The application of pre-paid cash for consumers

What is prepaid cash card?
A prepaid cash card is a plastic card which provides an alternative payment method to cash when making purchases. The payment time frame of prepaid cash card is different with debit card and credit card. The payment of debit card is make during transactions whereas credit card is make a payment after transactions. However, prepaid cash card should pre-loaded cash into card before make any transactions.

Benefits of using prepaid cash card

• No debt risk-The users can only spend the balance that has been preloaded onto the card and unlike credit cards the funds are transferred from the bearer's bank account instead of having the bearer to pay back on a later date. Therefore, the users can avoid falling into debt and never have to worry about finance charges, late charges, or over-the-limit fees.

• Convenience-It can be use to shop & pay bills online, purchase goods & services, withdraw cash at virtually any ATM, topping up mobile phone, the replacement of travellers' cheques and so on.

• Safety- It is more safety instead of carrying large sum of cash when shop in supermarket because the users need to enter a PIN number on electronic keypad and sign a receipt to ensure that user who is authorize to using the prepaid cash card. However, the user will find the item they want to buy and click on to the websites "checkout" page before filling in they details and those of their prepaid card when internet shopping. Then, the transaction will be completed as long as have enough cash loaded onto cash.
  

Applications and examples of prepaid cash card

Touch 'n Go for e-tailing
E-tailing or electronic retailing refers to the practice of selling goods and services over an electronic medium like the internet. Touch 'n Go is an electronic purse that can be used by Malaysian toll expressway and highway operators as the sole Electronic Payment System (EPS). Furthermore, cardholders can also pay for purchases made over the Internet using a smart card reader and the NETS E-Wallet.

Touch ‘n Go uses contactless smart card technology and it looks similar to a credit card. User can continue using the card as long as it is pre-loaded with electronic cash. User can reload the card at toll plazas, train stations, Automated Teller Machines, Cash Deposit Machines, Petrol kiosks and at authorised third party outlets.

Cardholders can pay charges and purchases made at retail outlets, vending machines, public pay phones, car parks, fast food restaurant and so on. It is very convenient because cardholders no longer need to prepare for small change or wait in queue at the cash lane to complete the transaction.


Octopus card application in Hong Kong

The Octopus card is an electronic fare card that used to transfer electronic
payment in online or offline system in Hong Kong. It was launched in September 1997. Furthermore, it is easy and convenience to use, saves time and eliminates need for small change.

It is simply waved over a sensor and the correct amount is either deducted or added to cardholder balance immediately. The cardholders can add money to it when they need. The Octopus card is also used for payment at convenience stores, supermarkets, fast food restaurants, on-street parking meters, car parks and other point-of-sale applications such as service stations and vending machines. However, the primary used of Octopus card is for public transport.

On the other hand, it was further classified into Child, Adult, Elder, and Personalised categories and different amounts of fare concession. For instance, the Octopus card for adult is sold for HK$150 with an initial value of HK$100. Furthermore, Octopus card's standard transaction time for readers used for public transport is 0.3 seconds, while that of readers used for retailers is 1 second. This is one of the reason Hong Kong residents like to use the Octopus card.

The other special-purpose card, the MTR Airport Staff Octopus, is available for the staff of Hong Kong International Airport and Asia World-Expo. Staff who apply for the card may use it for a discount of up to 64 percent for Airport Express single journey fares.


Related links:
http://www.bnm.gov.my/index.php?ch=17&pg=671&ac=581 http://www.moneysupermarket.com/c/prepaid-cards/guide/
http://forum.picantoclub.com/index.php?showtopic=941
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/trip-planner/transport.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus_card#Card_usage
http://www.hong-kong-travel.org/Octopus.asp

Mobile payment systems in Malaysia: Its potentials and consumers’ adoption strategies

Nowadays, mobile payment system was very famous especially in Europe and Asia. It also can be known as M-payment. It is a new and rapidly-adopting alternative payment method. Consumer can use mobile device such as mobile phone, smart phone or personal digital assistant (PDA) to pay their bills, or buy digital or hard goods such as music, online game, ringtones, books, and movie ticket. Usually for purchase ringtones and wallpapers will use sms text message and it will deliver by Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS). Nowadays, mobile web payment (WAP) and Direct Mobile Billing are more famous.

