I have to admit, I've always been jealous of Japanese Credit Cards having game characters on them. Every now and then on Kotaku or other gaming blogs you'd see cool game themed credit/debit cards and wonder "Why don't we get those in the US?". Then comes along the Capcom Unity Debit Card which features character designs from Street Fighter IV, Bionic Commando, Resident Evil 5 and others and I think "WOW! It's about time!".

The idea is that you put money on the card (it's a debit card, not a credit card) and I thought it'd be a great way to try and monitor/control my spending as I'm moving away quickly from regular credit cards. Sure, they charge you $10 to activate it, which sucks, but it could be worse...right? Ooooooohhhh yes it sure could.

What they don't tell you right away is how many fees there are for this card (it's downright ridiculous!). In my first week of owning the card and trying to buy something on Amazon here are the fees I accrued (warning: not for the faint of heart):

03/13/2009 Fee - POS Decline US $-0.50
03/13/2009 Visa settle - AMZ*Amazon Payments AMZN.COM/BILLUS $-7.72
03/13/2009 Fee - POS Decline US $-0.50
03/13/2009 Fee - POS Decline US $-0.50
03/11/2009 Fee - POS Decline US $-0.50
03/11/2009 Fee - Call Center Customer Service Fees $-6.00
03/11/2009 Fee - Call Center Customer Service Fees $-4.00
03/10/2009 Fee - POS Decline US $-0.50
03/04/2009 Fee - Activation fee $-9.95
03/03/2009 Credit Card $9.95
03/03/2009 Credit Card $50.00
OUCH!

Okay and now to explain what the heck was going on here. I originally started with putting $50 on the card. I received the card in about a week as explained (I got the Ryu SFIV card design by the way). I wanted to try it out and use it in a supermarket but the card wouldn't activate. It said "Please enter all 16 numbers on the front of your card". I did so and it repeated "That number is not valid, please try again". After nearly 15 tries, I decided to ask customer service what was going on. They said their automated system was down and they'd be happy to help me on the phone to activate it. What they Didn't tell me is that they charged me $6.00 and $4.00 respectively (not sure why twice!) to do it on the phone. How crappy is your company that you have to charge your users to activate your card when your automated system is down? Seriously?

Then to add insult to injury, the card didn't work when I brought it out. I was told the card was declined at the supermarket, the gas station and then later on Amazon.com. If you look at my fees you'll notice I was charged a handful of fees from them not accepting the card and a whopping $7.72 for "Visa Settle" with Amazon.com whatever that means. Man oh man is this card a rip off. To make things worse they charge you the following as well:

Standard Fees:
$09.95 - Card Activation/Issuance Fee
$04.95 - Monthly Maintenance Fee
$05.00 - Dormancy Fee (90 days after last card activity)
$00.00 - Signature Based POS Transaction Fees / Waived
$00.50 - Signature Transaction Decline Fee
$00.25 - PIN Based POS Transaction Fee
$00.50 - PIN Based POS Transaction Decline Fee

ATM Fees:
$01.50 - Withdrawal (In US) / per withdrawal
$03.50 - Withdrawal (Outside US) / per withdrawal
$00.50 - Decline (In US) / per decline
$01.00 - Decline (Outside US) / per decline
$00.50 - "Other" (per action or transaction)

$10.00 - Cash Advance / per transaction

$02.00 - Card-to-Card Transfer Fees / per transfer

Customer Service Fees:
$00.25 - VRU Fee / per action
$01.50 - Representative-assisted / per call
$02.00 - Request for Paper Statement (mailed)

$00.00 - Website cardholder account inquiries / Waived
$10.00 - Replacement Card Fee / per card
$20.00 - Express Delivery of Replacement Card / per card
$10.00 - Administrative Fee to Close Account
$10.00 - Overdraft Fee / per overdraft

Pay Bills Online:
$00.00 - Electronic Payment / Waived
$01.00 - Paper Check Payment / per check
$15.00 - Check Cancellations / per cancellation

Other Rules/Limits:
Maximum Card Load Limit: $2500 per day
Maximum Card Balance Limit: $5000
Maximum ATM Withdrawal Limit: 10 Transactions up to $500 per day
Maximum POS Transaction Limit: 20 Transactions up to $2500 per day
Maximum Pinned POS Transaction Limit: 10 Transactions up to $500 per day

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So in summary, in order to have a cool Capcom-themed Debit Card (that supposedly gets you discounts on their online store and such) you will have to: Pay to activate the card, pay to call customer service when their service isn't working properly, pay to use the card, pay to not use the card, pay to add money to the card, withdraw money from the card, transfer money to another card, pay money to your bills, pay when the card isn't working when it should be, pay if you decide to use your pin-code, pay to get a paper statement and many more.

CAGs, as tempting as it may be, stay far, far, far away from these cards. I'm about ready to suck it up and pay the $10 to cancel it and I've only had it a week. Capcom, I think you really have sunk to a new low. This is far worse than charging for DLC or multiplayer in Resident Evil 5.

Final Grade (in CAG Value): F