Competitive Strategies

• Amazon.com Inc. introduced Prime Reload, a service that lets Amazon Prime members earn a 2% reward when they reload their Amazon Gift Card balance with a debit card. The reward is added to the gift card balance. Users must give Amazon their debit card, bank-account, and bank-routing numbers when they …

By Jim Daly and Kevin Woodward@DTPaymentNews Financial-institution processor Fiserv Inc. reported Tuesday that it plans to buy United Kingdom-based Monitise plc, a faded star of the early mobile-banking and payments era that still has some valuable technology, for £70 million ($89 million) in cash. And HalCash North America, which goes …

• Processors Bora Payment Systems, Bottomline Technologies, CSI globalVCard, MineralTree, and Priority Commercial Payments have become the first companies to receive approval from Visa Inc.’s Visa Ready for Business Solutions program, which helps technology companies integrate with Visa’s business-to-business payments services. • In related news, Visa announced it will be equipping the stadiums …

• The Zelle person-to-person payments network announced its service will go live in the mobile-banking apps of more than 30 financial institutions beginning this week and continuing over the next 12 months. The coverage will include more than 86 million mobile-banking consumers, Zelle said, adding that more than 51 million transactions totaling more …

By O.B. Rawls IV Pivot. Transform. Expand. In today’s business landscape, especially in and around payments, flexibility and agility are key. Businesses must be prepared to evolve, regardless of their size, longevity, or core service and product offerings. But, for any of us who have been in business for a …

By Dave Yohe Selecting the right partner to process payments is essential for organizations taking payments directly from consumers. While it might be tempting to choose the provider offering the lowest rate, the short-term gains from saving a little money can risk longer term business revenue. In the following paragraphs …

• While House Republicans have stripped from the Financial Choice Act a provision that would have repealed the Durbin Amendment, the effort to get rid of the law’s debit-interchange caps and routing rules is still alive. As the House voted to pass the Act, a trio of Congressmen spoke in the House on Thursday …

VeriFone Systems Inc. is best known for its point-of-sale payment terminals, but the company is growing its cloud- and software-based payment products and services. VeriFone also has made a name for itself in payment and media services for taxicabs, but that business is now on the block, company officials announced …

Consumers have a new way to get, and pay for, clean clothes with the debut of Washlava. As announced this week, Washlava offers consumers a smart-phone app they can use to reserve washers and dryers, and then pay for that use. The service, another indicator of the increasing incidence of …

• Merchant processor Payment Data Systems Inc. extended the expiration of its non-binding letter of intent to buy independent sales organization Singular Payments LLC to enable Payment Data to finish its due diligence and Singular to conclude its audit; both companies agreed to the extension, Payment Data said. Terms of the stock and …