Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals
• A consumer class-action lawsuit filed by the United Kingdom government’s former financial-services ombudsman against MasterCard Inc. seeks 14 billion pounds ($18.6 billion) in damages for allegedly charging excessive merchant fees between 1992 and 2008, expenses merchants passed on to consumers. In a statement, MasterCard said it “firmly” disagrees with the claim and that “we intend to oppose it vigorously.”
• The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau levied a $100 million fine against Wells Fargo Bank N.A. for secretly opening unauthorized deposit and credit card accounts. The CFPB said the bank’s analysis found that employees opened more than 2 million such accounts that may not have been authorized. In addition to paying the largest penalty yet issued by the CFPB, Wells Fargo will pay at least $2.5 million in customer refunds, $35 million to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and $50 million to the City and County of Los Angeles. In 2015, the city of Los Angeles filed suit against the bank for allegedly opening unauthorized customer accounts.
• Processor Fidelity National Information Services Inc. (FIS) said credit-union services organization Co-Op Financial Services will offer FIS’s Cardless Cash ATM service to its mobile-banking clients; Cardless Cash enables consumers to make ATM withdrawals with smart phones instead of debit cards. Co-Op will begin testing the service in 2017’s first quarter.
• IPad-based point-of-sale provider Revel Systems said that it and Shell Retail, which counts more than 43,000 global fueling locations, signed an agreement that enables Revel’s POS system to be used at certain locations. The Revel system enables secure fuel and convenience-store payments, pump management, and offline payment acceptance. More than 25,000 Revel systems are in use already with other customers, the company said.
• First American Payment Systems L.P. said Storage Commander, a software developer for the self-storage industry, is offering First American payment-processing services to its users.
• UnionPay International Inc., a unit of China UnionPay, said more than 80% of U.S. merchants accept the payment card, with the figure exceeding 90% in favorite tourist destinations such as New York, Hawaii, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Orlando, Fla., and Chicago.
• SkyWire, a point-of-sale software developer, announced it completed EMV certification with gateway Shift4 Corp.
