With a number of processors and software houses having introduced applications over the past year to let merchants process cards on smart phones, many observers wondered how long it would be before the established point-of-sale terminal vendors entered this market. On Tuesday morning, the answer came with VeriFone Holdings Inc.'s …

If hype augurs success, the new Square payments application for mobile merchants is off to a promising start. The product, announced this week by a San Francisco startup called Square Inc., is attracting attention not just in the payments business but in the wider business community. That's because Square's founder …

Will the 2010 iteration of the Payment Card Industry data-security standard represent a major break from the current version or just have some minor changes? That's the question before the card networks, merchants, merchant acquirers, and payment processors now that one meeting with PCI stakeholders is down and another is …

PIN-debit cards and contactless acceptance seem like two unlikely electronic-payment services to promote in one point-of-sale device, but that's exactly what First Data Corp. is doing with the latest addition to its FD line of POS hardware. The big processor's goal with the new FD-30 PIN pad: build future demand …

In an unprecedented effort to thwart data breaches, the three leading vendors of payment card terminals on Wednesday put aside their normally fierce rivalries to announce creation of a non-profit industry group to implement common security standards and improve knowledge about security issues. “The self interest aligns with the public …

Merchant processor First Data Corp. bolstered its position as an up-and-coming provider of point-of-sale payment terminals today with the unveiling of one new and one retrofitted terminal in its FD line of hardware. The devices will help First Data shore up its offerings to check-accepting and multimerchant card-accepting locations. In …

Although observers report the economic downturn has soured many restaurants on so-called pay-at-table technology for the time being, some independent sales organizations see opportunity in the market and are moving ahead with plans to exploit it. Alpine Payment Systems, an ISO in Vancouver, Wash., that processes payments for about 100 …

U.S. Bancorp's Nova Information Services Inc. merchant-acquiring subsidiary is diving headfirst into the increasingly competitive payment-gateway business with its pending acquisition of Southern DataComm Inc., a gateway with a big presence in the hospitality sector. Largo, Fla.-based Southern DataComm handles an estimated $50 billion-plus in annualized payment volume, according to …

It's the summer of change in the executive suites of some major payment-industry companies. Two days after No. 1 processor First Data Corp. named a new chief executive, struggling payment-terminal manufacturer Hypercom Corp. announced that William Keiper, its chief executive for not quite two years, would leave his post Aug …

Beyond a recent press release, First Data Corp. hasn't made a huge public splash about its new payment terminal, the FD-100. Yet the terminal is not just a box that processes payment card transactions. It's an element of First Data's multipronged strategy to get more business from small and mid-sized …