Vending Operator Taps USA Technologies for 50,000 ePort Payment Devices

USConnect, a food-service network, has ordered 50,000 ePort vending-machine payment devices from USA Technologies Inc., making it the largest single order ever, says Malvern, Pa.-based USA Technologies. EPort devices enable vending machines to accept credit and debit cards and contactless payments.

USConnect will supply the devices to its network of 25 independent food-service companies over the next five years, a USA Technologies spokeswoman says. Each of those companies will decide their own installation timeline. USConnect manages more than 100,000 vending machines.

The ePort devices also will use USA Technologies’ ePort Connect service that enables payment processing, provides settlement to a merchant account, wireless connectivity, online sales reporting, remote management, vending-machine status reports, and complies with the Payment Card Industry data-security standard. USA Technologies says the number of connections made to its ePort Connect service reached 214,000 in June, a 161% increase from 82,000 in June 2010. The company says more than 5,000 clients use ePort Connect.

Earlier this year, USA Technologies debuted a loyalty program that offers consumers a prepaid card they can use to earn cash rewards or discounts on future purchases. USA Technologies also will integrate the SmartTap mobile-commerce technology offered by Isis, a smart-phone-based mobile payments service in development.

EPort devices accept the major card brands—Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover—except for MasterCard debit. That is because Visa Inc. signed a special rate deal with USA Technologies when the Durbin amendment went into force two years ago. With an average ticket of $1.67, USA Technologies could have seen its interchange expense rise by 235%, from 6.6 cents to 22.1 cents, had the Durbin cap of 22 cents plus 0.05% been applied. Some 82% of purchases on the company’s network in fiscal 2011 were small-ticket debit card transactions, with 75% of those on Visa debit cards.

That agreement, since renewed through October 2013 with an automatic renewal to October 2014, essentially brought the rate back to pre-Durbin levels, the USA Technologies spokeswoman says. She would not disclose the rate.

USA Technologies says less than 10% of the estimated 6 million to 7 million vending machines in the United States are equipped to accept cashless payments.