Bartercard
Bartercard is the operator of the world’s largest barter trading exchange. Bartercard enables businesses to exchange goods and services without the use of cash or cash equivalents, or without a direct swap.
Bartercard was founded on the Gold Coast, Australia in 1991 by Wayne Sharpe and has a presence in eight countries (Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, United Kingdom, United States, Thailand, United Arab Emirates and Cyprus) where 75 offices service approximately 54,000 cardholders worldwide who collectively barter-trade over $600m each year. [1]
In 2007, Bartercard Australia was sold in a management buyout.
Description
Bartercard provides members with an interest free line of credit which they can use to make purchases. Members earn Bartercard Trade Dollars / Pounds for the goods and services they sell and this value is recorded electronically in the member’s account database, or goes towards repaying the credit that the member may have used.
For taxation purposes, that is, for calculating taxation liability, the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) treats one Bartercard Trade Dollar the same way that it treats one Australian Dollar.[2]
Bartercard offers an infrastructure that allows members to transact using EFTPOS as well as an online trading platform and a smart phone application. Bartercard trade dollars can be transacted via a number of methods. Members find each other via an online directory, Bartercard's online trading portal MYBC.