Tag: US

Travel and tourism are rebounding in the U.S. and abroad, and digital payments are being used to support renewed growth, offer added value, and streamline payments to vendors and suppliers.

After the exceptional drop in 2020 and 2021, international tourism continues its gradual recovery in 2022 due to the easing of travel restrictions. According to the World Tourism Organization (WTO), international tourist arrivals more than doubled (+130%) compared to January 2021, growing by 18 million. According to the organization, the increase in the number of arrivals is the same as in the whole of 2021 over 2020. Meanwhile, the WTO reported that a rapid rise in domestic travel and tourism, especially in the U.S., is driving the recovery.

Despite the hard impact Covid has had on the industry, the pandemic has created a new category of domestic and international travelers deemed the “untethered worker” or “laptop lugger” that seeks to mix work and vacation. This growing group tends to be younger, aims to take longer trips, and is a higher-income group, according to a recently published study by Delloite. Additionally, this group is highly digital and actively seeks the ease and convenience of digital payments.

Another bright spot for travel and tourism is that travelers plan to spend more this year on longer trips and more expensive accommodations, according to a Sky Scanner travel agency survey of 4000 travelers in the U.S., U.K., Australia, and Germany.

Specialty segments are also on the rise, such as student, health and wellness, cultural and medical tourism, which includes patients traveling domestically and beyond international borders for surgeries and medical treatments. A recent analysis by Market Data Forecast indicates the U.S. medical tourism market alone will grow from the current (2022) $8.3 billion to $19.96 billion by 2027. This U.S. segment may also experience a significant increase due to the recent overturn of the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that recognized a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion and legalized it nationwide. A growing number of companies are offering financial support (‘Abortion Access’) to aide women employees in states banning abortion rights and are left with the only option of traveling to abortion-permissive states.

Delivering additional value to travelers and tourists

With a rebound underway, digital payments, including prepaid cards and digital wallets, offer a powerful and highly flexible solution that travel and tourism businesses can use to be competitive and improve efficiencies for paying vendors and suppliers.

The increased cost of travel due to rising fuel prices makes travelers more concerned with budgeting than other challenges, according to Delloite. Businesses can offer prepaid cards to provide additional value to budget-minded travelers who want to save and manage their money. Using B4B Payment’s prepaid travel cards and mobile/online application, cardholders can quickly load funds onto their cards, track spending, and even upload receipts. B4B Payments makes it simple for cardholders to add a physical or virtual card to a mobile wallet.

Offering prepaid cards also ensures travelers avoid the hassle of carrying cash. A prepaid card is much safer than carrying cash when traveling. Should a physical card be lost or stolen, B4B Payments enables cardholders to quickly deactivate their card and have funds painlessly moved to a new virtual or physical card.

Additionally, businesses can offer prepaid cards for particular use cases, such as stranded passengers or emergency payments, and offer travelers an incentive or reward program.

An improved service provider experience

The value prepaid cards and digital payments offer travel and tourism businesses value beyond supporting clients. Travel and tourism operators are reliant on vendor and supplier relationships. It is no secret that prompt payment helps companies be preferred customers and retain high-performing service providers. Ultimately this can translate to a better customer experience and a more significant opportunity to scale your business.

B4B Payments eliminate the need for traditional banking processes such as wire transfers and checks or cash. Our versatile prepaid product can easily be set up for making real-time payments 24/7 to providers anywhere in the world. This highly efficient form of making payments helps businesses optimize cash flow, manage peak volumes, and prevents the need to exceed credit limits.

Additionally, savvy businesses can easily use digital payments to enhance vendor relationships by offering channel incentives and rewards.

To find out more about how B4B works with travel and tourism companies, get in touch with us.

References:

SkyScanner 2022 Travel Survey

World Tourism Organization

Deloitte 2022 Summer Travel Survey:

Market Data Forecast:

PwC found that 74% of insurance companies see fintech as a challenge for their industry.

