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Discover Financial Services' Diners Club International Ltd. today announced it has signed an agreement with Elavon Inc., U.S. Bancorp's merchant-acquiring subsidiary, to expand Diners Club and Discover card acceptance in the U.K. and western Europe. Elavon by the second quarter of 2010 will provide consolidated pricing, underwriting, risk management, processing, settlement and reporting to merchants for Diners Club transactions, and Discover cardholders will "eventually" be able to use their cards at Elavon's U.K. and western European merchants, Discover says. Elavon claims to be Europe's sixth-largest acquirer, with a strong base of small- to mid-sized merchants. The deal is the latest in a string of agreements Discover has recently inked with ATM networks and acquirers in various regions around the world as it strives to expand global card-acceptance for its Pulse debit brand, and Diners Club and Discover cards. "Through a series of partnerships and agreements we are working to increase ATM and point-of-sale acceptance around the world for our card brands," Diane Offereins, Discover's executive vice president of payment services, tells CardLine sister publication Cards & Payments. Offereins adds that "there will be other agreements with merchants, processors and acquirers," but she would not say which markets Discover is eyeing next. Discover is determined to grow through agreements, rather than building its own global network merchant by merchant, Offereins says. "We look at ourselves as cooperative partners. If a network in another country wants interoperability with our network, we are happy to go that route," she says. Discover last year acquired Diners Club International from Citigroup Inc. for $165 million, paving the way for Discover card acceptance in 185 countries. Recent acceptance deals include a long-term merchant-acquiring deal Discover signed last month with Indian processor Venture Infotek Global Pvt. Ltd. to handle Diners Club and Discover transactions. Discover also signed a transaction-acquiring agreement last March with Multipay AG of Switzerland. This month, through Pulse, the company announced a deal with Belgian-based Trionis to provide ATM access in nine European countries and another deal with Canada's Interac debit card network to expand ATM access there for Diners Club and Discover cardholders (CardLine, 9/18). Discover inked reciprocal card-acceptance agreements a few years ago with China UnionPay and Japan's JCB Co., which Offereins says laid the groundwork for building a global card-acceptance network for its brands. "In essence we are taking the card-acceptance footprint we have in the U.S. with Discover and Diners Club's international acceptance network and merging and expanding them to create a global network," she says.
