More than one-third of the 40 million underbanked individuals in the United States would rather use a prepaid card than a checking account for basic financial transactions if costs were equal. Underbanked consumers say they appreciate the convenience, transparency, and privacy of prepaid cards. In addition, prepaid cards offer the promise of a checkless checking account, enabling financially underserved individuals not only to conduct transactions conveniently, cheaply, and safely, but also to save and access credit.

To understand current trends in general purpose reloadable (GPR) prepaid cards, CFSI partnered with Paybefore.com to conduct an Internet poll of industry executives. CFSI then interviewed 18 industry leaders across the spectrum of participants in the prepaid value chain. All interviews were conducted with senior level managers, generally the person responsible for the prepaid card business within a large company or the chief executive officer of a smaller company.