ABSTRACT
Payment cards are the dominant non-cash method of payment in the real world. Every year, billions of dollars of purchases are made with payment cards at shops, by mail order, or over the telephone. In lesser-developed markets, where most payments are still made by cash, payment cards are undergoing remarkable growth and transaction volumes continue to rise. The success of payment cards is rooted in customer psychology. The reasons for the phenomenal success achieved by the payment card industry in such a short time can be attributed to the following: convenience, global brand, worldwide acceptance, and flexible low-cost infrastructure. The payment cards industry offers a number of opportunities in the existing as well as in new and unexploited market segments. The chapter reviews these opportunities in three categories: existing payment segment opportunities, emerging payment segment opportunities and card-based product opportunities.
