Remittance card for Philippinos in Europe
Philippine National Bank Europe is providing a prepaid card to service the US$15bn Filipino remittances market in Europe.
Prepaid card provider Advanced Payment Solutions will supply the the cashplus prepaid Gold MasterCard through the bank’s European network.
PNB will promote the product to its account holders living or working in Europe as an international payment card and remittance tool. Over the past twenty years, the number of Filipinos living and working in the UK alone has increased by more than 833% from roughly 18,000 in 1986 to more than 150,000 in 2006.
Less than 10% are in domestic work with more than 65% of Filipinos in nursing and/or the allied medical fields and about 5% are entrepreneurs.
There are thought to be eight million Filipinos living and working overseas in total and the money they send back in remittances – about $15bn in 2006 – is very important to the Philippines economy.
PNB customers will be able to spend their funds on the card in the same way as a normal debit card. Using an additional card they can also share money with friends and relatives in their country of origin on an ongoing basis, as regularly as they would like to, for minimum charges.
Ronald Sipat, MD of the Philippine National Bank Europe commented: “The cashplus prepaid Gold MasterCard provides our customers with a simple way to access ATM and retail point of sale services around the world and an easy Money Share programme.”