Stocard - Loyalty Cards

Summary

 Is your wallet bursting at the seams from various discount cards? Feel like it's weighing down your back pocket? Now you can finally dump all the extra weight and use your wallet for bills and credit cards instead of rewards cards.

With the stocard app, you can scan all your courtesy cards and store them on your smartphone. Everytime you need to collect your reward points at the checkout counter, just let the cashier scan the barcode from your screen. Developed by three young college students, Stocard is an awesome concept with great potential. Find out why Stocard became one of the most popular apps on the Apple App Store and why you should try it on your Android device.

After installing the app, you can select any number from the following options:

• Germany
• UK
• Austria
• Switzerland
• Australia & New Zealand
• Hotel & Airline

After you've made your selection (which you can change at any point), you'll see a very minimalistic main menu with just two tabs: My Cards and Offers. All your scanned loyalty and rewards cards are listed under My Cards and you can add new ones by tapping on the + button. When you add a card, you can search through a list of preinstalled services ranging from airline miles programs to loyalty cards for grocery and furniture stores. Should your specific service/store not be in the list yet, you can add it manually by clicking on Other Card.

Once you're found the right card, you can either manually type in the number or scan the barcode with the phone's camera.Add an optional note – and your card will be displayed under that name in the main menu. By digitizing all your cards, you can leave finally leave them all at home and spare yourself the time of franticly searching through your wallet for the right card.

The app is practical, but it has two major limitations for the moment. First off, the app obviously can't store cards with magnetic strips and chips. So anything without a barcode will have to remain in your wallet (you can, however, use the app to store your frequent flyer numbers). Another problem is the fact that not all checkout scanners can read codes from a screen (included in this category are old laser and flatbed scanners. Fortunately, most majors stores are outfitted with the latest barcode scanners and the app performed well in big chains and box stores. And remember, even the scanner should fail to work, the employee can always just type in the number manually from your phone's screen.

So what does the Offers section do? Unfortunately, that part of the app is still under construction, but will be used in the future to match special offers for loyalty card holders. Sounds like a very promising feature once it gets launched.

Bottom Line: The main idea behind the Stocard app couldn't be anymore simple and ingenious. Rid your wallet of all the excess plastic and carry your smartphone with you instead.

The developers also did a fine job of making sure the screen lights up brighter when a barcode is displayed to make the scanning easier. Being able to add your own stores to the list is also a major plus, allowing you to add your own local stores and services. Personally, we would've loved to have the ability to add our own company icons, but maybe we'll see that option in the near future. It goes without saying that the app has a tremendous amount of potential. If it weren't for the empty Offers section, this app would've gotten all 5 stars.

Note:
Although some people may be hesitant to store their numbers on their phone, you'll be happy to hear that company is very meticulous about anything having to do with security. No personal information will be collected and the user statistics are conducted anonymously.

In terms of usability, the Stocard app is extremely simple and intuitive. Find your store, scan the card – and you're done. The whole thing takes just a few seconds of your time. Even the app's design is stylish, while keeping it simple and straight-forward.

Stocard runs snappily on my Nexus, even the scanning takes just a couple of seconds. It is a different story on the HTC Desire, which takes quite a while to scan the barcode as a result of that particular phone's poor camera.

Stocard is free and absolutely ad-free. What more could you want?