Knowledge Base
I often find inspiration in many things, none more so than film. One particular favourite was 2004’s Layer Cake,* which sees Daniel Craig navigate his way through the murky underworld until he meets the mastermind behind the curtain, Mr Temple. In a poignant scene in a bonded warehouse, our mob boss explains to our protagonist the facts of life – which for professional reasons I can’t repeat.
However, it’s required viewing if only for the following quote: “The art of good business is being a good middleman”.
A casual search for Dynamic Currency Conversion (DCC, or sometimes Cardholder Preferred Currency, CPC) online will turn up a multitude of articles explaining: what it is, the pros and cons as a cardholder, how your choice of card issuer influences what you may pay, why you should use it as a merchant and some nefarious practices around overriding cardholder choice.
In his 1789 letter to Jean Baptiste Leroy, Benjamin Franklin, a founding father of the Unites States declared that in this world nothing can be said to be certain except death and taxes. Well, he was close but sadly no cigar for this one anymore. The one he missed, which to be fair was clearly around in his time, is payments.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound impact on all areas of society. The virulent nature of the disease has led to many changes in our daily lives and the payments industry has not been immune to the need for transformation.
It is hard to dismiss the challenges thrown up by the coronavirus pandemic over the last few months, but if you look hard enough, every trial has a silver lining somewhere. For pretty much all markets and, in particular, for the payments industry, the old adage of necessity being the mother of invention has never been truer.
Every year someone, somewhere, trots out the story that cash is dead and electronic payments - be they card, digital or mobile - are the new king. Every year though, cash holds on, declining but fading slowly. A stubborn remnant from a different age but nevertheless a vital payment medium that is still relevant for an economy that is yet to go all-in digital.