you can try magtek.com. I believe they have an branch in the UK. They have a range of readers. I was using their insertion reader, but they have swipes in their range too. On terms of printing, check out zebra printers, they are not bad. I wouldn't worry about embossing too much, it is expensive, a good graphic on the card will be fine. As for encoders, the company I worked at had designed their own, so I cant help there. But you will be able to get away with a simple one, usually track 2 data is used, but you can go into 1 &3 too. Rfid while sexy, is a lot more expensive to setup. my last look it was around 5-10 time the price of swipe cards. HTH Travis