But, with consumer behaviours already changing pre-COVID and becoming evermore geared towards digital in the post-COVID world, insurance is at risk of being left behind.

But why is it so important that insurance firms take advantage of the latest fintech innovation?

Reaching a younger audience

Younger audiences are an important target audiences for insurance firms. Getting young people to take out a policy now and making sure that your offer suits their needs means potential customers for life, so getting it right with young people is a must.

Typically, Millennial audiences and younger Generation X consumers prefer digital methods for payments and communications. The less direct interaction with a business, the more convenient it is for this demographic to use a service.

Not only that, but this demographic are far less likely to be loyal to financial companies, swapping and changing as their needs evolve. This means that flexible, digital options are absolutely vital.

But PwC’s fintech global report found that, until COVID-19, apps were seen as ‘nice to have’, which means that many insurance companies and financial institutions might not yet be meeting the needs of a younger demographic.

Today, customers expect a great deal of flexibility, and insurtech offers this. Free from legacy products and processes, they use emerging technologies to build brand new systems and are much more targeted, rather than the old-fashioned end-to-end solutions that don’t meet everyone’s needs.

US insurance firm Metromile is a great example of this: by offering customers pay-per-mile insurance, particularly for those who live in urban areas and don’t drive very often, Metromile can offer customers flexible, bespoke insurance policies that meet their unique needs.

Another good example of a flexible, bespoke approach to insurance policies is life insurance firm Vantis Life. By making use of artificial intelligence, Vantis Life were able to underwrite life insurance policies in the US based on public records and third-party data, which meant that many customers didn’t need to undergo medical tests. Again, this minimal contact between customer and insurer will help to attract younger customers.

And AI isn’t just beneficial for the customer – in early 2017, home insurer Lemonade (also based in the US) reported that its AI-powered technology managed to process and settle a theft claim in just three seconds, without paperwork from the customer. It’s estimated that long claim processes can inflate a claim value by up to 30%, so speeding up the payment process can save insurers a great deal of money.

So making insurance processes simpler, more flexible and – most importantly – digital can work wonders for reaching a younger audience. Do it right, and you’ve got a customer for life, so investment in fintech and insurtech can have immense long-term returns for your business.

Build trust between you and your customers

IBM reported in 2020 that 42% of customers don’t trust their insurer. However, a Salesforce study found that 84% of customers globally say that the experience a company provides is just as important as its product or services.

This means that insurance has a long way to go to meet customers’ expectations. But, through fintech, that trust can be built and the customers’ needs can be placed front and centre.

At the time of a claim, customers might be experiencing loss or trauma, through theft or injury, so the interaction between insurer and policy-holder is delicate. No business wants to contribute to a customer’s difficult experiences but some insurers may be inadvertently doing so.

The last thing that customers want when getting back on their feet is a complex and lengthy process – they want efficiency, understanding and, importantly, speed. The quicker the payout, the sooner the customer can get back to their day-to-day life.

Fintech can make this happen. Solutions like virtual cards can offer a simple method of paying a claim that works for everyone. By issuing these cards when a policy is taken out, insurers can be sure that money is being sent to the right place within minutes of a claim being assessed, making for a much simpler and convenient process for customers than old-fashioned methods like bank transfer or – even worse – cheque.

As well as this, customers who receive regular recurring payments, like disability or annuity, can access funds immediately through a prepaid card.

Understand and build loyalty with your customers

Fintech also provides you with opportunities to provide personalised incentives and rewards for your customers in a way that legacy processes simply can’t, whilst also bringing in new revenue streams for your business.

By forming partnerships with other businesses, you can harness fintech to provide bespoke offers. For example, pet insurance claimants can receive discounts at pet shops or health insurance policy-holders could receive discounted gym memberships, when paid for through their prepaid card issued when taking out a policy.

What’s more, by providing this payment option to policy-holders, you can gather useful data on their spending habits to offer tailored products and services that meet their individual needs. This means you can understand your customers better, provide them with a better service, and keep them coming back.

