Did anyone know that now some banks are allowing you to generate your own digital credit card instantly after being approved, rather than having to wait a week for the physical card to arrive in the mail?
I just learned this on Friday. I was approved for a Westpac card. In the approval email, it gave me info that I could log into the app and generate my digital card and save to google wallet to use immediately while waiting for the physical card. I thought this was fantastic.
Now don’t get me wrong, I have used lots of digital cards in the past, but that was only after getting my physical card and doing the usual setup steps.
This is a gamechanger for me, because I usually get a new card in preparation for some big spends, and I often have to wait and wait for it to arrive.
So…
Lets put our knowledge together. Does anyone know of any other banks who are doing this great quality of life feature? As soon as you’re approved, you can activate your digital card and smash out that required spend for the introductory bonus before the physical card even arrives.
I think a lot of the newer “online-only” banks like up bank do that already.
Definitely a lovely innovation that I’m surprised hasn’t caught on that quickly with the more traditional big banks. It is great because customers can start spending on the card right away and also expose them to mobile payments (although I heard that banks have to pay more for mobile payments over standard card payments so that might be why they aren’t really pushing it).
It’s not just bank cards too! I’ve seen gift cards (specifically the restaurant gift card) use this! Just type in your phone number and your gift card code and they’ll send you an apple pay ready card. Beats carrying a gift card around and swiping everywhere.
Honestly, its been so convenient I don’t carry my wallet with me that often anymore. Its just drivers license and go card (Brisbane FTW WOOO!!!) at the back of the phone case, and then my phone for payments. Easy as.
I had a Westpac Altitude card back in Sep-20 and was able to generate the digital card. Since then, I have asked the AmEx and the ANZ CS teams re this and they said they haven’t heard of any plans of rolling this to customers.