Plum turns to sea salt for its 100% biodegradable bank card

Its plum-coloured card means Plum customers can spend directly from their account.

Savings and investing app Plum is making a big move into ‘spending’ today, with the launch of a debit card which will let customers tap into the cash in their account.

What’s most impressive, however, is that Plum’s card is 100 per cent recyclable and biodegradable when placed into a compost bin.

Customers can top up the card either by moving cash from their existing savings or investments via the Plum app or by transferring funds from their linked bank account.

Plum says the card will be available at no additional cost, but initially only to its ‘Plum Ultra’ customers who pay £4.99/month for extra cashback and budgeting tools, and now also get a card that also boasts no extra fees on overseas spending.

“The Plum Card is a huge step forward in that direction. We want to simplify money management for our customers at every stage in their financial lifecycle,” said Victor Trokoudes, CEO and co-founder of Plum.

“This card will give Plum users even better visibility and control of their finances, as they can set their own spending allowances. This means they can properly compartmentalise their spending.”

Many banks have been gradually increasing the amount of recycled plastic used in the production of their debit and credit cards, both Starling and Nationwide boast that the majority of the material they use is recycled, but a ‘recyclable’ card is much rarer and potentially more valuable for environmentally conscious consumers.

Plum’s card (plum-coloured of course) is made up of 57 per cent sea salt and 43 per cent crude oil, which makes it both 100 per cent recyclable (up to 8 times) and 100 per cent degradable in the right conditions.

Created by physical card provider allpay.cards, apparently the “eco degradable [card] has the same physical and technical properties as PVC with an additive which accelerates the degradation within microbe rich environments.”

In May Plum expanded to offer a commission-free investing product that lets all its customers open an ISA or GIA account and buy equities, for only a 0.48 per cent average fund and platform fee.