much time to complete the registration/validation process probably 30 minutes (not including waiting for emails etc)
Quick note I do not have any links with the company, others may offer similar benefits, but i couldnt find them!
A while back I wanted to get an online Credit Card, most seemed to be switch/ meastro based so was no good for me as i wanted a VISA card. Spent a while searching and after looking at various comapanies i decided to go for one called Entropay. Link
http://www.entropay.com/
I choose this one as it has no monthly or yearly fees, no hidden costs, all costs are displayed and are easy to understand and it all seemed legit. The only cost is the 4.5% Fee to deposit money onto your Visa Card and a £3 charge to withdraw money from your Entropay account to your own Bank account.
Ill Take it that you have signed up for a US account, if not there is plenty of FAQs about doing this on here or the Web.
So heres what to do..
First of all go to the Entropay site read FAQ and decide if its for you. http://www.entropay.com/
Now you have to set up an Entropay bank account, to me its a bit like Paypal where your money is stored until you decide what to do with it, in our case put it on an Entropay Visa Card.
Now you have to register, as it reads in the FAQs make sure that it is a current and Valid email address.
After Registration is complete you will get an email with a link and activation key. The link will take you back to EntroPay where you will be asked to enter your password. Then after entering your password you will be asked to confirm your email address and your EntroPay Account will activate. Once it is activated you can start using your EntroPay Account.
Once you have set up an account you have to register a top up source, this can be any other debit or credit card, this is used to deposit money into your Entropay bank account. This is done by logging into your account and clicking on CREATE TOP UP SOURCE, fill in all the details, you must keep your debit/credit card you are going to use to "Top Up" address the same as the address its registered to. When finished it will ask you to make a validation top up of £10 and enter 3 digit pin if needed. You will now have £10 in your Entropay bank account and be asked to validate your account.
Next you have to validate your Top up source, the £10 it took from your account will be split into 2 debits ie £3 and £7 and taken from your account. If you have access to online or telephone banking it will probably speed things up a bit as the 2 debits should appear next working day. Log back into your account and click on "top up" then "manage top up source", select the card you used and select Validate. You will then be asked to enter the 2 amounts for example £3 and £7 doesnt matter which way round you put them in.
If this is succesful you will get a "Know your Customer" Email.
In this email it gives you a list of things to send them to prove you are who you say you are you have to send all three of these.
1. A clear copy of your Passport/I.D. card/driving licience (both sides).
2. A clear copy of the credit/debit card (both sides) - blocking out the middle 8 digits of the card number and the 3 digit Card Security Code (CVV/CVV2) number on the back
3. A clear copy of a recent bank statement where your name and address are clearly visible.
You can either post or Fax a copy, but i found out that you can email the documentation. I scanned all the info needed as a black/white image, blacked out the middle numbers on the card using paint or something like it. This should leave first 4 and last 4 digits visible, I also blacked out the middle numbers on the rear of the card as you could make them out through the card, aswell as the 3 security digits leaving just my signature visible.
When all this is done you recieve an email telling you validation is complete and you can now add funds to your Entropay Bank Account.
Earlier i mentioned about a 4.5% cost to adding funds to your card, what this means is say if you put £20 into your Entropay Account you can only add £19.1 to your Visa card (4.5%) if you try to add £20 it will ask you to add more funds to your account, this got a bit confusing at first as i didnt see that it had gone back to the add funds to my account screen (DOH!). So everytime you add money to your account add 4.5% for the full amount e.g. if you want to put £20 on your Visa card you have to add £20.90. Not so confusing i hope. Also you can change the currency to Dollars, Euros etc so if you are going to use it on the US store it makes sense to set the currency as dollars. You should now be ready to get some US PS store Goodies!!
There helpdesk is very good, its one of those Instant messenger type things so the responses are normally fast and they seem to be very helpful. There Email responses are usually quite quick also.
One important thing i have not done as i use my virtual card for buying on ebay or in the states is that you can have a card for one place only, ie just the US PS store. This will mean you do not have to pay the 4.5% for transactions, not done this yet for 2 reasons first as i have said i use it for places im unsure off as they can only use what i have on the card so fraud isnt as much as a problem and secondly dont know how to add the US store as a single user. If anyone else manages to do this can you tell me how you got on doing it and any problems.
Hope this will Help some of you out.
Matt
Why it works is that the Virtual Visa card does not hold your own information on it as such. The card has a number Security code Expiry date that increments each month, but it does not use your name and most importantly Your Address. This means you can enter any address you want ideally the one you used to set up your US account. Helped a couple of people a week or so ago with it not sure how well it went, but feed back if i make any mistakes would help.
