News

September, 2007

• 20 September

  Discover Adds Chase Paymentech, Says More Acquirer Deals Coming

  With its announcement on Thursday that it has added Chase Paymentech Solutions LLC, the nation's largest merchant acquirer, to its stable of bank card acquirers offering acceptance to small and mid-sized merchants, Discover Financial Services LLC further reduces what was once a yawning gap between itself and the bank card …
• 19 September

  A Startup’s Technology Turns ATMs into Prepaid Card Dispensers

  A Phoenix-area company called Better ATM Services Inc. thinks it has a better idea for merchandising prepaid cards: sell them directly at ATMs, with cards dispensed through the same slot that dispenses cash. Founded in 2005, the Mesa, Ariz.-based firm is now implementing its ideas at five local restaurants. Thomas …
• 19 September

  Advice for M-Payments Entrepreneurs: Aim at the Underbanked

  For the raft of processors either moving into mobile payments or hammering out business plans to make an entry, the top executive with one company that has been in the market for six years has some advice: Focus on the market made up of people who lack bank accounts, and …
• 18 September

  Survey: 42% of Consumers Ditch Online Transactions After a Glitch

  Evidence emerged again this week that Web-site breakdowns are causing more broken transactions online than e-commerce managers might suspect. Indeed, the proportion of consumers who report having had a problem completing an online transaction has remained little changed over the past three years at around 90%, while the fraction that …
• 18 September

  First Data Cuts Data Centers As Its Road Show Starts

  First Data Corp. is giving more glimpses of its previously announced plans to tighten up operations as top management and private-equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. struggle to meet a planned Sept. 30 closing date for KKR's $29 billion leveraged buyout of the No. 1 payments processor. In a …
• 13 September

  The New Irony of Signature Cards: Good at Fraud, Bad at Risk

  Data Insecurity Part 5 While absolute dollars of fraud are rising with volume, the payments industry has done a commendable job in managing risk. For every $100 in purchases with signature-based credit cards, only about a nickel winds up as fraud?about one-third what it was 15 years ago?and that rate …
• 13 September

  New Biller Categories, More Vendors Spur PINless Debit Growth

  Transactions consumers make online with PIN-debit cards?but without entering their PINs?will soar 40% this year, to an estimated 92 million payments, driven by rising biller adoption, an expansion of eligible biller categories, and increasing availability of the payment option among vendors that handle payments for billers, according to a new …
• 12 September

  After a Delay, NACHA Unveils Interchange, Other Pricing for SVP

  NACHA-The Electronic Payments Association on Wednesday unveiled pricing for a pilot program it will launch early next year to test automated clearing house payments made by consumers to online merchants and billers, with payments authorized by online-banking programs. For e-commerce merchants, the fees, which will include a straight 1.35% levy …
• 12 September

  BancorpSouth out to Show Smaller Banks Can Succeed in M-Banking

  At a time when companies as big and diverse as Google Inc., eBay Inc.'s PayPal, the bank card networks and others are all moving into mobile banking and payments, a regional bank in Mississippi has emerged as one of the more experienced players in the embryonic market. Tupelo-based BancorpSouth Inc. …
• 11 September

  Sued by FTC, MPI Begins Turnaround, Looks to Expand to Midwest

  The new chief executive of Merchant Processing Inc. says his independent sales organization is on the road to recovery five months after the Federal Trade Commission accused the ISO and its then president of defrauding merchants and had MPI placed in receivership. James Keller, a certified public accountant with experience …