Pricing

Payment card acceptance costs have been swept into the furious Congressional debate about credit card interest rates, fees, and terms. Late Thursday afternoon, a proposal was pending in the U.S. Senate that would give merchants greater leeway to offer customers discounts if they use cash, checks, or debit cards versus …

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. paid discount fees totaling more than $1 billion to take credit and debit cards in the 12 months ended Jan. 31. Acceptance costs now exceed health-care premiums at The Home Depot Inc. And TJX Cos. Inc. finds sagging apparel prices make it difficult to recoup acceptance costs …

Hammered by rising payment-infrastructure costs and a deteriorating economy, billers are starting to push customers harder to receive bills electronically rather than by paper. The rising tide of home foreclosures, indeed, serves as a wakeup call to billers that aren't looking at electronic bill presentment, since it's getting harder to …

The White House is scheduled to dress down credit card issuers this week. That and current and possible bills in Congress increase the chances of new regulations on merchant acquirers, according to a lobbyist for the Electronic Transactions Association trade group of independent sales organizations and other merchant processors. Congress …

Bling Nation Ltd. on Wednesday said it has completed a 10-day test of its alternative-payment platform, known as the Community Payment Service. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company also said it plans to continue testing its system preparatory to a rollout. Bling Nation's platform creates closed-loop transaction networks linking local merchants …

The electronic-commerce payments market remains highly competitive despite the recession, and the online niche payment systems are trying to adapt their game plans to the fluid conditions. “The economy is helping us on the consumer side and the merchant side,” says Sergio Pinon, chief executive of eLayaway LLC, an online …

An interchange battle is raging this week in Washington D.C., even though there is no interchange bill pending in Congress. Some merchants, however, hope that will change soon and are pushing their agenda with an advertising campaign that includes a YouTube video and advertising designed to influence new members of …

The merchants have spoken, and they're none too happy with the new pricing plans Google Inc. disclosed earlier this month for its nearly 3-year-old Google Checkout online-payment service. Merchants are registering their ire on Google Checkout's Web site, where many of the 90-plus recent postings in a section reserved for …

More information is trickling out about new transaction fees planned by Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. While the main ones are slightly under 2 cents per affected transaction, when applied to the vast stream of bank card purchases they could produce more than $600 million in new revenues for the …

Announcements last week from two of the major online payment systems, PayPal Inc. and Google Inc.'s Google Checkout, show the two are taking differing roads: PayPal is getting ready for a big growth spurt, while Google Checkout is changing its longstanding pricing plan with tiered rates that amount to price …