Who is BIN sponsorship for?

We explain who could benefit from BIN sponsorship, how it works and how Monavate is doing things differently…
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Want to deliver better products for customers, faster? Or maybe internationalise your offer? Interested in innovation, cost efficiencies, speed to market – or all three?
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BIN sponsorship could be the answer.
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What is BIN sponsorship exactly?

Simply put, BIN sponsorship allows you to move money using card rails without having to join a card scheme directly.
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So, it’s great if you’re a retailer, insurer or any other kind of company that’s looking to include payments as part of a wider proposition.
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Or if you’ve got a great idea to help people buy things more easily. Or afford something they really want. Or just spend less time worrying about how to move on money.
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How does BIN sponsorship work?

Leaving aside cash and crypto for a moment, there are two main ways to move money between parties and across borders. Either via bank or card rails.
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• Bank rails: If you want to use bank rails – yes, you’ve guessed it – you have to be a bank. If you’re not one already, you must apply for a banking licence, with all the time, cost and expertise that this entails.
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Make no mistake, the process really is time-consuming and costly. It could take up to 18 months and cost €25,000. And you need experts to cope with capital adequacy requirements, Basel III and MiFID 2 among other things.
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• Card rails: If you want to use card rails – yes, you’ve guessed it – you have to join a card scheme like Visa, Mastercard or Discover, with all the time, cost and expertise that this entails. Think: form filling, registration fees, collateral requirements and more.
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BIN sponsorship offers a third way.
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BIN sponsors join the card schemes as members and can allow clients to issue cards and/or acquire card payments under their licence. This makes BIN sponsorship the quick and convenient alternative to joining a card scheme directly.
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What are BINs?

BIN stands for bank identification number. And very little can happen in the card world without one. 
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It’s how Visa, Mastercard and everyoneother networks participating in these schemes knows who’s doing what, plus where to settle the funds.
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It’s no surprise that as they’re so important, BINs are hard to get. Schemes only assign them to members. And that’s where BIN sponsors come in. 
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BIN sponsors can sponsor clients to use assigned BINs and account ranges. They offer a short-cut to card issuance, whether that’s plastic, virtual or tokenised cards.
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Who offers BIN sponsorship?

Full disclosure: Monavate is a BIN sponsor. We’re direct members of Visa, Mastercard and Discover, and you can talk to us about JCB, UnionPay and more.
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Other BIN sponsors are available. Where we think we differ is with our features, partner network and tech.
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• Features: We offer BIN sponsorship as a fully managed end-to-end service. It’s our job to get your program from idea to implementation, so you can focus on growing your business. We’re all about simplifying complexity to help save our clients time, effort, money and more.
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• Partner network: We give you access to a full and dynamic partner networks. That’s everyone from processors and card manufacturers to fulfilment houses and others, available on a single contract. That’s how weto take clients from contract signing to live cards in market in only xx weeksshort timescales.
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• Tech: MonavateOne, our self-service card issuing platform, provides everything needed to set up, launch, scale and manage a card program in one place. This is all part of our aim to demystify finance, making it accessible to all.
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Contact us

At Monavate, we know there’s no such thing as simple card issuance. But at the same time, we’re genuinely baffled as to why so many have made it so hard for so long. And how they’ve managed to get away with it…
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BIN sponsorship is so much more than a functional connection to the card schemes. To find out more about issuing BIN sponsorship and the Monavate difference, contact us today.

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