While the recession is making an impact on consumer spending generally, PIN debit card usage is faring considerably better than that of signature debit. Indeed, PIN debit transactions by consumers grew 15% between July and December, the period during which the economic downturn began making itself felt, nearly four times …

Intuit Inc. on Thursday entered the race to sign up plumbers, carpet cleaners, delivery people, and other small on-the-go merchants for card acceptance. The Mountain View, Calif.-based vendor of the popular QuickBooks accounting program rolled out a product, called GoPayment, that works on mobile phones but doesn't require other hardware, …

The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday overwhelmingly passed a sweeping credit card reform bill that leaves out retailer-backed regulation of interchange. The bill, which the Senate sent to the House Tuesday, includes a Congressional interchange study and could open the door to controls on gift cards. The House earlier …

The U.S. Senate didn't pass a credit card reform bill last week as many expected, but senators are expected to take up the issue again Tuesday. The question for the merchant-acquiring industry is whether the final bill, which is concerned with regulating credit card issuers' most controversial practices, also would …

Payment card acceptance costs have been swept into the furious Congressional debate about credit card interest rates, fees, and terms. Late Thursday afternoon, a proposal was pending in the U.S. Senate that would give merchants greater leeway to offer customers discounts if they use cash, checks, or debit cards versus …

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. paid discount fees totaling more than $1 billion to take credit and debit cards in the 12 months ended Jan. 31. Acceptance costs now exceed health-care premiums at The Home Depot Inc. And TJX Cos. Inc. finds sagging apparel prices make it difficult to recoup acceptance costs …

Airlines lost more than $1.4 billion to online fraudsters in 2008, representing about 1.3% of their Web-generated revenues. Those are two key findings from a first-of-its-kind survey about air carriers' Internet-related fraud. Mountain View, Calif.-based CyberSource Corp. commissioned the survey with Airline Information LLC, which produces conferences and publications about …

Noca Inc., which this week launched a beta version of an online-payments product that relies on the automated clearing house network, plans to have a commercial service ready for launch by June, Pankaj Gupta, president and founder of the Mountain View, Calif.-based startup tells Digital Transactions News. One feature the …

A downward-spiraling economy is accelerating what had already been a rapidly developing trend for startups to introduce online payment methods as alternatives to bank cards. Indeed, one such company, Miami-based Mazooma Inc., launched a cash-based commercial service on Tuesday with the premise that consumers are looking for ways to buy …

This is the fourth installment of a six-part series exploring the impact of Web 2.0 on the payments business. Previous articles have dealt with the transition from the first generation of eCommerce to the emerging world of social networks and highly personalized interactions utilizing Web 2.0 technology. Consumers will be …