News

August, 2010

• 9 August

  NACHA Mulls Recurring TEL Debits, Other E-Check Changes

  NACHA, governing body of the automated clearing house, is considering rules changes that could add volume to the ACH. Among them: allowing recurring payments under the TEL code for telephone-authorized electronic-check conversions; raising the dollar limit to $50,000 for three major e-check codes, and eliminating opt-out notification requirements on two …
• 6 August

  Little-Noted, Prepaid Rules Would Cover Non-Banks As Well As Banks

  With the growing popularity of prepaid cards and other stored-value devices over the past few years, law-enforcement agencies and regulators have voiced concerns that payment devices intended for consumer convenience could become tools for money launderers, terrorists, and other illicit players. To address those concerns, the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial …
• 5 August

  Visa Hopes RightCliq Adds the Right Value for Online Payments

  Visa Inc. sees its new RightCliq shopping service as a means by which it can control more e-commerce transaction volume. But it might also represent a tactic by which it can add value to payments at a time when payment processing is increasingly perceived by merchants and consumers as a …
• 5 August

  Thanks to Tempo, Discover Enters Decoupled Debit

  In relaunching a debit rewards card for the QuikTrip Corp. convenience-store chain this week with a new issuer and new payment card network, specialty debit processor Tempo Payments Inc. plugged Discover Financial Services into the decoupled-debit market. And after concentrating on non-profits for the past year, Tempo says more Discover-branded …
• 5 August

  Study: About One-Fifth of Breached Entities Were PCI-Compliant

  Supermarket chain Hannaford Bros. Inc. stunned the electronic-payments world when it revealed that it had passed its most recent audit for compliance with the Payment Card Industry data-security standard (PCI) before hackers breached its computer systems and compromised more than 4 million card numbers (Digital Transactions News, March 18, 2008). …
• 3 August

  Merchant Resistance Could Hobble the Carrier-Led NFC Venture

  The carrier-led mobile-payments consortium, news of which became publicly available on Monday, may break new ground in bringing payments based on near-field communication (NFC) to market. But it could confront major issues in attracting merchants, especially the big chain retailers looking to chop transaction costs, says one expert observer who …
• 3 August

  Portfolio Defections Hurt Quarterly Debit Results for MasterCard

  The profits rolled in for MasterCard Inc. in the second quarter despite a lackluster performance by the No. 2 payment card network’s U.S. operations. Several portfolio losses hurt MasterCard’s debit results in both the United States and the United Kingdom, though top executives said at a Tuesday morning conference call …

July, 2010

• 30 July

  Merchants Get More Aggressive About Gift Card Reloads

  A provision in the new Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 that exempts some reloadable prepaid cards from interchange regulation could make such cards an attractive option for retailers. But merchants were heavily promoting reloadable gift cards long before the legislation appeared for another reason: to …
• 29 July

  Visa Hopes It Can Come to Terms with the Justice Department

  Barely a week after Congress landed a hard left punch on the card networks, the U.S. Department of Justice might be about to land a right in the form of a lawsuit challenging network rules aimed at preventing merchants from surcharging for credit card payments or otherwise steering customers toward …
• 28 July

  Acculynk Scores Again, This Time with Its MasterCard Pact

  Just two weeks after announcing its biggest EFT network partnership with the Discover Financial Service-owned Pulse network, online PIN-debit technology provider Acculynk Inc. landed an even bigger fish. Under a deal announced Wednesday, MasterCard Inc.’s approximately 8,500 U.S. Debit MasterCard issuers will have the option of offering Acculynk’s PaySecure service …