Fintech is opening doors in insurance – don’t be left behind.

With fintech providing opportunities to reach younger customers and, more significantly, keep them coming back, the importance of insurance firms embracing and investing in fintech in a post-COVID world has never been more clear.

To find out how we can help you embed fintech into your insurance firm, contact B4B Payments today.

The Covid-19 pandemic has had a massive impact on clinical trials. As many people globally were unable or unwilling to leave their homes for a large portion of 2020, researchers had to develop new and innovative ways of gathering information for life-saving treatments.

While decentralised trials weren’t exactly new before the pandemic, only 34% of developers used them and they were mainly for rare diseases, where subjects were difficult to source, for paediatric trials, and for lower level chronic diseases like asthma and dermatology.

Now, though, the global clinical trials market is expected to grow at a rate of 5.7% per year until 2028, and with good reason. Decentralised trials have been proven to be effective and desirable for a number of reasons, a key benefit being the removal of barriers for patients. By bringing the trial to the patient, rather than asking patients to come to you, researchers have found not only a greater number of people willing to participate, but that it’s reduced costs as well.

There’s a whole range of tech out there to make decentralised trials run smoothly, so what does some of that look like?

Wearable devices

The usage and popularity of wearable devices like Fitbits, Garmins and Apple watches have grown massively over the past decade. In fact, the total number of wearable devices in use globally has more than doubled over the past three years and is expected to exceed one billion this year.

While the devices used recreationally to monitor heart rate, sleeping patterns and activity levels aren’t accurate enough for clinical trials, more sophisticated wearable tech, such as skin patches and smart pills, has huge potential. Sensors that track constant, real-time physiological data with necessary precision provide a great opportunity to gather patient data from a distance, without the need to travel to a trial site.

What’s more, the data captured is taken from a real-life setting, with patients going about day-to-day activities as normal, which means that data can be understood and interpreted in context.

And, with similar, commercial devices already very popular, wearable sensors make for a widely understood and accessible method of engaging trial subjects, removing a potential barrier for volunteers and empowering them to understand their own health.

Fluid communications

A key benefit of decentralised trials is the ability to communicate with patients regularly. Without the need to travel to test sites, communication can be much more flexible, fluid and, importantly, accurate.

The use of apps allows patients to make diary entries, complete questionnaires and speak to healthcare professionals from the comfort of their own home or even on the move. Results of trials can be uploaded and analysed in real-time, without the risk of human error in inputting. On top of that, with a virtual distance between patient and healthcare professional, subjects are more likely to be honest and less likely to omit information that they’d rather not discuss face-to-face.

What’s more, virtual communications allow for scheduled updates and reminders to be sent to patients on their mobile devices, meaning that information can be reliably gathered and submitted on time, with minimal fuss.

As well as this, the use of virtual communications tools allows trials to be accessible to multiple languages, meaning that patients can be recruited from a much more diverse, global pool.

And let’s not forget that apps allow for full audit trails and functions for capturing e-consent, meaning that security and protection of patient data can be top-notch.

Incentivising with Fintech

An important aspect of clinical trials is keeping participants engaged and often volunteers are compensated financially for their contributions.

In the context of decentralised trials, fintech innovation can play an important role in keeping patients on board and compliant throughout the trial but also in future trials. Card-based reward schemes can offer participants immediate return on their contributions – for every diary entry submitted or questionnaire completed, patients can immediately access their financial reward through a branded card.

With the ability to reward immediately and virtually, patients can take part in a trial and get immediate return from anywhere in the world. And, with a branded card already in their wallet, participating in future trials will be at the forefront of patients’ minds.

The Covid-19 pandemic has brought decentralised trials front and centre, proven to increase the number and engagement of volunteers. There are a wealth of digital methods out there to help the development of pharmaceuticals run smoothly and effectively – from wearable tech to communication and fintech, global decentralised trials have a range of opportunities available for better data collection and valuable clinical trial results.

To find out how we can help with your decentralisation of clinical trials, talk to B4B Payments today.