AMADEUS has joined hands with MasterCard and payments firm Ixaris to introduce its recently announced B2B Wallet Prepaid product to the travel industry.
These partnerships will enable Amadeus to build on MasterCard’s global network to offer travel agencies payment acceptance and security worldwide, while Ixaris will allow travel agents to easily create and add funds to their virtual payment cards.
“Virtual card technology is the ideal application of Fintech (financial technology) innovation for the travel industry,” remarked Celia Pereiro, Amadeus’ head of travel payments. “Since we launched the product in some markets in February we have seen overwhelming demand for it. Today, we have customers in 10 European countries.”
The Amadeus B2B Wallet Solution will be gradually rolled out in select Asia-Pacific markets in 2017 to bring travel agencies a virtual payments product with the option of either earning or saving cash when paying travel providers.
Hany Fam, MasterCard Enterprise Partnerships, added: “With our global acceptance, advanced security and automatic consolidation, Amadeus B2B Wallet gives travel agencies a host of reasons to leave cash, checks and other payment mechanisms behind, saving time and money.”
Commenting on its strategy to develop B2B payments for specific industries, Alex Mifsud, CEO of Ixaris Group, said: “Travel, and in particular, online travel, is an industry with huge potential to benefit from the changes in the way we pay, receive and send money.”
