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Card issuers' uncertainties surrounding such issues as prepaid debit, debit card fraud, and the future flow of interchange income have led a major ATM industry trade group to form a new organization to represent issuers' interests. The Debit Council of the ATM Industry Association held its first meeting today at …
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 »Vero Launches Network to Cut Risk of Cashing Checks for the Unbanked
There are 25 million people in the U.S. who have a regular income but don't have a bank account, says Vero Financial Group, Lake Oswego, Ore., and now the 2-year-old company has developed a card-based, biometric system to cash checks for this market that cuts transaction time and cost while …
Read More »Discover Buys Pulse for $311 Million, Gains Major PIN Debit Position
In an announcement with far-reaching implications for the electronic payments business, Discover Financial Services Inc. announced today it is buying the Houston-based Pulse EFT Association for $311 million “and other strategic value.” The deal, which the parties say will close by mid January pending approval from regulators and Pulse members, …
Read More »Visa’s New Debit Rates Help Interlink But Could Anger Merchants
Visa's decision to increase its interchange rates for PIN debit transactions on its Interlink network may generate more revenue for the network's issuers but will also create more interest in competing non-bank networks catering to merchants, according to some observers. Visa yesterday released a four-page document to member banks outlining …
Read More »By Bailing on P-to-P, Yahoo Also Abandons Remittance Market
Yahoo Finance's decision to shutter its 4-year-old PayDirect person-to-person payment service means it is also discontinuing a service it started up only 10 months ago to allow electronic remittances from domestic users to recipients overseas. The new international payment service was an effort by Yahoo Finance, a unit of Sunnyvale, …
Read More »How Livewire Plans to Use ATMs to Expand Its Network 10-Fold
Livewire International Inc., a York, Pa.-based software company with about 100 kiosks and other devices on its network selling items like ski-lift tickets, has teamed up with at least one ATM manufacturer and plans to make agreements with several more to sell tickets through ATMs in supermarkets and convenience stores. …
Read More »Tranax Aims at a Year-End Debut for Its ‘Self-Service Terminal’
Responding to increasing demand from the independent sales organizations that distribute its ATMs, Fremont, Calif.-based Tranax Technologies Inc. is planning to introduce a low-end multifunction machine toward the end of the year that will combine conventional cash dispensing with typical kiosk functions like ticket and gift-card sales and check cashing …
Read More »EFunds Bails out of ATM Deployment, Continuing an Industry Trend
The parade of major ATM deployers out of the business of owning and managing ATM networks continues with the announcement that eFunds Corp., Scottsdale, Ariz., is selling its fleet of 17,200 machines, which are under merchant contracts in the U.S. and Canada, to Portland, Ore.-based TRM Corp. for $150 million …
Read More »Canada’s First Debit Fraud Estimate Pegs Losses at $44 Million
Debit card fraud in Canada last year amounted to $44 million ($34 million U.S.), which criminals drained from some 27,000 accounts, according to data recently compiled by Interac, the national electronic funds transfer network. The study represents the first attempt in Canada to measure fraud losses sustained by holders of …
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