By Ashwini Pandey, CEO, Copecto

One assumption keeps surfacing whenever I speak to banks about sustainable payment cards: if a card is made from a more sustainable material, it must be the more sustainable choice.

The industry has spent years replacing conventional PVC with recycled plastics, bio-based materials and other alternatives. That work has made sustainability visible and improved card manufacturing. Yet we have allowed one useful question — what is this card made from? — to do far more work than it should.

A payment card has a life before it reaches a customer’s wallet and another after it leaves it. Its environmental impact is shaped by sourcing, manufacturing, transport, personalisation, distribution, use and disposal. Material composition tells us something important about that journey, but not whether the finished programme is the better environmental choice.

The market has moved faster than the buying process

Five years ago, many conversations with banks and issuers were about availability. Could suppliers produce a credible alternative to standard PVC? Would it survive normal use? Would customers accept it? Those questions have been answered. Banks now have a broad range of products, with most carrying environmental claims. However, comparing those claims is much harder than finding them.

To compare claims, one question need to be asked to cut through the marketing noise: does the evidence describe the exact card being offered?

A claim may relate to a raw material, a product family or a single manufacturing site. A certification may cover the origin of one component without saying anything about factory energy, transport or what happens after the card expires. None of those claims are wrong. The problem is that they are treated as though they all prove the same thing.

This can distort a supplier comparison. One bidder leads with a memorable recycled-content claim. Another has a less eye-catching material story but stronger evidence on traceability, manufacturing, durability and disposal. The first may be easier to understand; the second may be easier to defend when challenged. Procurement teams need to distinguish between the two. Material choice still matters, but it should be an input to the assessment rather than its conclusion.

Evidence is becoming part of the product

Consumers have also become wary of environmental messaging. Copecto’s research found 69% of consumers suspected brands might use sustainability as greenwashing. Yet 63% also believed banks should do more to make their products and services sustainable.

That creates awkward tension for issuers. End users expect visible progress, but broad environmental claims attract suspicion. If a bank cannot explain the basis of a card’s sustainability credentials, it inherits the reputational risk attached to them. The supplier’s evidence is therefore part of what the bank is buying, even if it never appears on the card carrier or in the launch campaign.

Independent standards can make claims more comparable, but a certificate should start a conversation rather than end one. What exactly has been certified: a forest or waste stream, a component, a factory or the finished card? Against which criteria, over what period and with which exclusions? Strong suppliers can show their workings: data boundaries, assumptions, chain-of-custody records and unresolved trade-offs.

A card has a life before and after the wallet

A lifecycle view starts well before a finished card reaches the bank. Where did the raw material come from? How was it collected or grown? What processing turned it into a usable substrate, and how far did it travel? At the factory, procurement teams should examine the energy and water used, the waste generated and what happens to offcuts. These details are less photogenic than a new material, but this is where meaningful differences lie.

The same is true once the card is issued. Durability matters because a product that needs to be replaced more often requires another round of manufacturing, personalisation, packaging and delivery. End-of-life claims deserve scrutiny too. A card may be technically recyclable, but that tells an issuer little unless customers can access a collection route and the component materials can be processed.

Lifecycle assessment belongs early in supplier due diligence, not in a specialist appendix consulted after a commercial preference has formed. Otherwise, a bank can spend weeks comparing materials believing it has compared environmental performance.

Three questions for the next RFP

A better RFP does not need dozens of additional sustainability questions. In my experience, three areas expose most of the weaknesses.

The first is whether the evidence applies to the exact card and supply chain being proposed. Product family averages and group-level commitments provide context, but cannot replace information about the product an issuer will buy.

The second concerns the boundaries of the claim. A supplier should be explicit about which lifecycle stages are included, which impacts are measured and which assumptions shape the result. A precise claim with a narrow boundary can still be useful; the risk arises when that boundary disappears from the sales narrative.

The third is what could change the result in practice. Expected card life, failure and replacement rates, personalisation, fulfilment distances and access to collection routes all matter. Procurement teams should test the attractive headline against the operational details behind it.

This is more demanding than asking suppliers to describe their sustainability story, but card programmes run for years and the decisions made affect sustainability reporting, operations and customer trust. Evidence gathered during procurement may later be needed by colleagues who were not in the room when the supplier was selected.

The payments industry deserves credit for making alternative materials mainstream and proving that a bank card need not be made the way it always was. Issuers now need to become better judges of the claims surrounding those alternatives.

That judgement matters because, if a sustainability claim is challenged, the supplier’s brochure will not answer to the bank’s customers, auditors or board. The issuer will. Asking for lifecycle evidence before signing the contract is how a bank ensures it has an answer worth giving.