Early Warning today announced it will leverage MasterCard Send and Visa Direct to enable U.S. debit card holders to send and receive money through the clearXchange network, according to a press release from Early Warning.   

"Early Warning is focused on providing real-time payments to all U.S. consumers," said Lou Anne Alexander, group president, payments, Early Warning. "Through our agreement with MasterCard, Early Warning is able to significantly extend the reach of the clearXchange network." 

"Early Warning’s participation in the Visa Direct program is an important step in our faster payments initiative,” Alexander said. “We are pleased to work with Visa to bring more U.S. consumers the benefits of faster payments.”

With the use of MasterCard Send, clearXchange will now enable U.S. debit card users to send money to, and receive money from, customers of participating banks in real-time. The new capability will provide for a faster payments experience for more clearXchange users and expand clearXchange’s overall network reach.

MasterCard Send is designed to align with the needs outlined in the Federal Reserve's initiative focused on enhancing the speed, security and efficiency of the U.S. Payments System, according to the announcement. 

"Through our work with Early Warning, we are supporting banks' efforts to provide their customers with seamless and ubiquitous P2P solutions. As a result, consumers have peace of mind knowing funds are available quickly and can be used to meet personal needs," said Jorn Lambert, executive vice president of digital channels and regions at MasterCard. 

Visa Direct is a payments platform that enables financial institutions, developers and partners to offer real-time person-to-person payments and business disbursements to and from any enabled debit card in the U.S. The Visa Direct platform is available in more than 200 markets around the world and can be potentially used to reach more than three billion consumer card accounts.

"Visa's focus has always been to offer fast and convenient payments to financial institutions and their card holders. With Visa Direct, we can deliver on that goal by leveraging the existing payments infrastructure to allow anyone to make secure P2P payments within seconds," said Jack Forestell, senior vice president of global product Visa. "We are very excited to work with Early Warning to expand the reach of their P2P service which will greatly benefit their member financial institutions and their members' customers."