Keep up-to-date on the payment processing front with news from MerchantSeek.
- Greater Security, Flexibility, and Global Acceptance Driving EMV Adoption in U.S. - January 31, 2012
On August 9, 2011 Visa moved forward with a three-part plan to speed up the adoption of EMV chip technology in the United States. Globally, for both credit and debit cards, the standard represented 40.1 percent of the payment cards in circulation for the first quarter of 2011 with 71 percent of the POS devices... Read more »
- New Smartphones Approved for use with VISA payWave - January 20, 2012
On January 10, 2012 Visa Inc. and Visa Europe made public their certification of a new range of NFC-capable smartphones that can be used with payWave, the company’s aptly named mobile system for point-of-sale payments. The new phones by Samsung, LG, and RIM have been added to the list of Visa-compliant payment products and can... Read more »
- Smartphone Popularity Driving Creation of Mobile Wallet Offerings - December 20, 2011
The proliferation of smartphones in the United States is driving a wave of new mobile wallet initiatives, but pundits are divided in their opinion about which firms will take the lead in spurring widespread adoption of the payment method. AT&T, American Express, Discover, First Data, Google, Citi, Sprint, MasterCard, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Visa have all... Read more »
- Mobile, NFC, and Contactless Payment Options Expanding Exponentially - December 12, 2011
Competition in the mobile / contactless / near-field communication payment segment is heating up thanks to the proliferation of hand-held mobile point-of-service (POS) devices and of applications that allow smartphones to function in much the same manner. Some of the major contenders include: Verifone’s PAYMEDIA Solutions, Ingenico, the ViVOpay 8100 terminal by ViVotech, Google Wallet,... Read more »
- U.S. Acceptance of EMV Standard Will Change Payment Landscape - December 6, 2011
Emerging technologies are having a major impact on electronic business today. The mainstream adoption of the Europay / MasterCard / Visa, or EMV standard is a prime example. EMV is a global interoperational standard for integrated circuit or “chip” credit cards. The necessary technology to support this standard is poised to elevate the level of... Read more »
- Obama Administration to Propose Online Internet Identity System - November 2, 2011
An recent article on BusinessWeek announced that the Obama administration has plans for an Internet Identity system that iss upposed to limit fraud and make online ordering easier. The U.S. Commerce Department will actually oversee this new system but it will be maintained by private firms. This new system could result in fewer passwords and... Read more »
- Paypal founder Peter Thiel says: If I’d Known, I Would Never Have Started PayPal - May 25, 2011
An interesting article with PayPal’s founder Peter Thiel reveals that had he known about the difficulties in the payments space, he would have never founded Paypal. Though we aren’t sure of the specific difficulties he is referring to, this article pretty much makes the point that many payment professionals have been trying to make to... Read more »
- Visa to Waive Japanese Relief Donation Interchange Fees - March 27, 2011
Visa has recently announced that they will waive Interchange fees for a select number of organizations that are providing Japanese relief efforts. If you are one of these organizations you may be entitled to free interchange through late April. The organizations are: United States • American Red Cross • AmeriCares • Habitat for Humanity •... Read more »
- Verifone Releases News on SquareUp’s Merchant Swipe Reader Allowing Unencrypted Data - March 9, 2011
Recently Verifone Systems, Inc announced that it had been able to develop a third party app that could access card data swiped by the SquareUp free card reader that is included with this account. Though Verifone mentions skimming as the main threat, with all the creativity of hackers out there I could easily see an... Read more »
- Target Becomes First Retailer to Launch Scannable Mobile Coupon - March 10, 2010
An recent article on BusinessWire announced that Target has become the first national retail to launch their scannable mobile coupon program. Ever since the launch of online bar-codes a few years ago, and the up rise in mobile marketing a couple years ago there has been buzz about how this may someday be the way... Read more »
- Heartland Sniffer Hid on a portion of the disk that was unused. - December 9, 2009
A recent report by Shuman’s StoreFront TalkBack blog explains how the sniffer that caused the largest credit card system breach in history stayed for so long undetected This is a must read for merchants and processors as this shows just how vulnerable we all are to having malware on our systems that go undetected. Processors... Read more »
- American Express Reports an Increase in Credit Card Usage - November 13, 2009
An article on Yahoo discusses how American Express reported an increase in credit card spending again this past October. This could signify an increase in consumer confidence on the economy. Spending has improved steadily and declines in usage are beginning to slow, which all could represent an upswing just in time for the holiday –... Read more »
- Google Checkout will begin charging standard transaction fees to Non-Profits - November 6, 2009
Google has announced recently on their blog that they will be restructuring their checkout to now include standard fees for Non-Profits. So this means that soon the days of their giving away processing will be over. This comes as no surprise as there is not much room for giving away financial services anymore with the... Read more »
- Amazon.com drops the Bill Me Later service - October 10, 2009
Amazon.com has announced that they will no longer be accepting Bill Me Later as a payment option. This decision seemed to come after Ebay had acquired the Bill Me Later payment service. Amazon also refuses to accept Paypal as a payment option (which appears to be a good choice as their use of a “real”... Read more »
- Credit Card Issuers launch programs to help customer pay down balance - October 6, 2009
