Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals
Lost and stolen credit and debit cards equipped with EMV chips may become the bane of e-commerce merchants. As the U.S. payment-card industry begins its gargantuan migration to smart cards, counterfeit fraud at the point of sale should decrease. But fraud in other places very likely will increase. That’s …
May, 2015
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19 May
With MasterCard Send, MasterCard Promises P2P Payments ‘Within Seconds’
MasterCard Inc. on Tuesday launched a person-to-person payment service in the United States that will allow debit card holders to send money to any other individual with a debit card account, regardless of the card brand and with the money arriving nearly instantaneously. The new service, dubbed MasterCard Send, also …
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18 May
New Devices, New Terminals, New Programs Will Drive In-Store M-Payments, Report Says
By John Stewart Left for dead as recently as two years ago, the concept of mobile payments in physical stores is staging a remarkable resurrection. The signs are everywhere. In April, PayPal Inc. said it will adopt near-field communication (NFC) after years of mocking the technology, which enables wave-and-pay transactions …
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18 May
Restaurants Most Likely To Adopt Mobile Payments, Consumers Say in a Survey
Consumers expect restaurants to be the top merchant type to adopt mobile payments, especially as they envision it simplifying the payment process. That’s the finding of a survey from independent sales organization Harbortouch Payments LLC, which also products point-of-sale products for restaurants and other merchants. In the survey of 1,000 …
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18 May
E-Commerce Sales Hit 7% of Retail Volume for the First Time
Electronic commerce hit a milestone in the first quarter by accounting for 7% of total retail sales for the first time, the U.S. Commerce Department’s Census Bureau reported Friday. Preliminary estimates from the Census Bureau pegged seasonally adjusted retail sales at $1.15 trillion, with e-commerce totaling $80.3 billion. In 2014’s …
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15 May
EMV for Small Merchants Is a Hard Sell, But It’s Easier With The Right Approach
Selling payments services to small merchants is never easy. Now, throw in EMV and its attendant complications, add in merchant ignorance of the technology, and the sales pitch gets more complex. With the impending liability shift set for Oct. 1, independent sales organizations, acquirers, processors, and banks are scrambling to …
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15 May
Global Payments Seeks Dismissal of the CFPB’s ‘Unprecedented’ Accusations
By Jim Daly Global Payments Inc., the biggest processor swept up in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s April lawsuit against allegedly fraudulent debt collectors, came out with guns blazing Thursday in its first response to the CFPB’s complaint. “The CFPB’s attempt to hold Global [Payments] responsible for the actions of …
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14 May
COMMENTARY: For Some Banks, Prepaid Cards Aren’t Worth New Regulatory Compliance Costs
By Paul Schaus Considering new regulations on general-purpose prepaid cards, is it worth it for banks to still be in the business? The answer is: Maybe not. If banks have enough customers who are underbanked or unbanked, as well people just on a tight budget clamoring for prepaid cards, prepaid …
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13 May
When It Comes to Acquirer Revenue, It Pays To Be Big—Just Not Too Big
By John Stewart Experts in merchant acquiring have long pointed out that, when it comes to revenue, size matters. Now there are numbers measuring just how much it matters. Acquirers processing the most annual volume, some $30 billion or more each, earned revenue at a rate of 41 basis points …
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13 May
Apriva Issues Software Development Kit To Ease Mobile-Payment Integration in Apps
It’s no secret that one cool use of smart phones and tablet computers is the ability to use apps. Research firm eMarketer Inc. predicts that 93% of U.S. smart-phone users will download and install at least one app in 2015, and 90% of tablet users will, too. It’s also …