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PayPal Inc. has announced it will no longer allow sellers that have bank accounts registered with the San Jose, Calif.-based processor to block payments funded by credit cards, effective next month. Sellers' ability to refuse such payments has been part of the company's “Payment Receiving Preferences” policy for so-called premier …
Read More »Discover Seals Its Pulse Acquisition Following Pulse Members’ OK
Discover Financial Services Inc. and Pulse EFT Association announced today that Discover's $311-million acquisition of the Houston-based electronic funds transfer network, announced in November, has closed. The deal's completion follows approval of the merger by Pulse's member banks, and, according to Discover, more than doubles the company's U.S. card base …
Read More »GTCR Will Keep Its Grip on VeriFone Even After the Proposed IPO
VeriFone Inc. will continue to be controlled by GTCR Golder Rauner LLC, a Chicago-based private equity firm, and its current chief executive, Douglas Bergeron, will continue to be a major shareholder even after the San Jose, Calif.-based point of sale terminal maker completes its proposed initial public offering of stock. …
Read More »Half of Online Banking Customers Are Phishing Targets, Survey Shows
Half of online banking customers now receive fraudulent e-mails, known as phishes, and 78% say they are less inclined to respond to e-mails from the banks they do business with. That's according to a study released by New York-based security software company Cyota Inc. that illustrates how much worse the …
Read More »WaMu’s Move to MasterCard Underlines Intense Card Competition
Washington Mutual Inc.'s decision to switch its 10.5-million-card debit portfolio to MasterCard International from Visa U.S.A., though a big win for MasterCard, doesn't necessarily herald a trend, observers say. At the same time, it throws into relief a bylaw Visa quietly put into place in 2003 that penalizes large debit-card-issuing …
Read More »Visa Holiday Volume Up 15.7%, as Transactions Peak Christmas Eve
Visa reports the holiday shopping season generated a 15.7% increase in dollar volume on its card products compared to the same time last year, with volume reaching $218.7 billion on all Visa-branded cards in the Nov. 1 to Jan. 2 period. Consumer spending on the company's debit cards grew 26.2%, …
Read More »TechTrans Begins Service to Deliver and Install ATMs for Makers
Technical Transportation Inc. announces it has added ATM support to its delivery service for high-value, heavy machines. The 15-year-old company, based in Dallas, says it will now deliver, install, and test ATMs, bringing them from manufacturer to location and working through a network of agents and technicians. The company says …
Read More »USPTO Will Re-Examine CyberSource’s Patent at ReD’s Request
The United States Patent and Trademark Office has said it will re-examine a patent granted in 2000 to CyberSource Corp. that lies at the heart of a patent-infringement suit the Mountain View, Calif.-based processor filed last August against rival Retail Decisions PLC (ReD) and its U.S. operation, Retail Decisions Inc. …
Read More »C-Store Chain Sheetz Is First Merchant to Adopt PayPass Chainwide
Sheetz Inc. will install MasterCard International's PayPass tap-and-go payment system in all 305 of its stores by March 1, the two companies have announced. Sheetz, a top-10 operator of convenience stores based in Altoona, Pa., says it hopes the radio-frequency-based system will add to customer convenience by cutting transaction time …
Read More »Sovereign Re-ups with First Data for Merchant Processing
Sovereign Bank has renewed a merchant-processing contract with First Data Corp., the Denver-based processor has announced. The five-year deal represents an extension of Sovereign Merchant Services, which was established in 2001 as one of a number of alliance agreements First Data has concluded with banks in which FDC provides merchant-transaction …
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