AmEx expands Serve via Wal-Mart

The American Express Co. is expanding its prepaid account product, American Express Serve, by offering the service at approximately 4,100 Wal-Mart Stores Inc. locations across the United States. The Wal-Mart implementation includes the expansion of Serve's free cash reload network. The card brand's move can be seen as an extension of its partnership with Wal-Mart, as the companies teamed for another alternative financial product, Bluebird, in 2012.

"By offering American Express Serve alongside Bluebird at Walmart, we're expanding our portfolio of products to meet the needs of more Walmart shoppers," said Dan Schulman, group president, Enterprise Growth at AmEx. "Bluebird is a great option for the 'unhappily banked' who are looking for a true alternative to the fees and hidden charges often associated with debit and checking.

"With Serve, our full service reloadable prepaid account, we can now provide the nearly 70 million Americans who are unbanked or underbanked a simple and affordable way to move and manage their money."

AmEx cited Aite Group LLC research in stating that the Wal-Mart addition, in combination with InComm's reload network over which Serve accounts can already be topped up, makes Serve's entire reload network the largest in the United States.

In October 2012, the AmEx and Wal-Mart cobranded Bluebird product was introduced. Bluebird is not marketed as a prepaid product, but as a debit card alternative. At the time of launch, Schulman said Bluebird was a "first of a kind" product that brought together the best of prepaid, debit and checking. He added that it was a comprehensive service for consumers who either don't have access to traditional banking, are underbanked or, just as importantly, are "unhappily banked in some way."

AmEx has marketed Serve as a more conventional prepaid card account service than Bluebird.

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