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Federal regulators on Tuesday issued their final rule for preventing terrorists, drug dealers, and other criminals from using prepaid cards for money laundering. The new rule from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCen) subjects merchants and other non-bank entities that sell or manage prepaid cards to some …
Read More »Isis Now Counts Visa, MasterCard, Discover, And AmEx As Network Partners
Rebounding after abandoning plans to build a proprietary merchant network, the Isis mobile-payments joint venture of three leading telecommunications companies on Tuesday said it had enlisted the support of the four major general-purpose card networks in the U.S. The announcement marks an advance by the venture backed by AT&T, …
Read More »Eye on EMV: UNFCU Study, Aite Survey, Jack Henry Service
n The first U.S. financial institution to introduce EMV cards, United Nations Federal Credit Union, released the results of a study along with Gemalto, the vendor of its cards. The study comes one year after the credit union launched its chip-and-PIN credit cards. As a result of the study, …
Read More »With the Fed’s Debit Rule in Place, Anti-Durbin Crusader TCF Throws in the Towel
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Read More »Issuers Eyeing Fees for Debit Can Expect Cardholder Backlash, Survey Shows
Some 49% of debit card holders would either stop using their cards or use them less often if their issuers slapped a $1-to-$2 monthly fee on their checking accounts in return for unlimited usage, and another 25% would close their accounts altogether, according to consumer research released this week. …
Read More »AmEx Launches a Reloadable Prepaid Card with Practically No Fees
With issuers and program managers having come under fire in recent months for allegedly high and numerous consumer fees for prepaid products, American Express Co. on Tuesday launched a reloadable prepaid card that levies no activation or maintenance fees. It also charges no reload fee when value is loaded …
Read More »With Durbin Looming, Are Issuers Pushing Higher-Interchange Cards?
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Read More »An Improving Economy Buoys Volumes for Payments Players
Charge volumes for some major payments-industry players, including American Express Co. and U.S. Bancorp, grew by double digits in the first quarter, an indication that consumer spending is recovering and generating more revenue-producing transactions for merchant acquirers. –American Express’s growth was especially strong. The company reported Wednesday that U.S. card-billed …
Read More »How Banks, Spurred by Regulation, Are Eyeing Prepaid Products
Banks are likely to become much more active as issuers of reloadable prepaid cards in response to new regulations that are making traditional bank accounts more expensive for consumers, according to a new report from Javelin Strategy & Research. “There’s an opportunity for banks to use prepaid as an account-replacement …
Read More »Aiming to Boost Its Position with Cardholders, Discover Launches a P2P Service with PayPal
Once avoided as a money-loser, person-to-person payments are picking up momentum, with Discover Financial Services as the latest entrant. Discover’s Money Messenger service, which went live Monday, allows cardholders to send cash to anyone with a PayPal account. Recipients who aren’t PayPal customers can set up an account quickly via …
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