First National Merchant Solutions has completed its pilot program of a reloadable prepaid card for San Francisco Yellow Cab Cooperative drivers and is planning to roll out the service to the entire fleet of around 500 drivers in the next 50 to 90 days.
First National Bank of Omaha, the merchant processor's parent company, issues the cards.
The Visa-branded cards, which bear the design and logo of Yellow Cab Cooperative, enable Yellow to reimburse drivers directly to their reloadable prepaid accounts for fares paid with credit and debit cards or corporate vouchers.
Before the prepaid card initiative, drivers had to come to Yellow Cab garages for reimbursement of noncash payments. "Now the driver has a device that provides more mainstream access to their money," Scott McCormack, a vice president at First National, said last week. Funds appear in drivers' prepaid accounts within seconds of transactions settling, he said.
Drivers can view and transfer funds online to their bank accounts, or they can withdraw cash for free from any Allpoint automated teller machine. The 300 to 400 drivers who participated in the pilot did not report any problems with using the cards, McCormack said. First National also serves as the merchant acquirer for Yellow's credit card transactions.
