FairFX Lands Mastercard Membership for Potential Worldwide Expansion

Competition in the mobile payments and mobile banking fields is tight, and despite a handful of firms exiting the market in 2017, it’s only looking like the competition will get tighter. Recently, FairFX announced a new measure that would give it some edge in the field: Mastercard membership status. With such status comes new rights and privileges, and a new way to get and keep customer interest.

FairFX is an e-banking operation that also handles international payments, and with the arrival of Mastercard membership, the company can now issue Mastercard-branded cards connected to its operations. The membership applies to Europe for now, but will soon expand to other regions. It represents one major development in that FairFX is applying directly to payment networks and banking networks rather than routing its efforts through third parties.

FairFX had been steadily working on expansion for some time, with several card programs in place administered by third parties. Now, these programs can all be brought in-house, a process which will both simplify internal operations and improve delivery at the customer level, meaning a near-certainty of reduced costs and a fairly good chance of improved revenue besides.

FairFX’s CEO, Ian Strafford-Taylor, noted “Gaining Mastercard Membership is a major step in our stated aim of reducing FairFX’s reliance on third parties and providing choice for the business. We can now place our various products and services through the supply chain that fits best from the perspective of cost, flexibility and reliability. Going forward this will simplify our product iteration and reduce our cost base which will ultimately benefit our customers.”

Any kind of differentiation, in a market full of competitors, will be at least some help to a business going forward. When there are so many brands of e-banking options out there—many of which are backed up by physical bank branches—anything that gives an e-bank an edge is worth considering. Mastercard membership for FairFX should be part of that mix. Reduced costs and improved services will help, but FairFX should be plowing those savings into as much R&D as the business can stand.

FairFX has made one great step here, but if it doesn’t follow that step up with something substantial—and soon—it may only realize limited benefit at best.