Lydia? A Bit Plastic

“Lydia. Oh, Lydia. Oh, have you seen Lydia?” Groucho Marx asked audiences decades ago, and the refrain might raise echoes again, in the unlikely halls of payments in France.

French startup Lydia, which has its genesis as a peer-to-peer payments application that allows for mobile money transfers, has gathered some critical mass, with 500,000 users in the country. The end-to-end destinations and receiving points reside in users’ credit cards, and now, the firm is launching a card that will work across retailers accepting Mastercard. Sending money, TechCrunch reported, takes seconds; settlement takes a few days.

But, the site noted, “this is about to change,” as the ability to withdraw funds becomes an instant-access event, with the addition of physical plastic into the mix. The initial card outlay is €10 ($11.15), and then, consumers will have to pay €3.99 ($4.45) per month for continued access, according to the company. As an optional offering, Lydia users are still able to withdraw funds from their accounts for free.

In an interview with the tech site, CEO Cyril Chiche said: “A card is just a piece of plastic; it’s only a way to authenticate you. And now, we’re realizing that the tech infrastructure behind it matters more than the card itself.” The wrinkle here is that the individual user can activate or, conversely, deactivate features from the app. There’s the ability to set limits on transactions, for example. The card can be enabled or disabled on the holder’s whims (a boon, for example, should the card be lost or stolen). There are no overdraft fees, according to the company, and the card can be used globally.