As Consumers Revisit Stores, J.P. Morgan Teams Up With ACI to Expand in Europe And the U.K.

With consumers becoming more comfortable returning to in-store shopping as Covid-19 vaccinations roll out, J.P. Morgan is partnering with U.S. processor ACI Worldwide Inc. to enable merchants in Europe and the United Kingdom to offer in-store payment acceptance.

The deal expands J.P. Morgan’s omnichannel processing presence by giving merchants a single service provider for in-store and e-commerce processing, which J.P. Morgan says is an important step in its payments strategy. J.P. Morgan is a marketing name for the investment businesses of banking giant JPMorgan Chase & Co. and its global subsidiaries and affiliates.

ACI will offer merchants in Europe and the U.K. an in-store payments service that enables them to use J.P. Morgan’s acquiring capabilities, which are pre-packaged with terminals and pre-certified and validated for point-to-point encryption, Andrew Quartermaine, a vice president at ACI Worldwide, says by email. Merchants will be able accept payments at the counter as well as with in-store mobile terminals.

Through this collaboration, European and U.K. merchants will have access to processing services for Visa, MasterCard, American Express credit and debit cards, contactless cards, and digital wallets such as Google Pay and Apple Pay.

“While e-commerce has clearly accelerated during the last year, we’re also seeing that consumers are keen to return to physical stores,” Basil Bailey, head of product for J.P. Morgan’s EMEA merchant services, said in a prepared statement. “Streamlining merchants’ operations during this readjustment period by offering them an in-store payment option alongside our established e-commerce processing platform will enable them to save time, costs, and ultimately focus on growth.”

J.P. Morgan says it partnered with ACI, with which it works in other regions around the world, because of ACI’s experience in offering payment processing across both online and in-store channels. In addition to ACI, J.P. Morgan collaborates with payments providers Aurus Inc. and FreedomPay Inc. to provide omnichannel payment solutions to merchants.

U.S.-based FreedomPay announced Wednesday it is working with J.P. Morgan to install contactless-payment technology for cards and digital wallets at merchants in the United Kingdom, European Union, Switzerland, and parts of the Nordics.