Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals

December, 2018

• 21 December

  COMMENTARY: For Merchants, Much Has Been Accomplished, Much Is Yet To Be Done

  Merchants have come a long way since the inception of the Merchant Advisory Group, but far more needs to be done to restore some semblance of balance in payments. Upon reflection, it is remarkable that traditional merchants had no formal means to get together to discuss payments until the MAG …
• 20 December

  Growth in Remote Card Payments Far Outpaces Point-of-Sale Payment Growth, the Fed Reports

  

  E-commerce, online bill payments, and other forms of card-not-present payments continued their strong growth last year to capture a bigger share of total card payments, according to newly released Federal Reserve data. The number of what the Fed calls remote payments using general-purpose payment cards grew 22.8% in 2017 from …
• 20 December

  Click2Gov Payment Application for Municipalities Cited in 47 Data Breaches

  

  Click2Gov, a software application popular among municipalities for processing online payments of utility bills and fees, has been compromised in 46 U.S. cities and one Canadian location, according to an analysis released this week by Gemini Advisory. The New York City-based data-security firm estimates 294,929 payment card records have been …
• 20 December

  It’s the Holiday Season, But Fresh Data Shows How Fraudsters Work Online Year-Round

  

  Online merchants expect to battle fraud with added vigor during the holiday-season shopping frenzy. But now data released this week shows how fraud losses, and the costs of managing fraud, plague these merchants year-round. On average, e-commerce merchants sustained 142 successful fraud transactions each month this year, up 12% from …
• 20 December

  Synchrony Financial Extends Qurate Private-Label Card Deal and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 12/20/18

  

  Mobile-commerce platform PredictSpring said it developed a mobile-shopping app and store-associate app that provides a buy-online, pickup-in-store function for BevMo!, a specialty-beverage retailer. Synchrony Financial announced it will provide private-label credit card services to Qurate Retail Group, parent company of HSN, beginning in 2019. Synchrony also extended existing deals with …
• 19 December

  Square Resumes Its Pursuit of a Bank Charter

  

  After a lull of more than five months, merchant processor Square Inc. is resuming its attempt to obtain a bank charter. A spokesperson for San Francisco-based Square confirmed Wednesday morning that the company would refile its application the same day. Square in September 2017 filed for an industrial-bank charter from …
• 19 December

  Venmo for Crypto? A Startup’s New Wallet Lets Users Send And Receive Bitcoin Via Text Messages

  

  Bitcoin has had a bad year, but that isn’t stopping enthusiasts from launching new methods for consumers to buy, sell, and spend the digital currency. The latest introduction is a mobile wallet that allows users to send Bitcoin to contacts on their phone, and receive the currency from others, through …
• 19 December

  FIS in Shell Loyalty Deal and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 12/19/18

  

  E-commerce technology provider 3dcart said its merchants can now offer Bread, an online financing service for consumer purchases, to their shoppers. Fidelity National Information Services Inc. (FIS) said consumers can redeem rewards points instantly at the pump at approximately 13,400 Shell stations nationwide through a new agreement between FIS and …
• 18 December

  Active Role for Fed in Real-Time Payments Gets Support from Big Companies and Small Banks

  

  Big banks generally aren’t too thrilled about the Federal Reserve taking a direct operational role in a U.S. real-time payment system, but smaller banks and credit unions as well as some big companies support the idea. The Fed’s two-month comment period on its proposed Real Time Gross Settlement service closed …
• 18 December

  Postpone the Requiem for ATMs: A Drop in the Global Installed Base Isn’t the Whole Story

  

  With the onset of digital wallets, observers of the payments scene might expect consumer demand for cash to wither, and with it the population of ATMs. It turns out the ATM count worldwide did hit its zenith last year, according to research released this week, but the reason is a …