Bartercard Continental Europe
& Payment Providers

June 16, 2021
by Sérgio Lopo, Managing Director, Bartercard Continental Europe
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The mission of payment technology companies are to make transactions simple, secure and accessible to as many users as possible, enabling their beneficiaries to carry out their activities in an increasingly global and digital world.

The service is materialized through credit cards, debit cards, prepaid cards, gift cards, and digital means of payment, which are generally made available through the customers' banks and are part of an international network that accepts the payment management company's protocol.

We rarely think about what's behind every payment we make but these companies have served to connect consumers, businesses, banks, and governments worldwide; and they have evolved from being a global payment processing network to provide fraud protection services, facilitate e-commerce, serve as a prime means of digital payments, and even foster loyalty systems. It's an invisible but essential job.

In the last decade we have seen the emergence of new entities, with different specificities, new technologies, and new ecosystems, which have increased the possibilities of development of the transactional market, but also challenging the traditional banking market. Nevertheless, it is a regulated market that continues to be led by companies that are a reference in the sector.

With an important part in the development of commercial transactions, the Bartercard model also integrates a way for its members to benefit from a simple, secure and accessible payment system, but also without the need to use fiat money. This feature is one of the many specificities and advantages that a Barter presents in complement to the traditional financial and insurance markets.

Bartercard not only allows transactions without recourse to fiat money, but also a manages a platform of companies that share among themselves the credit risk of their operations; encourages sales among members thus ensuring a new sales channel, channeling these sales to available operational capacity or excess stock thus increasing the sales margin; reduces expenses in fiat by reserving its use and necessity, and facilitates international trade.

The advantages of integrating the Bartercard model into the business model of payment technology companies would allow:

  • Additional channels for raising business.
  • Access to a tool that allows them to make secure transactions without the use of fiat money, Euros and improve cash flow.
  • Specially designed for SMEs that often do not have access to tools to facilitate credit risk management.

For commercial payments intermediation companies, the advantages would be:

  • Monetize new business relationships between their users.
  • They provide a new service to mitigate credit risk and facilitate cash flow.
  • They have concrete information about the behavior of companies in their commercial transactions, enriching the information made available.
  • They add value to the economy by facilitating commercial transactions between companies, many of which, due to their size, are excluded from traditional financial/insurance products.

A close collaborative relationship between Bartercard and payment technology companies brings these and other benefits to all parties.

The payment technology companies could count on all the instruments, from Bartercard, to launch this new line of business quickly and successfully. These are:

  • Commercial transaction management platform.
  • Online access technology for Customers via web and App.
  • Business and service and/or product directory.
  • Training and support documentation.
  • Support in operationalization and credit risk management.

For us, it is one of the fastest and most effective ways to launch a Bartercard in each European country.