News

April, 2012

• 20 April

  A Battered Acquiring Industry Seeks New Political Survival Strategies

  In the wake of the Durbin Amendment’s debit card price controls taking effect last fall and other new regulations, the payments industry is feeling politically battered and bruised and fearing that more fights with merchants are on the way. “Our era of self-regulation of pricing has ended,” Mary Weaver Bennett, …
• 19 April

  Mobile Acceptance Spurs Interest in Aggregation to Sign Merchants in Bulk

  As more and more companies vie to put mobile card-acceptance gear in the hands of tiny merchants, acquirers are starting to look at signing up merchants on their own merchant account rather than using the more traditional—but also more time-consuming–process of establishing an account for each seller. The method isn’t …
• 19 April

  AmEx Reports a Strong Quarter on Higher Usage Domestically And Abroad

  Higher cardholder spending and historically low credit losses helped American Express Co. post record first-quarter revenues and earnings. The company reported on Wednesday that U.S. card-billed business increased 12% to $139.6 billion in the first quarter from $124.1 billion in 2011’s first quarter. Volume outside the U.S. also increased 12% …
• 19 April

  As U.S. Gears up for Chip Cards, a Big-Box Merchant Group Points to Key PIN Issue

  Among card networks, payment processors, point-of-sale terminal manufacturers, and even issuers, the coming of EMV chip card payments to the U.S. has an aura of inevitability on par with Mitt Romney securing the Republican presidential nomination. But just don’t tell that to one critically important sector in electronic payments: merchants. …
• 18 April

  EBay Chief Lauds Progress of Mobile Payments at PayPal, Looks Ahead to 2013

  EBay Inc.’s top brass made it clear on Wednesday that mobile technology is dominating strategic thinking at PayPal Inc., even though it does not yet account for a significant share of transaction volume for the eBay unit. Addressing stock analysts during eBay’s quarterly earnings call, eBay chief executive John Donahoe …
• 12 April

  Survey Shows Prepaid Cards Filling a Growing Financial-Services Void

  Among five major financial products, only prepaid cards grew in consumer ownership last year, according to new findings from Javelin Strategy & Research. Pleasanton, Calif.-based Javelin assessed prepaid cards’ current market position and prospects through a random online survey last October of 3,210 U.S. adults, and compared many of the …
• 11 April

  Intuit Picks up Key In-Store Checkout Technology with AisleBuyer Deal

  With rivals like PayPal Inc. and Square Inc. having made moves recently to enhance their point-of-sale payments offerings, Intuit Inc. on Tuesday confirmed it had bought AisleBuyer LLC, a 3-year-old startup whose technology lets consumers check themselves out of stores with their handsets. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, …
• 11 April

  Mitek Fires Back at USAA In a Spat Between Two Remote Deposit Capture Heavyweights

  Leading mobile remote deposit capture vendor Mitek Systems Inc. says it has the documentation to disprove allegations of patent-infringement and other claims that USAA, the pioneering financial institution in remote deposit capture, filed against it in a lawsuit last week. The force behind the dispute, according to Mitek president and …
• 10 April

  Card-Using Customers at Vending Machines Apparently Aren’t Miffed at Cash Discounts

  Vending machine payment-network operator USA Technologies Inc. has instituted a two-tier pricing option that gives machine owners the ability to offer discounts for cash. But the Malvern, Pa.-based company says early results show many consumers still prefer card payments even if paying by cash would save them some small change. …
• 10 April

  In Opening Salvo over Credit Card Fees, C-Store Group Decries Card Costs at Pump

  A major merchant trade group on Monday fired an opening shot in what is likely to be a long, hard battle over credit card acceptance costs. The NACS, an association for convenience-store operators, released a report claiming that card discount fees in general—and especially credit card fees–are partly responsible for …