Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals

Christopher J. Rodrigues, group chief executive of U.K.-based banking firm Bradford & Bingley, is the new president and chief executive of Visa International, the bank card network announced today. Rodrigues, 54, will take over June 1 from William Boardman, chairman of Visas International's board, who is serving as interim chief …

On the same day that Visa International gained a new chief executive, Visa USA lost its top marketing officer. Rebecca Saeger, executive vice president for brand management, is leaving to take a senior marketing post at Charles Schwab & Co. Inc. in San Francisco, according to an internal announcement distributed …

Lightbridge Inc., a Burlington, Mass.-based provider of software and transaction services to wireless telecommunications carriers, today announced it is buying Authorize.net for $82 million in cash in a deal expected to close by June 30. Eight-year-old Authorize.net is an American Fork, Utah-based subsidiary of InfoSpace Inc., Bellevue, Wash. It provides …

The National Automated Clearing House Association (NACHA) announced today a change in its rules that will require billers that use NACHA's increasingly popular electronic check conversion service at lockboxes to notify customers they may opt out of the service. The new rule takes effect June 11. It does not specify …

Target Corp., which has opened more than 9 million accounts for its cobranded Visa smart card since the program's launch in November 2001, has announced it is shutting down the chip function on the card owing to lack of use. Target said in a statement today the phase-out will begin …

Information Architects Corp., a Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based provider of Web-based employee-screening technology, has announced it is entering the market for electronic point-of-sale transactions secured by cardholders' fingerprints. The company says it has acquired a U.S. patent (6,270,011 B1) that covers a fingerprint-scanning methodology for credit cards via scanners deployed at …

With chargeback rates running well in excess of 1% on Internet transactions, Visa International and MasterCard International have for some time been pushing a form of online cardholder authentication, called 3D Secure, that is intended to make cardholders, issuers, acquirers, and merchants feel confident that Web payments are legitimate. But …

As expected, First Data Corp. completed its merger today with Concord EFS Inc. in a deal valued at $7 billion, based on the Feb. 25 First Data closing price of $40.79 per share. The acquisition of Concord means the combined company has 30,000 worldwide employees. It expects to take in …

A survey of consumers released today reveals that while most say they are more informed about identity theft, they feel no safer from it than they did a year ago, and more consumers are reluctant to give online retailers personal data than was the case last year. The survey of …

Visa USA's increase in credit card interchange rates, announced today, are intended to help the giant bank card network keep its members' business in the face of recent efforts by American Express Co. to court banks as issuers of its cards, Visa says. As expected by many observers, Visa today …

Carrollton, Tex.-based Taco Bueno Restaurants Inc. has become the latest quick-service restaurant chain to begin accepting credit and debit cards. Paymentech L.P., a Dallas-based transaction processor owned by First Data Corp. and Bank One, announced today it will provide processing services for card acceptance at all 124 Taco Bueno locations, …

With its new real-time check-verification and settlement product announced yesterday, Star Systems Inc. will be offering merchants and transaction processors a service that converts paper checks to electronic transactions just as retailers and financial institutions are preparing for the advent of check-imaging technology. Though Maitland, Fla.-based Star, the nation's largest …

MasterCard International today announced it is acquiring TowerGroup, the Needham, Mass.-based research firm, from Reuters PLC for an undisclosed price. The 11-year-old TowerGroup, which focuses on payments-technology and financial-services research, will become part of MasterCard Advisors, a subsidiary through which the bank card company operates an existing research and advisory …

So-called bust-out fraud is an old credit card crime that's not going away, and currently it's responsible for about $800 million annually in largely unreported fraud losses. That sober estimate came this week during a presentation on worldwide transaction-system fraud given by John Schettino, MasterCard vice president for security and …

A new technology that fights counterfeit card fraud by allowing a sort of “fingerprint” comparison routine based on magnetic stripes is getting its first commercial application with shipments having started within the past few weeks of card-personalization machines enabled with the technology. Kiran Gandhi, vice president for Carson, Calif.-based MagTek …

MasterCard International plans by the end of the year to have in place a program to certify instant card issuance activity in the United States. The bank card company is testing an instant-issuance certification plan in Brazil now, and is concerned enough about perceived risk in instant issuance that it …

A new U.S. standard in the works now could dramatically cut the costs ATM deployers face in bringing their machines into compliance with the so-called Triple DES encryption requirement set by the bank card networks. As things stand now, banks and other deployers must distribute the Triple DES encryption key, …

The immediate reaction among industry observers to the disclosure last week that MasterCard International Inc. is raising its interchange rates on some credit card transaction categories effective April 2 was that the move is meant to recoup issuer income lost in the major debit card settlement reached last year. But …

Electronic Clearing House Inc., an electronic transaction processor based in Camarillo, Calif., today announced a 22% increase in revenue in its October to December 2003 quarter over the same quarter in 2002. Revenue for the most recent quarter reached $11.4 million. This result was fueled by increases in both bank …

Seven founding members announced today the formation of a new regional association serving merchant-level salespersons, ISOs, vendors, processors, and financial institutions in the western United States. Called the Western States Acquirers Association, the new group plans to hold its first conference in November in San Francisco, and is in the …