Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals

NACHA on Tuesday opened for comment a sweeping proposal to introduce a same-day settlement mechanism for the automated clearing house network. The comment period will run through Feb. 6, the regulatory body for the ACH announced. If the proposal is approved, the ACH network will process almost 1.4 billion same-day …

  Fast-food restaurant chain Chick-fil-A Inc. has jumped into the mobile-payments frying pan with the debut Monday of a mobile payment and ordering app. Atlanta-based Chick-fil-A says the app, available for iOS and Android smart phones, can be used for mobile ordering at 130 Chick-fil-A restaurants in Atlanta, Chicago, Houston, …

The Fast IDentity Online (FIDO) Alliance, a non-profit with more than 150 members in banking, payments, technology, and other industries, on Tuesday published its first standard for a better system of online authentication than the common but vulnerable user name and password. “Today, we celebrate an achievement that will define …

Financial institutions, processors, and regulators have been moving toward systems that speed up electronic payments, but ironically their success in replacing paper checks with electronic processing may undermine their efforts. That’s because image exchange, the process by which paper checks are replaced by electronic images for clearing, has driven down …

By Rick Oglesby, Double Diamond Payments Research Apple Pay was the talk of the Money20/20 trade show last month, but should it have been? Before Apple Pay can become a dominant payment vehicle, merchants need the ability to accept it (only about 2% of merchant locations can do so today), …

MasterCard Inc. said Monday it is taking a two-pronged approach to developing interactive payment cards with an investment in Dynamics Inc., a maker of interactive payment cards, and a deal to commercialize the devices. Pittsburgh-based Dynamics makes payment cards that have features such as buttons, display and light-emitting diodes (LEDs). Consumers can …

Gateway and e-commerce services provider Digital River Inc. on Monday joined some other payments companies that have experienced the wrath, or panic, of investors on news that their relationship with their largest customer was threatened. Shares of Minnetonka, Minn.-based Digital River plunged 22.7%, falling $5.80 to close at $19.71, after …

  The Merchant Financial Cyber Partnership, a unique coalition of eight financial-services trade associations and 11 merchant groups, wants Congress to make it easier for retailers and financial institutions to share information with each other related to data breaches. Merchants and financial-services companies often are bitter foes when it comes …

While governments and established payments networks around the world reckon with Bitcoin, the upstart digital currency has itself had to reckon this year with volatility that has seen its price plunge about 50% since its $700-plus January high. But in other respects, Bitcoin is riding high. One of the latest …

  When negotiating a merchant-portfolio acquisition, buyers and sellers may want to examine more than the usual terms and conditions for elements that could affect the value, and potential, of the portfolio, advises an analyst. While there are obvious terms to look for, such as those directly related to ownership …

With the recent release of MPaay by New Media Insight Group Inc., merchants have another option when considering a smart-phone app that can provide mobile loyalty, rewards, and payments capabilities. n Consumers choose from three options to make a payment. One is via existing point-of-sale terminals at merchants that accept …

More than 3,700 individuals, groups, and companies have submitted comments regarding New York State’s novel proposal to regulate virtual currencies. A Digital Transactions News sampling of comments from payments organizations about the so-called “BitLicense” shows they want more clarity in definitions and exemptions from some proposed licensing requirements. New York’s …

  Braintree, the PayPal Inc.-owned online processor, says it has expanded the availability of its One Touch mobile-payments service into international markets. Announced in September for U.S. merchants, One Touch enables consumers to make payments without typing their user names and passwords for each transaction. Braintree says this helps reduce …

By John Stewart The advent of younger users, combined with the rise of smart phones and a much-improved user experience, is helping to drive a surge in mobile person-to-person payments. But providers still haven’t figured out how to make money on the service, which lets consumers use smart phones to …

  Consumers wielding smart phones and tablets put their PayPal accounts to work over the just-passed holiday-shopping weekend. PayPal, a unit of eBay Inc. until its anticipated spinoff in 2015, says its global mobile-payments volume increased 62% on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, over the same day in 2013. …

As small online merchants prepare for holiday-season sales, they’re seeking out financing to support extra help and added order fulfillment, and that’s boosting new financing options from online processors. PayPal Inc., for example, now has 20,000 mostly e-commerce businesses using its 15-month-old PayPal Working Capital merchant cash-advance service. It has …

What’s that big, juicy new target out there for cyber-hackers? Apple Pay, of course. And don’t forget ATMs, either, since many deployers have yet to upgrade machines running old, increasingly vulnerable versions of Microsoft Corp.’s Windows XP operating system. Apple Pay and ATMs are included on Woburn, Mass.-based data-security services …

Once perceived as a payment method for drug dealers and shady merchants craving anonymity, the Bitcoin virtual currency is now accepted at approximately 75,000 merchants worldwide, and their numbers are growing fast, according to a new report by First Annapolis Consulting Inc. Even so, it will be a while before …

  Parking-garage operator SP Plus Corp. says card readers at 17 garages it operates were hacked this fall, with one breach extending back to April. Chicago-based SP Plus says the company that provides and maintains the payment card systems in the 17 garages—10 are in Chicago, three in Evanston, Ill., …

Well into the annual Cyber Monday shopping frenzy, online sales are up nearly 9% compared to last year, while mobile devices are driving more traffic and sales, continuing a trend established on Thanksgiving and on Black Friday. That’s according to IBM Corp.’s Digital Analytics service, which is reporting periodically on …