Prepaid card processor eCommLink Inc. is joining with mobile phone and payment technology providers to offer a cell phone and prepaid debit MasterCard tied to a single account. The prepaid MasterCard function eventually will be incorporated into the phone, enabling consumers to use the phone for payments at merchants' points …

With efforts by merchants to force down interchange rates picking up steam, the rapidly expanding prepaid card market will confront two very different outcomes should those efforts ultimately succeed, according to an expert on interchange. Cards issued by merchants would likely benefit, but those issued by banks would be hurt, …

Visa USA's chief executive on Wednesday outlined a multimarket strategy for prepaid cards, while announcing that convenience-store titan 7-Eleven Inc. has joined Visa's fledgling prepaid reload network and calling for greater efforts to educate regulators about the unique characteristics of prepaid plastic. “There's an incredible opportunity [in the prepaid market],” …

More than 3 million PayPal users have been invited to try the online processor's virtual debit card since it was introduced in July, a PayPal executive responsible for the product tells Digital Transactions News. That represents almost 10% of PayPal's total active account base. The card, which links to users' …

Payment processor eFunds Corp. will take over the processing of American Express Co.'s fast-growing retail and gift card portfolio in 2007 and 2008 under a deal announced Wednesday. The deal, financial terms of which were not released, is the biggest prepaid contract to date for Scottsdale, Ariz.-based eFunds, which focuses …

Processor Metavante Corp. has come up with a seemingly natural but rare pairing of two booming payment niches: payroll cards and electronic bill payments. A major provider of both services to financial institutions, Milwaukee-based Metavante this week introduced what it calls Metavante Prepaid Bill Payment. The service makes Internet-based bill …

A Conshohocken, Pa.-based processor has begun marketing a service that allows employees covered by flexible-spending health-care plans to use any payment or loyalty card they have to access benefits. Finpago Inc. announced this week an agreement with health-benefits administrator WageWorks Inc., San Mateo, Calif., to launch its FSAok AnyCard program …

Wireless provider Virgin Mobile USA LLC on Monday introduced a reloadable prepaid card that will allow its 4 million mostly young subscribers to pay for goods and services at stores and on the Web, pay bills, and send cash to one another. The card, a Visa-branded product Virgin calls the …

The business of putting debit cards in bank customers' hands on the spot, at the moment they open an account, is growing rapidly and may soon include prepaid cards and credit cards, according to a supplier of software that controls the process. Dynamic Card Solutions, Englewood, Colo., says it now …

PayPal Inc. will start rolling out its so-called virtual debit card to “hundreds of thousands” of users some time this month in a process it expects to complete by the end of August, a spokesperson for the San Jose, Calif.-based unit of online auctioneer eBay Inc. tells Digital Transactions News. …