View from City Road: The not-so-flexible friend

The key question about the Mondex project - the new 'smartcard' capable of storing money just as a telephone card stores call units - is whether customers will want it.

As a payment system, it will have few advantages over credit cards, or debit cards, which deduct the payment immediately from the customer's account. Customers will not have to wait for authorisation calls but Mondex is less likely to be used for large purchases. It is meant to replace cash, not cheques.

Nor does the customer benefit from having cash stored, interest- free, on a card rather than in an account. And Mondex will have to wait before retailers install machines. Don't hold your breath.