M-wallet: BarclayCard Promoting Google Wallet

• BarclayCard US has just agreed to encourage its cardholders to save their cards to Google Wallet, and even select it as their default payment choice.

• Users may subscribe online on BarclayCard’s portal. Once logged on, they are redirected to their Google Account to complete their registration. Once the option activated, a full-colour image of the card is displayed promoting usage and confidence about which payment account is being used (as other cards may have been stored).

• The wallet will first be proposed to BarclayCard’s co-branded L.L.Bean and US Airways subscribers. Other programmes should follow.     

Source: Press release

• After a rather unsteady start in the m-payment market (only Citi MasterCard cards and Google prepaid cards could originally be stored), the Web giant went for a strategic turn last August through rethinking its entire payment data storage (see April and August 2012 Insights).

• In addition to Citi cards, the wallet now may include BarclayCard US, Green Dot or Silicon Valley Bank cards. Besides American Express, which does not encourage its cardholders to store their cards to the wallet, the other main networks are represented.

• As this announcement comes in, Isis’s launch keeps been delayed; in talks with the JV, BarclayCard however opted for Google Wallet to serve customers right away.

• Since Google’s recent moves, its usage has more than doubled and its integration process has been simplified for banks. Also to be noted, as of October 17, Google prepaid cards will no longer be available, as the Wallet is now open to the main card networks.