News

October, 2013

• 23 October

  Somewhat Warily, Payments Execs Acknowledge That Bitcoin Will Make Its Mark

  By Jim Daly A summer poll of payments executives found that less than a third think Bitcoin and other so-called math-based virtual currencies will greatly change how money is moved within 10 years. But majorities, some strong, also think that Bitcoin will spur responses from PayPal Inc., the big wire-transfer …
• 22 October

  Network Divide Over EMV Comes to the Fore as Rumors About a Liability-Shift Delay Surface

  By Jim Daly The deep divide within debit networks about bringing Europay-MasterCard-Visa (EMV) chip cards to the United States was on full display Monday at a conference in which a Visa Inc. executive hinted that Visa might be open to a delay in a major EMV deadline. But an executive …
• 22 October

  Dwolla Aims To Speed Real-Time Payments with Alliance Data Deal for Cardless Credit

  In its latest gambit to commercialize instant payment settlement, Dwolla Inc. on Tuesday unveiled a service that will let users pay online merchants using credit rather than their own money. The service, which the Des Moines, Iowa-based alternative-payment processor is calling simply “Credit,” is intended to accelerate progress toward faster …
• 22 October

  AmEx Cardholders Can Use Points to Pay for Taxi Rides in New York

    American Express Co. cardholders for the first time can use their rewards points at the point of sale when they pay for rides in New York City taxis that use VeriFone Systems Inc. taxi point-of-sale services, AmEx said Monday. Cardholders can use their points in more than 7,000 New …
• 21 October

  IP Consolidator Unwired Planet Slaps Square with Suit Alleging Patent Infringement

  Intellectual-property company Unwired Planet Inc. is suing Square Inc. alleging Square’s mobile-payments technologies infringe on three of its patents, Unwired Planet announced Monday. The suit asserts that mobile point-of-sale provider Square infringes on patents for wireless transactions and location-based services as used in Square Wallet, and location-based notifications as used …
• 16 October

  PayPal Continues to Grow, Topping $1.6 Billion in Q3 Revenue

    PayPal Inc., the financial services arm of marketplace eBay Inc., continues to work on expanding PayPal acceptance beyond e-commerce, and its decision last month to buy Braintree Payment Solutions LLC for $800 million is one part of that effort, eBay executives said Wednesday. EBay has been expanding the number …
• 16 October

  Citing Shady ISO Practices, Heartland’s Carr Predicts Further Crackdowns by the FTC

  Merchant processors can expect federal regulators to continue cracking down on their industry, Robert O. Carr, chief executive of Heartland Payment Systems Inc., predicted in a speech Wednesday at an acquiring-industry conference. The reason for stepped-up federal oversight, Carr said, is that independent sales organizations haven’t policed themselves effectively. He …
• 16 October

  Merchants Cite “Don’t Know” as the Most Common Acquirer Name: Survey

    Ideally, merchants that use payment card acceptance services would know which merchant acquirers they work with. But in a recent report from research firm Aite Group LLC, the most common response when merchants were asked to name their acquirers was “Don’t know.” Of the 491 U.S. merchants surveyed for …
• 15 October

  Dwolla Ends Support for Virtual Currency Bitcoin

  By Kevin Woodward Person-to-person and mobile payments company Dwolla Corp. is ending support for Bitcoin and other virtual currencies effective Oct. 28, Dwolla announced on Friday. Less than 0.1% of Dwolla’s merchants use virtual currencies, Des Moines, Iowa-based Dwolla says in a statement. “Dwolla has notified the few affected merchants …
• 15 October

  Decoupled Debit Scheme Pulls Up at the VeriFone Fuel Pump

  Consumers this fall will be able to use their smart phones to pay for fuel at certain gas stations that use VeriFone Systems Inc. technology and offer National Payment Card Association’s mobile-payment app, VeriFone announced Monday. Point-of-sale terminal maker VeriFone says convenience store and gas station operators using its Smart …