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Every corporate merger presents risks to the companies involved and their owners, employees, and customers. Leading U.S.-based point-of-sale terminal maker VeriFone Systems Inc.’s planned takeover of smaller rival Hypercom Corp. is no exception: a recent regulatory filing detailing VeriFone’s merger plans devotes 26 pages to a host of risks. Of …
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Visa Commits to a Two-Tier Debit Card Interchange Structure
In an apparent effort to calm its smaller debit card issuers, Visa Inc. says it will develop a two-tier interchange schedule, one with regulated rates arising from the Dodd-Frank financial-reform law and the other with unregulated rates applicable to banks and credit unions with fewer than $10 billion in assets. …
Read More »United Bank Card Raises the Bar in Free POS Equipment
United Bank Card Inc., a big independent sales organization that touched off the so-called free-terminal trend seven years ago, has begun offering merchants full-blown point-of-sale business-management hardware and software at no charge. It is also offering its outside sales representatives a $300 commission per terminal sold. Many merchant-acquiring industry observers …
Read More »Data Breaches Stabilize in 2010, But There’s an Asterisk
At first glance, a review of the data-breach scene in 2010 shows signs of improvement, or at least stabilization, according to figures from the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC). Although the total number of reported breaches increased to 662 from 498 in 2009, the number of records known to have …
Read More »TSYS Cements Strategic About-Face with Takeover of First National Merchant Solutions
Total System Services Inc. on Tuesday brought to an end a short-lived joint venture with First National Bank of Omaha by buying the 49% of FNBO unit First National Merchant Solutions LLC it didn’t already own. In the deal, TSYS paid FNBO $169.6 million for the remaining stake, implying a …
Read More »Rewriting the Transaction Routing Rules
Rewriting the Transaction Routing Rules The Durbin Amendment throws out exclusive debit network agreements and gives merchants more freedom to route debit transactions according to their wishes. Who will win and lose in the post-Durbin world? BY JIM DALY By the time you read this, the Federal Reserve Board will …
Read More »What’s Holding up the Mobile Point of Sale?
Endpoint What’s Holding up the Mobile Point of Sale? As powerful as the technology is, mobile-payment acceptance won’t go very far until solution providers start giving businesses the choices they’re looking for in hardware and processing platforms, says Bill Clark. One likely cause for this slow growth rate is merchants’ …
Read More »The Forgotten Ones
The Gimlet Eye The Forgotten Ones No doubt everyone is still digesting the debit card interchange proposals that the Federal Reserve Board released on Dec. 16. These rules, which represent the first-ever government regulation of payment card interchange, are the result of a years-long tug-of-war between merchants on one end …
Read More »An End to the Great Data-Storage Debate
Security An End to the Great Data-Storage DebatePeter Lucas Weaning merchants from their ingrained practice of storing payment card data won’t be easy, but security experts conclude it must be done. Meanwhile, encryption technology, though growing in popularity, is not invulnerable. Having survived database breaches at high-profile retailers and merchant …
Read More »‘We’re Betting on the Gesture of Tapping’
Transactors ‘We’re Betting on the Gesture of Tapping’John Stewart By building bridges between the online and offline worlds, Bling Nation hopes to popularize ‘tapping in’ at merchants. It’s all about going viral, says one of the mobile-payments startup’s top executives. Scarcely two years old, Bling Nation Ltd. has already deployed …
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