US gift, payroll, travel cards developer eCOM Financial Group has selected transaction management services provider Hosted Data Transaction (HDX) as the seller and distributor of prepaid eCOM gift card MasterCard and reloadable eCOM prepaid MasterCard cards in Canada.

Under the five-year agreement, merchants can accept the cards like any MasterCard card and are able to sell, activate and redeem the card via HDX's POS solutions, HDX customer self serve kiosks or any MasterCard payment technology. HDX also allows for MasterCard PayPass integration to HDX's touch-screen POS solutions.

Issued by Servus Credit Union, the cards can be used as student allowance cards, as a way of providing 'controlled' spending for young adults or by those who need to reserve tickets or hotel rooms, rent a vehicle or order goods and services on-line. The prepaid card can be used as an alternative to travelers' cheques. The prepaid eCOM gift card MasterCard and the reloadable eCOM prepaid MasterCard cards can be used at over 25 million MasterCard merchant locations and ATMs worldwide.

According to MasterCard, there is an annual market opportunity of USD 6.46 trillion for global prepaid products.