Product Launches

RegaloCard aims for remittance market

Wed, Feb, 10 2010

The one-upmanship in the international remittance market continues unabated, with the newest player delivering quite a shot across the bow: free text message- based, retailer-specific funds transfers to Central America. Regalocard, a Miami-based prepaid card company, has developed a system that allows senders to purchase a prepaid gift card in the US for use at a specific retailer in Central America.

Turkey’s Garanti launches iPhone app

Wed, Dec, 9 2009

The emergence of Apple’s iPhone has led to a flurry of applications from financial services providers eager to tap into a tech-savvy demographic of young and wealthy consumers. T urkey’s Garanti Bank, already an innovator in the fields of cards and payments, has now launched its own app, as Victoria C onroy reports

Somalia's first debit card programme launched

Wed, Nov, 11 2009

Somalia, a country ravaged by civil war over the past 15 years, may not be an obvious market in which to launch a modern payment card programme, but one money transfer business, Dahabshiil, has taken the bold step of launching the first-ever debit card offering in the country.

Chasing after the small business market

Fri, Oct, 23 2009

With small businesses bearing the brunt of slowing spending and rising costs, Chase Card Services has launched a range of business charge cards. Charles Davis reports on how Chase is hoping that the new cards will tap into small business owners’ desire to keep a tight grip on cash flow.

Region Round-up

Wed, Aug, 12 2009

The National Credit and Commerce (NCC) Bank of Bangladesh has launched a foreign remittance payment card, known as ‘mBridge’, which will enable beneficiaries of remittances to withdraw their money from both the NCC Bank and 250 rural outlets of TMSS, a non-governmental organisation, across the country. The card can also be used to make purchases at Visa-affiliated merchants.

An evolving corporate marketplace

Wed, Aug, 12 2009

In this month’s guest article, Matthew Lanford, head of prepaid at MasterCard Europe, examines how the current economic environment and the need for cost control are combining to elevate prepaid as an ideal tool for corporates and institutions in areas such as payroll and expenses.

Egg takes on the World

Mon, Jul, 27 2009

The launch of the Egg World Money credit card in the UK heralds a new era of card products targeted at mass affluent consumers, with a wide array of features aimed at high transactors. But it also comes with an annual fee, and many in the industry are now asking if such fees will become more commonplace. Victoria Conroy reports.

New model for merchant-funded rewards

Mon, Jul, 27 2009

As consumers increasingly turn to debit cards, financial institutions cannot simply cut-and-paste credit card rewards programmes and apply them to debit cards. As such, some banks are now exploring the merchant-funded rewards proposition and expanding their profitability potential, as Charles Davis reports.

A vision of the future

Fri, Jun, 12 2009

While many financial institutions and payment players are scaling back their operations and trying to minimise costs, First Data is bucking the trend with continued investment in its recently-rebranded FirstVision platform. John Hill speaks to Nadeem Shaikh about the rationale behind the rebranding.