Contis Financial Services has today launched the airBaltic Payment Card, which is a Visa prepaid debit card in partnership with the Latvian Airline, airBaltic, the main carrier for the Baltic Region.
The airBaltic Payment Card provides a wide range of benefits* for the airline's domestic, international, retail and corporate passengers, including BalticMiles loyalty Points on all purchases including flights.
The airBaltic Payment Card is available in Euro and Latvian denominations and is fully supported through dedicated web, mobile and a local Riga-based call centre operation, offering Latvian, Russian and English language options.
Peter Cox, Executive Chairman of Contis Group, comments: "Contis is proud to partner airBaltic in this ground breaking launch of a multi-faceted cobranded Visa card, which embodies every capability of our advanced financial and technology offering. This airline card offers a market-leading range of loyalty and payment options based on our real-time payments platform and European Visa card issuance capabilities.
"Our ability to automatically link bank, card, loyalty and mobile payments through one relationship will offer airBaltic clients a truly multilingual, multi currency, international money transmission and payments solution, combined with an award-winning loyalty programme, BalticMiles."
Michael Grimme, Chief Commercial Officer of airBaltic, added: "The launch of this payment product, in partnership with Contis Financial Services, is a milestone in providing our customer base with a payment option on our flights, which immediately delivers significant cost reductions on ticket purchases and rewards our customers for being loyal to the airBaltic brand. The airBaltic Payment Card is an advanced financial solution, designed not only to cover ticket purchases, but to offer our customers a competitive payment card for their domestic and international spending needs, providing them with additional benefits alongside the immediate savings on booking fees."
Gabi Kool, Chief Executive of BalticMiles, further added: "By combining the BalticMiles loyalty proposition with the airBaltic Payment Card rd we have moved one step forward in building our international acceptance and rewards programme. We are delighted to have entered into this new partnership with Contis Financial Services, linking them to our extensive partner network and rewards redemption offering. We have fully integrated our rewards and partners programme into this dynamic payments offering; in addition, airBaltic payment cardholders will be auto enrolled into our BalticMiles programme, if they are not already members, as they sign up for a payment card."
*The airBaltic Payment Card provides the following key cardholder benefits:
• No booking fees for flight purchases via airBaltic.com, a saving of €5.90 per booking
• No credit checks required
• A Lats or Euro version
• Award winning BalticMiles loyalty Points on all purchases including flights
• 250 BalticMiles Points on sign up
• A flight voucher to the value of the card purchase fee on sign up
• Competitive FX rates on cross border transactions
• Online and mobile money transfer options, card to card and bank to card
• Money request and send transfer options for funds transfers between airBaltic cardholders
• Real time SMS and web reporting of transaction details, with live balance information
• Web statements and reporting options
• Multilingual call centre support
airBaltic cardholders have the option of a secondary card, linked to their account, that can be given to partners, dependants or associates. The airBaltic Payment Card can be loaded via a bank transfer or by depositing funds at any branch of Citadele Bank in Latvia.