Sorry if it a bit long but it doesnt take much time to complete the registration/validation process probably 30 minutes (not including waiting for emails etc)
Quick note I do not have any links with the company, others may offer similar benefits, but i couldnt find them!
A while back I wanted to get an online Credit Card, most seemed to be switch/ meastro based so was no good for me as i wanted a VISA card. Spent a while searching and after looking at various comapanies i decided to go for one called Entropay. Link
http://www.entropay.com/
I choose this one as it has no monthly or yearly fees, no hidden costs, all costs are displayed and are easy to understand and it all seemed legit. The only cost is the 4.5% Fee to deposit money onto your Visa Card and a £3 charge to withdraw money from your Entropay account to your own Bank account.
Ill Take it that you have signed up for a US account, if not there is plenty of FAQs about doing this on here or the Web.
So heres what to do..
First of all go to the Entropay site read FAQ and decide if its for you. http://www.entropay.com/
Now you have to set up an Entropay bank account, to me its a bit like Paypal where your money is stored until you decide what to do with it, in our case put it on an Entropay Visa Card.
Now you have to register, as it reads in the FAQs make sure that it is a current and Valid email address.
After Registration is complete you will get an email with a link and activation key. The link will take you back to EntroPay where you will be asked to enter your password. Then after entering your password you will be asked to confirm your email address and your EntroPay Account will activate. Once it is activated you can start using your EntroPay Account.
Once you have set up an account you have to register a top up source, this can be any other debit or credit card, this is used to deposit money into your Entropay bank account. This is done by logging into your account and clicking on CREATE TOP UP SOURCE, fill in all the details, you must keep your debit/credit card you are going to use to "Top Up" address the same as the address its registered to. When finished it will ask you to make a validation top up of £10 and enter 3 digit pin if needed. You will now have £10 in your Entropay bank account and be asked to validate your account.
Next you have to validate your Top up source, the £10 it took from your account will be split into 2 debits ie £3 and £7 and taken from your account. If you have access to online or telephone banking it will probably speed things up a bit as the 2 debits should appear next working day. Log back into your account and click on "top up" then "manage top up source", select the card you used and select Validate. You will then be asked to enter the 2 amounts for example £3 and £7 doesnt matter which way round you put them in.
If this is succesful you will get a "Know your Customer" Email.
In this email it gives you a list of things to send them to prove you are who you say you are you have to send all three of these.
1. A clear copy of your Passport/I.D. card/driving licience (both sides).
2. A clear copy of the credit/debit card (both sides) - blocking out the middle 8 digits of the card number and the 3 digit Card Security Code (CVV/CVV2) number on the back
3. A clear copy of a recent bank statement where your name and address are clearly visible.
You can either post or Fax a copy, but i found out that you can email the documentation. I scanned all the info needed as a black/white image, blacked out the middle numbers on the card using paint or something like it. This should leave first 4 and last 4 digits visible, I also blacked out the middle numbers on the rear of the card as you could make them out through the card, aswell as the 3 security digits leaving just my signature visible.
When all this is done you recieve an email telling you validation is complete and you can now add funds to your Entropay Bank Account.
Earlier i mentioned about a 4.5% cost to adding funds to your card, what this means is say if you put £20 into your Entropay Account you can only add £19.1 to your Visa card (4.5%) if you try to add £20 it will ask you to add more funds to your account, this got a bit confusing at first as i didnt see that it had gone back to the add funds to my account screen (DOH!). So everytime you add money to your account add 4.5% for the full amount e.g. if you want to put £20 on your Visa card you have to add £20.90. Not so confusing i hope. Also you can change the currency to Dollars, Euros etc so if you are going to use it on the US store it makes sense to set the currency as dollars. You should now be ready to get some US PS store Goodies!!
There helpdesk is very good, its one of those Instant messenger type things so the responses are normally fast and they seem to be very helpful. There Email responses are usually quite quick also.
One important thing i have not done as i use my virtual card for buying on ebay or in the states is that you can have a card for one place only, ie just the US PS store. This will mean you do not have to pay the 4.5% for transactions, not done this yet for 2 reasons first as i have said i use it for places im unsure off as they can only use what i have on the card so fraud isnt as much as a problem and secondly dont know how to add the US store as a single user. If anyone else manages to do this can you tell me how you got on doing it and any problems.
Hope this will Help some of you out.
Matt
