The launch of Bankcard
In the early 1970s, there were no credit cards in Australia. There were a few “charge cards” available such as store charge cards, Diners Club cards and American Express cards. However, these were technically not credit cards for a few reasons – first of all, they were not accepted everywhere and secondly, the balance was required to be paid off at the end of the month. For instance, a store charge card was only accepted at the issuing store, while American Express cards were accepted mainly at airports and restaurants.
No single company wanted to launch a credit card in Australia. Because Australia is a very large country, it was thought that launching a credit card in Australia would be a very expensive venture and would not be profitable. In the early 1970s, however, a number of banks decided to work together and launch a joint credit card. They obtained the license to launch this card in 1972 and the Bankcard was launched in 1974.
Since Bankcard was the first credit card issued in Australia, a huge marketing campaign was launched to get the credit card accepted. The largest ever direct mail campaign in Australia was conducted. Since it was thought that resistance to using a credit card might be quite high, many customers were mailed a Bankcard which was pre-approved for $300 worth of credit.
The Bankcard was operated by separate banks who were often competitors. The card was then branded by the issuing bank, and that bank set the credit limits and other terms and conditions. So Bankcards issued by different banks might have had different credit limits as well as different terms and conditions.
The decline of Bankcard
After a few years, other companies such as Visa and MasterCard began to offer their credit cards in Australia. Unlike Bankcard, these cards were accepted overseas.
Over the years, the banks started to stop issuing Bankcard, in favor of other credit cards. Of course, some customers still continued to use Bankcard.
In 2006, the National Australia Bank was the only bank issuing Bankcard. It was announced that Bankcard would be withdrawn from the market, and in December 2006, the last Bankcard transaction was made.
Bankcard closed down its operations and stopped operations completely from 2007. The life of Bankcard was over and now you know the answer to the question, what happened to Bankcard?
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Posted on Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010 at 10:21 am
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