Law and Regulation

Claims by banks that merchants won’t pass along savings from the Credit Card Competition Act to consumers are grossly misleading and do not reflect the economic realities merchants face, argues the Merchants Payments Coalition, a lobbying group representing sellers on payments-acceptance matters. Passing along cost savings or at least holding …

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on Wednesday issued an interpretive rule that buy now, pay later users are entitled to some of the same rights and protections of the Truth in Lending Act that apply to credit cards. Protections the CFPB says consumers are entitled to include the right to …

Despite some claims to the contrary, the odds are long that merchants would pass on any potential savings to consumers from the Credit Card Competition Act, payments experts say. One argument for this is that merchants price products on a line-item basis, which means the savings on a single product …

A bill containing a provision that would raise the asset threshold for debit card issuers covered by the Durbin Amendment narrowly passed in a vote late Thursday by the House Financial Services Committee. The committee voted 24-22 in favor of advancing the bill, called the Bank Resilience and Regulatory Improvement …

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s victory at the Supreme Court on Thursday answers for now the question of its constitutionality and may quiet the agency’s critics, who view it as a largely unnecessary agent of federal power operating with an overly aggressive agenda. But some payments experts fear the decision, …

Point-of-sale technology provider MagTek Inc. said it has worked with KwikPOS, a developer of POS systems for restaurants, to develop a handheld device that links to MagTek’s gateway and uses the company’s mobile card reader. Tassat Group Inc., a real-time settlement platform based on blockchain technology, announced it will work with cross-border …

The National Retail Federation and the Merchants Payments Coalition have lined up against the Federal Reserve, arguing that while a rate reduction on debit card transactions is welcome, the Fed’s proposed pricing does not go far enough. The two industry trade groups sent their respective letters to the Fed on …

Paysafe Ltd. wants to do more to sign merchants directly, and to that end it’s hiring salespeople—lots of them. The London-based merchant processor, which has a big operation in North America and aspirations for a larger one, hired 55 salespeople in the first quarter and plans to add 170 in …

Just 38 app developers have so far applied to Apple Inc. to enable payment processors outside of Apple’s proprietary payment system, the iPhone maker said. That’s out of 65,000 developers that were eligible to apply, according to Bloomberg. The report follows legal action that required Apple to make the alternatives available for apps. Ohio-based …

Open banking has been attracting the attention of bankers, merchants, and card networks. It’s also drawing notice from regulators. The concept of making a payment through a direct transfer from a bank account can appeal to consumers because it’s fast and easy, and to merchants because the transaction is reportedly …