Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals

New mobile-transaction technology developed by ATM maker Diebold Inc. is already attracting interest in the marketplace and promises to change not only the way consumers interact with ATMs but also how they pay merchants and each other. The North Canton, Ohio-based company announced earlier this week it had received five …

Omaha, Neb.-based RemitPro Inc. is teaming up with payment processor Vanco Services LLC to open up a new category of smaller merchants to the developer of electronic-check software while removing the need for those businesses to change banks. RemitPro produces the eRemitPro data-capture and imaging application used by 150 clients …

Seeking to contain a growing form of payment card fraud, the NYCE Payments Network LLC has called upon risk-control technology provider Fair Isaac Corp. to help it spot fraud at the network's point-of-sale terminals and ATMs that accept PIN-based debit cards. While NYCE is not reporting any unusual fraud, its …

Nearly 4,000 gasoline stations branded by Shell Oil Co. have so far adopted a technical change from Visa USA that allows merchants to cut off delivery of a product on a prepaid card transaction as soon as the funds in the account are exhausted. Shell plans to roll out the …

Pulse EFT Association LP, which has become the latest electronic funds transfer network to introduce a commercial PIN-less debit service that allows cardholders to make recurring payments to certain billers, sees the service as a way to take payment market share from the automated clearing house network. “It's a great …

Data Insecurity Part 2 In a purely physical world, if you lost your wallet, and your Social Security card with it, you had a pretty good idea that something was amiss, and could report the loss and replace the card, if needed. Today, in a relentlessly electronic life, the Social …

The payment gateway business may be consolidating, but smaller players are trying to survive by adding services to meet e-commerce merchants' demand for more diversified payment options than simply credit cards. This week, for example, Los Angeles-based USA ePay announced that it is offering Digital EFT Solutions LLC's DEFT Deposit …

Tussles between vendors and financial institutions over data security are slowing down progress in contactless payment based on mobile phones, a research firm contends. While MasterCard Worldwide, Visa USA, and major banks like JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc. have launched trials of handset-based contactless payment in the U.S. …

A small Oklahoma banking company is looking to an ambitious university prepaid card deployment, which also involves contactless payment, to help it diversify a prepaid service it offers primarily to the Hispanic population. Central National Bank, Enid, Okla., is issuing PIN-based prepaid debit cards to the 10,300 students, faculty, and …

Processor First Data Corp.'s Star electronic funds transfer network on Tuesday announced a deal with the Bethesda, Md.-based Allpoint ATM network that Star expects will fill in some geographic gaps in its nearly nationwide ATM coverage. Under the arrangement, financial-institution users of Star's Starsf service will be able to offer …

In a sign of the spreading popularity of remote deposit capture among U.S. businesses, Wachovia Corp.'s treasury services division announced on Monday it had hit $1 billion in remote capture volume for a single day. The Charlotte, N.C.-based regional bank attributed the milestone to the increasing adoption of the technology …

MasterCard Worldwide announced on Thursday that taxis in New York City are accepting contactless cards in a program that will include 5,000 vehicles by December. The bank card network also said a so-far undetermined number of Las Vegas cabs will take place in a contactless pilot in Las Vegas that …

Culling seems to be a popular practice at the two largest non-bank ATM networks these days. Both Cardtronics Inc. and financially troubled TRM Corp., which is telling investors it might not survive, lost money in the second quarter and say their U.S. ATM counts are down. TRM, which has been …

Acquirers will be penalized one interchange tier for large merchants that qualify for volume-based tiered rates and fail to show compliance with the Payment Card Industry data-security standard (PCI) by Sept. 30, Visa USA says. In a document it released earlier this month to its members, Visa clarified an interchange …

Consumers' willingness to pay credit card bills online is rising rapidly, with 524 million transactions in 2006, a 27% jump over 414 million payments in 2005, according to survey data from comScore Inc. The most recent online payment volume, which represents payments consumers make at card issuers' Web sites, is …

Data Insecurity (Editor's Note: This is the first of a 10-part series by noted electronic-payments-industry analyst Steve Mott on the current crisis in transaction security?its causes, its costs, and its possible solutions?ranging from the point of sale to the Internet to mobile commerce. After eight weekly articles, the series moves …

The $29-billion leveraged buyout of payment processor First Data Corp. will proceed as planned, a spokesperson for the huge processor says, even though the private-equity firm leading the buyout acknowledged Monday that recent market events could make its future prospects riskier. New York City-based Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.'s statement …

Extending its reach into emerging mobile-banking and payments markets, First Data Corp. on Thursday announced an agreement with mFoundry Inc. under which the leading payment processor will offer mFoundry services to the thousands of bank and credit-union members of First Data's Star electronic-funds transfer network. The First Data agreement marks …

Payment-processing software specialists hoping to find new business through independent sales organizations may have a new way to reach those often-elusive customers. The channel comes in the form of an agreement between Denver-based technology provider IP Commerce Inc. and eProcessing Network LLC, a gateway with links to major payment processors, …

Capital One Financial Corp.’s decision to buy prepaid card processor NetSpend Corp. comes at a time when the network-branded prepaid card market is rapidly expanding and close on the heels of Cap One’s market-changing move into debit cards that can be held by consumers with accounts at any bank (Digital …