News

November, 2011

• 2 November

  Square’s Latest Enhancement for Card Case Aligns with Hands-Free Trend

  Square Inc. on Wednesday introduced an enhancement to its Card Case wallet application that detects when a user is near a participating store and automatically links the user’s phone to the store’s Square account. By relying on this method, which the San Francisco startup calls automatically opening a tab, the …
• 2 November

  “Selective” Incentives Will Help Steer Debit Volume to MasterCard, Banga Says

    n At a conference call with analysts to discuss the No. 2 payment card network’s third-quarter earnings, MasterCard president and chief executive Ajay Banga said his company is offering select merchants and merchant acquirers incentives to direct debit card transactions MasterCard’s way. “We are in a completely different competitive …
• 1 November

  Aiming to Smooth In-Store Mobile Transactions, VeriFone Buys Global Bay

  Extending itself further into mobile retailing and software, VeriFone Systems Inc. on Tuesday announced it has acquired 9-year-old Global Bay Media Technologies, a South Plainfield, N.J., vendor of in-store mobile solutions. Terms of the deal, which had already closed by the time of the announcement, were not disclosed. The acquisition …

October, 2011

• 31 October

  Acquirers Fret That PayPal/Square Model Masks Risk, Poses Competitive Threat

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• 27 October

  Citing New IRS Rules, the ETA And the ABA Ask to Delay Part of Federal Reporting Law

    Two industry trade groups are asking for a delay in implementation of portions of the new federal law requiring acquirers to report merchants’ electronic payment transactions to the Internal Revenue Service, saying constant changes in the reporting form and other problems are making it difficult to meet the reporting …
• 27 October

  In the Wake of Reporting Complaints, IRS Says It Will Delay Penalties, Withholding

  Responding to complaints about problems in implementing a new federal law requiring acquirers to report merchants’ electronic payment transactions, the Internal Revenue Service announced on Wednesday it will delay penalty provisions and withholding requirements for a year, until Jan. 1, 2013. Acquirers still are required to file the new 1099-K …
• 27 October

  Federal Agencies Turn a Watchful Eye on Third-Party Payments Providers

    Already the subject of new debit card regulations, the payments industry is coming in for more scrutiny from the federal government. A Federal Trade Commission official told attendees at a merchant-acquiring conference on Thursday that the government has formed a task force to monitor third-party payment-services providers. The feds’ …
• 26 October

  With Numbers up, Visa Execs Touch on Strategies to Keep Network Dominant

  Confirming other findings that payment card usage is picking up in the U.S., Visa Inc.’s credit and debit card dollar volume rose 9% in the network’s fourth fiscal 2011 quarter ended Sept. 30 to $516 billion from $474 billion a year earlier. Payment transactions increased 7.3% to 10.5 billion. Visa’s …
• 26 October

  Apriva Poised to Offer a Mobile Wallet Aimed at Guarding Acquirers from ‘Outsiders’

    The mobile-wallet race, which has attracted a slew of entrants in recent months, is about to get more crowded on fears that established merchant acquirers could be elbowed out of the nascent mobile-payments business. Apriva Inc., a Scottsdale, Ariz.-based provider of wireless technology for payments, will launch in November …
• 25 October

  Payment Firms’ Returns Belie the Economic Gloom

  Shadows darken the recent economic news, but early third-quarter reports from payments-industry companies paint a much sunnier picture. The big card-issuer and merchant processor Total System Services Inc., for instance, on Tuesday said it was increasing its dividend by 43%, its first dividend increase in five years. Last week, Visa …