Heyo, I don't think you need a phone number to activate a GreenDot card, at least, I don't remember needing it for the last two I had.
a phone number is not necessary if you activate it online. you might need to fill one in on the application, but you can put in any number you want.
Good thread topic. I was thinking of ordering some stuff online soon, and I was wondering if using GD would work. It's not surprising that it didn't work though, most companies want you to fill in the blanks with an actual address, but it doesn't mean that you have to physically live there.
green dot and similar cards WILL work. anytime i needed to order something online i'd just go change my address on the card online to wherever i needed to have the package delivered.
GreenDot works fine enough, I used it for about a year. BUT when you do activate it (and you need to in order to use it any/everywhere) you've got to do it by phone and they need an address to send it to. It was ok enough, but they charge you 5$ every monthr for the account and then another 4$ for the card (which comes with 24 hours support, etc, blah, blah, blah). NOT worth 10 feking dollars every month, IMO.
there are good prepaid cards, and bad ones. the good ones won't charge you for sending you a physical card. most prepaid cards charge about $5/month. for some reason though, the walmart versions of green dot only charge you $3 for the card and $3 for reloads (free if you do it in a walmart) and $3/month. also i believe if you sign up online walmart will send you a card free of charge.
i recently switched to paypal's prepaid card, which costs a little more ($5/month) but it's totally worth it if you do a lot of paypal stuff, since they'll give you
instant transfers from your paypal account (to transfer from paypal to other prepaid cards takes anywhere from 3-5 days). so for example, when someone donates money to stp's paypal account, i can instantly access that money from my paypal prepaid credit card, and pay the server bills (since linode.com doesn't take paypal payments).
if you're considering one of these cards, look closely at the fees. if a card charges you fees to check your balance, withdraw money from an atm (in addition to the atm fees) or anything other than a monthly fee and a reload fee, don't bother, they're rip offs (netspend, i'm looking at you).
i've been using prepaid cards in lieu of bank accounts for about 6 years (pretty much since they started selling them, back in the days when you didn't need to verify your address/ssn) and i can tell you that absolutely the best card to use is the walmart visa card from green dot. they only charge you a monthly fee ($3) and a fee to put money on it ($3) but are also compatible with the $5 green dot reload cards you find everywhere else. the walmart card doesn't charge you to transfer money onto it from a paypal or direct deposit account.
as i said above, the paypal mastercard is a decent choice if you're into doing a lot of paypal stuff. i've been using mine for about a year now and it's been pretty great.
Get the visa gift cards, not the reloadable ones. Don't need to have anything for those. And there's no fees.
Also, some places now have Amazon drop boxes at 711, you can get stuff shipped there. Only seen that in Portland so far.
visa gift cards (non-reloadable) can be used for physical goods/transactions, but cannot be used to buy anything online without registering your name/ssn/address first. this is to prevent 'money laundering' and other similar schemes (although, really, it's a minor hurdle that isn't hard to get past).
and the thing about amazon drop boxes is that they are not only for amazon products only, but also only for amazon products that are either sold directly from amazon or an authorized FBA (fulfillment by amazon) retailer. this means that most used goods don't qualify for amazon drop boxes. a minor point, but something to consider.