Nowadays, mobile payment system was start using by Malaysian and become popular in Malaysia. This is due to mobile payment system is convenience in this fast growing market and it will make our busy life to become more simple and easy. By using mobile payment system consumers can pay their bills or transfer money by using their mobile phone at anywhere or anytime. This will help the consumer save their time for queuing up for bill payment at the counter. Beside that, consumers also no need to carry money to make the transaction because it can be paid by using the mobile wallet.

Mobile payment system does not require minimum monthly transaction, rental fee and merchant account. Therefore, consumers do not need to hit the minimum monthly transaction to waive the rental fee. Mobile payment is safe and secure because consumers do not have to worry about the cash, cheque, and credit card handling problems or fraud. It also secured by a strong pin fraud protection, therefore consumers does not need to worry about their date will hack or steal by other.

For the consumer’s adoption strategies, most of the Malaysian use mobile payment system to pay the credit card debt and bills. Therefore, we can know that Malaysian still not familiar with the mobile payment system even though it’s become more popular. Therefore, we need to educate consumers about the mobile payment system, the usefulness and its function. Besides that, we also need to enhance consumer’s confidence and the system’s security.

There are many mobile systems in Malaysia such as mCheck, Telemoney and Mobile Money (MM Wallet). Mobile Money is a PIN-based Mobile Payment Solution designed by Mobile Money International Sdn Bhd to address the limitations and bottlenecks created by cash, cheques and credit cards. Mobile Money allow users make payments and registered users to pay for goods and services at anywhere and anytime by using a mobile phone with a 6-digit security PIN (Personal Identification Number) via SMS (Short Messaging Service). This will encourage more consumers to shop online.

Related link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_payment

http://www.neowave.com.my/mobilemoney_overview.asp

Credit card debt: Causes and Prevention.

Credit card debt results when a client of a credit card company purchases an item or service through the card system. In another ways, credit card can be defined as debt accumulates and raises via interest and penalties when the consumer does not pay the company for the money he or she has spent. In spite of the fact that goverment has organized so much financial planning seminar to reduce the credit card debts impact, but the amount of the people are still increasing in credit card debt significantly.

1.Lack of financial planning. People does not have a desire to make a well financial planning and basic money managemnet skills for their expenses and income. They usually dont make planning first to decide which things are wanted and unwanted , before they make a purchase decision.

2.Poor money management skills. Obviusly,most of the people cannot well manage or handle equilibrium between expenses and income. They do not have an income and spending budget, so they will spend over their income unwisely.

3. Reduced or lost of income. Serious debt may caused by divorce or unemployement. If there is a enormous gap between income and expenses, the alternative way to fill the gap is with credit card debt.

4. Saving too little or not at all. The feasible way to avoid unwanted debt is to prepare for unexpected expenditures by saving three to six months of living expenses. Apparently, a savings cushion in planing, a job layoff, illness or divorce will not cause immediate financial strain and increase debt.

5. No money communication skills. The most important things is to communicate with your spouse or significant other and your children about finances. Keep the lines of communication wide open and discuss financial goals and spending styles. If you are married to a spender and you are a saver, you will need to figure out a strategy for you both to get what you want. Knowing what credit accounts you each have and promise each other to be honest about what each other spends.


Although there are many causes of Credit card debts, there are also have some preventions and safety tips.

1.Photocopy the credit card offer which include the interest rate and terms. Then, form a letter to your credit card competitor companies mentioning that you are thinking of switching to their competitior because they are contributing a quite reasonable interest rate. As a result, credit card companies do not want to lose your business so they will offer a lower rate than the competitor company has offered.

2. Pay off smaller balances first. It is common for a person to try to focus on their cards with larger balances first. Pay off the smaller ones. It will take less time and you will feel a sense of satisfaction when you have actually completed your goal. This will boost your confidence and make it easier to tackle the higher balances.

