Commenting on the new appointment, Bill Sutton, Director of Operations at Alliance & Leicester Commercial Bank said: "The pre-paid card market is set to see considerable growth, with predictions that there will be forty million pre-paid cards issued in the UK by 2010. Alliance & Leicester is committed to becoming major provider of pre-paid cards and James' appointment highlights our ambition. The bank has nearly forty years' experience of providing money transmission services to businesses and public sector organisations and therefore the pre-paid card market is a natural development.

James will lead the business unit responsible for developing Alliance & Leicester Commercial Bank's pre-paid card strategy, building a successful pre-paid card business in the UK and Europe. James has over 22 years' financial services experience and held a number of senior positions at Barclays Bank including roles in Barclaycard, Marketing, Strategy Development, Change Management and Sales.

The pre-paid card offers an effective money distribution solution, for both commercial and public sector organisations, by replacing the uncertainties of cash, cheques or paper methods with a controlled and easy to administer system. Pre-paid cards overcome virtually all the problems associated with distributing money to a wide range of people. For a start, there is little requirement for IT development, once funded the card performs exactly like a debit card but without the need for a bank account.

James Le Brocq said: "This is a very exciting time to be in the pre-paid card market, with predictions that the European market will be worth $164 billion by 2010. Alliance & Leicester Commercial Bank has recently launched a range of pre-paid cards for different industry sectors and plans to roll out more in the coming months. I am confident that the bank's offer together with our experience and expertise as money transmission providers will prove to be a big success."