Caxton FX Launches Prepaid Travel Card with Altair

Altair Financial Services International Plc (Altair), a leading prepaid card and transaction processing solutions provider, have delivered an extensive upgrade on the Caxton FX prepaid travel card program (caxtonfxcard.com). The prepaid card program now boasts a host of new features, including the Altair Mobile Payments System (AMPS), both US Dollar and Euro currency options and enables cardholders to select their own PIN at the time of application.

Rupert Lee-Browne, CEO of Caxton FX comments, "We are delighted to have joined forces with Altair to launch the Caxton FX currency cards. We selected Altair because of their excellent reputation for strong project management and flexibility in implementation. Ultimately, flexibility has been at the core of Caxton's success - we identify a need, make decisions quickly and implement rapidly. By launching our card program with Altair, we are now at the forefront of prepaid card technology, keeping up with the needs of clients and customers.”

The addition of Altair Mobile Payment System (AMPS) to the Caxton FX card program provides cardholders with a range of self-service card management tools by simply using their mobile phone. After the cardholder associates their mobile phone with their prepaid card, they can send mobile SMS (text) messages to load their card and check their balance. For account security purposes, AMPS can eliminate unauthorised use with ‘lock’ and ‘unlock’ commands. When locked using AMPS, the card can not be used at point of sale or to withdraw cash at ATMs.

Lee Britton, Altair CEO remarks, “The market for prepaid travel cards is vast. 67m overseas visits are made each year, and in most cases the travellers are paying over the odds for their travel money. We expect that Caxton FX will make a serious impact on the travellers’ foreign currency market, offering anyone who travels overseas, on business or pleasure, excellent value for money.”

The cards are issued by Newcastle Building Society and are available to UK residents over the age of 18 can apply for both a EUR and USD on the Caxton website (www.caxtonfxcard.com). They can also apply for a secondary card for one of their dependents (min age 13). The secondary card will be linked to the primary and will share the same balance as the primary card. Like an electronic purse, cardholders can pre-load the card with up to €7500 or $10,000.

Cardholders can load funds onto the card in three ways: using the Internet, via SMS or by calling the UK based Caxton Customer Services team.

Altair Financial Services International Plc
3rd Floor, 37 Maddox Street, London, W1S 2PP
Press Contact :
Steven Phillips
Tel: +44 (0)20 7659 1140
Fax: +44 (0)20 7900 2511
email: steven.phillips@altair-financial.com

About Altair Financial Services International Plc
Altair Financial Services International Plc was incorporated in 2005 as a global provider of Prepaid Card solutions with enhanced functionality. Altair acquired established transaction processing company, Symmetrex, Inc. in March 2007. Altair is headquartered in London with banking and processing relationships in UK, USA, Asia Pacific and throughout the Latin America and Caribbean regions and issues on behalf of MasterCard® and Visa.

Altair solutions are designed to be flexible enough to provide companies with almost any type of prepaid card functionality, including open and closed loop programs. Through its relationship with MasterCard® all Altair cards issued in Europe are based on Chip & PIN technology and are EMV standards compliant. Altair is a certified issuer and transaction processor of contactless (MasterCard® PayPass™) prepaid cards in the United Kingdom. For more information, visit www.altair-financial.com.

About Caxton FX Ltd
Caxtonfx is a foreign exchange company based in London. The company was founded in 2001 as an FX (foreign exchange) broker, offering bank-beating rates and fee-free transfers on large currency transfer transactions - they now exchange millions on a daily basis. The success of the company has been based on two simple principles: Value and Service. They set themselves apart by offering genuine value for money.

These principles have been carried through to the recent introduction of the Caxtonfx Euro and Dollar Card, which bring genuine savings to travellers and are set to revolutionise the world of travel money.
For more information visit www.caxtonfx.com or www.caxtonfxcard.com.

About Newcastle Building Society
Newcastle Building Society is the biggest building society based in the North East and one of the strongest mutual building societies in the country. With assets under management of over £4.4bn we are certainly large enough to cope but small enough to care deeply about the needs of our members. We are committed to providing a range of innovative and attractive investment products.
The Society is committed to remaining mutual and by doing so we feel we are better placed to continue to provide our investors with the quality of service expected from one of the country’s strongest building societies.

Newcastle Building Society has over 60 live and a further 50 planned prepaid and debit card programmes including: Debit cards; Retail gift cards, Mobile phone cards – combined top-ups and payments cards; Teen cards – 13-plus age introduced to card holding; Un-banked adults cards; Travel cards – Safe convenient alternative to travellers cheques; Corporate incentive cards – cards issued direct to employees as reward payments; Payroll and Payroll Plus cards – salary payments for employees.

The Society is a MasterCard Principal Member, with the most MasterCard approved prepaid programmes in the UK. We hold a SEPA licence and have live programmes in the UK, Ireland, Germany, Belgium and Italy.

This release was published on openPR.