3. Another alternative is to cut up your cards so that you are not tempted to use them. Save one card for emergencies.

4 If you have equity in your home, look into paying off credit card debt with a refinance or fixed-rate home equity loan. Do not use a home equity line of credit, the rates will rise as the prime rises and suddenly you may find it impossible to keep up with your bills.
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References:

http://www.mozdex.com/prevent-credit-card-debt/

http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/debt/debt_manage_2004/top-10-causes.asp

Electornic Currency

Electronic currency is also known as e-money, electronic cash, digital money or digital currency. It refers to money or script exchanged electronically through computer network, internet or digital stored valued system. The examples of electronic currency are Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT) and direct deposit. Besides that, also have some system involved the electronic currency system, which are:

1. ClickandBuy
ClickandBuy system is a full-service solution for e-payment and billing system. In 1999s, Norbert Stangl founded FIRSTGATE Internet AG which is the Internet payment system ClickandBuy and was launched in 2000. Nowadays, the ClickandBuy is available all over Europe, US and Asia, which include 126 different currencies and 46 different payment methods. ClickandBuy is used by Apple iTunes, Skype, msn, Playboy and so forth.

2. PayLoadz
The server host of PayLoadz.com is located in New York, United States. PayLoadz provided a secure Digital Goods E-Commerce service for everyone to sell downloadable good online. Such as Software, eBook, music, movies, articles, files, forms, and anything else that can be downloaded.

3. Paystone Technologies
Paystone Technologies is an online money transfer company that provided secure, convenient and quick money transfer and payments for its customers around the world. Paystone Technologies have offering 3 distinct services which are:
a) International money remittance and email money from North America to any bank account in 15 counties.
b) Payment gateway linking North American e-commerce merchant to Chinese online buyers.
c) GroupPay, is a mass payments system that allows you to pay many people at one time internationally via email.


4. Peppercoin
Peppercoin is a cryptographic system for processing micropayments and was developed by Silvio Micali and Ron Rivest. Peppercoin is a small payments technology company transforming routine card transactions into new revenue opportunities. Peppercoin provides a loyalty-ready PCI-complaint small payments suite for all payment models, including pre-paid, subscription and pay-as-you-go with Intelligent Aggregation.

5. DigiCash
DigiCash Inc. was a pioneering electronic currency corporation founded by David Chuam in 1990. DigiCash transactions were unique in that they were anonymous due to a number cryptographic protocols develop by its founder and it was declared bankruptcy in year 1998. Nowadays, DigiCash Inc provide the Digicash Wallet, which can gives merchants a revolutionary new approach for initiating real-time, value-creating coupons and promotion in increase sales, margin, and customers loyalty.

6. Beenz.com
Beenz.com was founded by Charles Cohen, from UK. Beenz.com was a website allowed consumers to earn beenz (is a type of online currency) for performing activities and the beenz e-currency could be spent with participating Web merchants around the world. Since Beenz illegally launching a new currency in many countries, therefore the finance ministers across Europe assure them that Beenz would be categorized as virtual points. After 9/11, Carlson’s business was struggled and the beenz concept was shelved. Therefore, the beenz.com was closed.

7. Flooz.com
Flooz.com was founded by Robert Levitan and promoted by comic actress Whoopi Goldberg in a series of television advertisements in February 1999. Flooz.com was a dot-com venture. The name of “flooz” means “money” in Arabic word. The company establishes a currency unique to internet merchants. Users can accumulate floodz credits to redeem for merchandise at a variety of participating online stores. The company was close on August 26, 2001.

References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_money
http://clickandbuy.com/US/en/
https://www.payloadz.com/
http://www.techvibes.com/company-directory/paystone-technologies-corp
http://boston.bizjournals.com/gen/company.html?gcode=FF52DE71940147CC86BA8F120810453A
http://www.answers.com/topic/peppercoin
http://www.digicash.com/
http://www.answers.com/topic/beenz-com
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/12892.html?wlc=1246385546
http://www.answers.com/topic/flooz-com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DigiCash