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Acquirers will be penalized one interchange tier for large merchants that qualify for volume-based tiered rates and fail to show compliance with the Payment Card Industry data-security standard (PCI) by Sept. 30, Visa USA says. In a document it released earlier this month to its members, Visa clarified an interchange …
Read More »Volume Climbs for PayPal, While Some Sellers Will See Fees Rise
Volume for Internet payment processor PayPal Inc. climbed 21% in the second quarter, to 172.9 million transactions, and the San Jose, Calif.-based company continues to make steady inroads with e-commerce merchants away from eBay Inc.'s online auctions, according to statistics filed last week by eBay, PayPal's parent company. Off-eBay volume …
Read More »A House Antitrust Panel Becomes the Latest Interchange Battlefield
The Capitol Hill spotlight shone again on payment card acceptance costs Thursday when a U.S. House of Representatives antitrust panel held a hearing to investigate interchange. At issue is the question whether the federal government should play any role regarding this most controversial aspect of card pricing. Bank interests are …
Read More »With Coghlan Out, Will Merchant Focus Survive at Visa?
Now that the two top executives have been appointed to run Visa Inc., the massive entity that will emerge from a sweeping restructuring of the worldwide Visa organization, payments observers see more capability in place to deal with issues to come. But the departure of Visa USA head John Philip …
Read More »Bill Payment Likely to Be a Key Function of Wal-Mart MoneyCard
Electronic bill payment is a key function Visa USA is expecting holders of the new Wal-Mart MoneyCard prepaid plastic will use the product for. According to Visa, nearly 20% of purchase transactions on its existing reloadable prepaid products are bill payments. The MoneyCard, which is issued by GE Money Bank …
Read More »PropertyBridge Brings PIN-less Debit to Residential Rent
PropertyBridge Inc., which handles electronic rent payments on behalf of property managers, plans to launch next month a recurring PIN-less debit option. It is processing some PIN-less transactions now in a test, or so-called “beta,” mode, for an unnamed property-management firm, says Jason Gardner, president of the Oakland, Calif.-based company, …
Read More »Will MasterCard Win, Cap One Card Unleash Debit Brand Switching?
MasterCard Worldwide received a double dose of good debit news last week. First came the news that big credit card issuer Capital One Financial Corp. is rolling out a MasterCard-branded rewards debit card that doesn't require the cardholder to have a deposit relationship with Cap One (Digital Transactions News, June …
Read More »USA Technologies And Coke Bottler Strike Biggest Vending Deal Yet
In the largest agreement so far for deployment of vending machines accepting mag-stripe and contactless cards, USA Technologies Inc. has been awarded a three-year contract that includes supplying card readers for up to 7,500 machines operated by Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc., the world's biggest Coke distributor, in cities across the country. …
Read More »MPI Case May Not Be the Last ISO Action, FTC Says
A recent case filed by the Federal Trade Commission against an independent sales organization in Beaverton, Ore., may not be the last such action the federal regulator will bring. In April, the agency sued Merchant Processing Inc. in federal court, alleging the ISO duped merchants by promising to buy out …
Read More »Why Synovus Is Optimistic About NACHA’s Secure Vault Payments
Unlike its experience with online bill payment, Synovus Financial Corp. expects ultimately to generate significant revenue from a new Internet payments system based on the automated clearing house for which a 12-to-18-month pilot will start by October. Exactly how much revenue, however, may depend on the pilot itself, as well …
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