By : 
Mr Credit Card
Mr Credit Card
The Verve Mastercard (issued by Continental Finance) has a mobile app that is available in both Android and IOS. The app is extremely useful for cardholders to get an overview of their card simply by scanning the home page, which includes your minimum balance, payment due date, statement balance and a link to your recent activities and transactions.
You can also make payments from your mobile app through your checking account. The app (and online portal) allows you to set up multiple bank accounts so you can use different banks to pay your statement bills if you want to.
You can also set up alerts in your app such as when your statement is available, when a payment is due, or when your balance exceeds a certain threshold. There are also some limitations on the app. For example, you cannot set up autopay from the app, but must do that in your desktop online portal instead.
In this review, we go through what the app does and does not do and give our evaluations.
What the Surge Credit Card Mobile App Can Do
Home Page Snapshot
The home page of the Surge credit card mobile app gives you a snapshot of your minimum balance, Payment due date, statement balance and recent activities. I find the layout well thought out and at a glance, you can see all the relevant information just from the home page (see picture below).
Viewing Your Recent Activities and Transactions
Most of you will be using your mobile app to view your latest activities and transactions on the card. You can simply tap on the "recent activity" tab on the home page. One issue that some cardholders have is that the app does not update your recent transaction immediately. That issue can be resolved by simply logging out and then logging back into your app again. Having said that, I hope their software developers will simply create a refresh button to solve this issue.
Making Payments from the app
Many of you would want to use the mobile app to pay your statement bills. To make a payment from the app, you have to use your checking account (there is no way around this). Fior those of you who want to use your debit card, you have to "pay by phone". Some of you would say that your debit card is linked to your checking account. But the app is set up so that you can save your checking account information (which includes your bank account number and routing number) for the convenience of not having to enter these information every time you make a payment from your app.When you click the "payment" tab, you are given a choice to pay the full balance, minimum payment or other amounts. You can then choose the bank account that you want to use (or have already set up in your app or desktop portal).
For those of you who want to use autopay, you have to set it up on your desktop portal. At this moment, it appears that you cannot set it up on your mobile app yet though it shows whether you have autopay enabled.
Biometrics and Face ID
The Verve App now has biometrics and Face ID login. Some folks have complained that the feature does not always work or stops working if you change your phone. Regardless, you can always fall back to simply logging into your app the normal way.Alerts and Notifications
- statement available
- credit card payment due date - especially if you do not intend to set up autopay and like to pay manually either via the app or portal
- payment post to account
- credit limit reached or exceeded
- balance exceeds threshold - this is a great setup to do if you are looking to keep your spending on the card to a certain credit utilization ratio
- balance is within a specified amount of your credit limit
What the App Cannot Do
Debit Card Cannot Be Used to Pay on Mobile App - When you pay your bills via the mobile app, the payment will come from your checking account. To make things simple, you should set up your bank account in your app or online portal where you save your bank account and routing number and give your bank a "name". If you do not do that, you will have to enter your account and routing number everytime you pay. Having said all this, you cannot use your debit to pay even though it is linked to your checking account. To use your debit to pay, you have to pay via phone.
App Manages Only One Card with One Login - Surge credit card is one of the many Continental Finance credit cards. The mobile app only allows you to manage one card with one login. If you have two Continental Finance credit cards, you actually need two separate logins. This is quite a real inconvenience and hopefully, the software developers will fix this issue.
Cannot freeze Surge card from mobile app - If you lose your Surge credit card or you think you might have, you cannot freeze your card using your mobile app. Instead, you have to use the old fashion way and call customer service to report the loss.
No Live Chat or direct call to customer service from app - The Mobile App at this moment does not have a "Live Chat" feature. They do list the customer support number but you cannot call directly by clicking on it. This is another "to do list" for their developers.
Cannot order replacement card from app - Though some mainstream credit card issuers have apps with this feature, Surge credit card app does not. But this is not an issue that most of you will care about.
Our Take: A Decent App Which Will Get Better Over Time
Many of you will be using the app to pay your bills and the process is really easy. To make your life even easier, you should definitley set up your bank account so that you do not have to fill in your bank account and routing number each time you pay. One thing to be aware of is that you cannot use your checking account debit card to pay your bill from your mobile app (ie you can only set up bank account with routing number). If you want to pay your bills using your debit card, you have to pay over the phone.
One thing to take note of is that you cannot set up autopay from your mobile app at this moment. You can only do so from your desktop portal though the app will show you if autopay is enabled.
While there are some things that you cannot do on the mobile app (like freezing your card or have live chats), it has been improving over time and more features will be added. For the moment, it is a very decent app for a subprime credit card.