A proposal for a new payment application that would allow merchants to convert bundles of consumer checks to electronic transactions in a central location has received largely favorable comment from banks, merchants, and other industry participants. NACHA, the Herndon, Va.-based rules-setting organization for the automated clearing house, is reviewing written …

The battle over interchange, which has already spawned some 47 antitrust suits against the bank card networks and major banks, reached the U.S. Congress today as advocates for both retailers and banks traded sometimes barbed arguments before a panel holding a one-day hearing to look into the networks' pricing mechanism. …

In building out a network of point-of-sale readers to accept their contactless cards and tokens, banks and their card associations could be creating an infrastructure that will also support payments based on new mobile-payment technologies like Motorola Corp.'s M-Wallet software that could bypass the lucrative credit card interchange system, one …

Motorola Inc.'s new payment software for mobile phones, called M-Wallet, will begin commercial rollout within three to six months with wireless carriers, the Schaumburg, Ill.-based technology company tells Digital Transactions News. A test of M-Wallet is already in progress, officials say, though they can't give details. The company is in …

When the Check Clearing Act for the 21st Century (Check 21) went into effect in October 2004, experts predicted it would be years before banks weaned themselves from the so-called image-replacement documents provided for in the law. These IRDs are paper printouts of check images that travel the last mile …

Merchant litigation against bank card interchange may end up benefiting bank card network competitors like American Express Co. more than retailers, a Wall Street analyst who has followed the interchange controversy cautioned this week. If successful in forcing Visa USA and MasterCard International and their members to cut interchange rates, …

Citigroup Inc.'s Citibank, which last year announced it would issue contactless tokens linked to customers' credit and debit card accounts in the New York metropolitan area, is now allowing those devices to be used in a test of radio-frequency-based electronic fare payments by the Metropolitan Transit Authority's MTA New York …

Eight months after rolling out its Internet payment service in the U.S., Ottawa-based MODASolutions says it is seeing results, both in merchant recruitment and in consumer adoption. The company, whose SECURE-eBill product allows consumers to pay e-commerce merchants in the same way they make electronic bill payments, won't disclose transaction …

Despite some poor fourth-quarter financials, shares of First Data Corp. rose nearly 7% this morning after the big transaction processor announced plans to spin off its fast-growing and biggest subsidiary, Western Union, to First Data shareholders. Denver-based First Data also ended speculation that it might sell its lackluster Card Issuing …

Webpay Inc.'s Click&Buy payment service, which handles largely digital-content sales, will begin processing transactions on consumers' phone bills April 1. The service will work with two so-far unnamed telecommunications carriers that together cover 55% of U.S. land-line subscribers, says Fabian G. Siegel, president and chief executive of Webpay, which has …