Some credit card issuers have announced new programs to help customers pay down credit card debts and build savings through rewards and cash back cards. The CreditCards.com Article/News Release may be found here: http://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/rewards-cards-pay-debt-build-retirement-1273.php?aid=2741cce8&rss_lnk=25 —————————————– MerchantSeek Your Payment Acceptance Source www.merchantseek.com
- Some Grocery Stores Considering Not Accepting Checks - September 22, 2009
A recent article in the LA Times talks about how some large grocery store chains are looking to discontinue check acceptance and only accept cash, credit and debit cards. According to recent studies check usage has declined so much in exchange for debit and credit card usage that it’s no longer necessary to offer check... Read more »
- New Payment Options for Medical Patients That Can’t Pay Bill - July 9, 2009
A recent article by CNNMoney.com talks about how more and more Americans are paying their medical doctors with credit cards. Though some advise against this practice, patients are faced with the choice of not paying the doctor at all or paying with credit. According to the report American’s spend close to $294 billion annually in... Read more »
- New Fees for Card Usage Overseas – to Card Users - May 18, 2009
A recent article by the Wall Street Journal highlights a new increase in fees that are being charged by Discover and American Express to users (not merchants, just FYI) that make purchases in foreign currencies. Some banks are also beginning to charge fees to card users that use foreign cards even if they’re made in... Read more »
- Grocery Store Coupon Usage Spikes to Record High - December 8, 2008
A recent survey by Select Coupon Program announced that grocery store coupons have reached record numbers in the US. Of course, many cite the economic conditions as the primary reason for this spike, so it’s really tough to tell if this is a negative or positive. The entire press release on the survey’s findings may... Read more »
- Credit Card Manual Imprinters May Become Obsolete - December 2, 2008
This year Visa announced their unembossed credit card program, where they will begin issuing cards that are completely flat and do not contain embossed numbers (which are often useful in the case of imprinting credit cards). While these cards have a “cool” look and feel they create a bit of a problem in the case... Read more »
- Contact 2 – Credit Card - October 9, 2008
(A Fox 2 story on restaurant credit card fraud and a terminal that sets to combat it) Investigators report more than half of all stolen credit card information occurs at restaurants. Think about it: It’s the only transaction where your credit card is taken away from you—You never actually see the transaction. A crooked server... Read more »
- Important information on Visa/MC PCI Compliance for Internet Merchants and Merchants that Store Card Data - June 3, 2008
The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) is a relatively new initiative backed by Visa, MC, AMEX, Discover, and JCB to ensure best practices of protecting cardholder data. The PCI DSS scanning requirements applies to all merchants that store or process credit card information via the Internet. According to the PCI Compliance Guide... Read more »
- Symantec Warns on New Banking Trojan Threat - January 17, 2008
U.S Internet security firm Symantec has uncovered a new banking Trojan which steals customer data from over 400 banks worldwide. Trojan.Silentbanker intercepts account information before it is encrypted, redirects traffic to phishing Websites, and even alters transactions to send money to the attacker’s bank account. It redirects financial transactions without the customer’s knowledge. Worryingly, the... Read more »
- Retailers Want Banks to Store Card Data - October 22, 2007
The National Retail Federation (NRF) is calling for the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Security Standards Council to stop requiring merchants to store card data. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) is a set of mandatory requirements for protecting cardholder data, which are governed by the PCI Security Standards Council. These requirements apply... Read more »
- Money Laundering Scheme Uses ATMs to Transfer Drug Cash - September 25, 2007
ATMs around the world are being used to launder money from the U.S, authorities in New York have revealed. The practice, known as ‘microstructuring,’ involves small deposits being made into bank accounts in the U.S., and funds being withdrawn at ATMs abroad. Microstructuring is emerging as a major problem for law enforcement officials due to... Read more »
- Amazon.com to offer payment solution to compete with Google and Paypal - September 1, 2007
Amazon.com a service originally founded as a traditional bookstore, that has involved into more of a one stop shop ecommerce store, is planning to enter the third party credit card processing market dominated by Paypal. This service is an extension of their Amazon Payments solution which currently allows Amazon third parties to sell products in the... Read more »
- Boomers Say Cash Is Dying - August 29, 2007
The majority of U.S baby boomers and echo boomers predict electronic payment transactions will one day replace cash and checks, a study by Visa USA reveals. The study found that 79 percent of baby boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964, believe cash is on the way out. The same belief is held by 74... Read more »
- New Service Reduces Chargebacks/Fraud By 80% - February 19, 2007
VoiceStamps has developed and tested a new service that has shown to reduce instances of credit card chargebacks and fraud by 80% or more. Not only does the service reduce chargebacks, but it can process credit card and ACH check transactions from any touch-tone telephone. It makes a terrific order verification/processing service for all types... Read more »
- PICO-PAY LAUNCHES TRIAL ADVERTISER-FUNDED MICROPAYMENT GATEWAY - April 2, 2002
Pico-Pay(tm), a next-generation advertiser-funded micropayment gateway, is entering a free-trial period from the 1st of April, 2002, for a period of 90 days. During this time, advertisers, content publishers and casual web users, will be able to trial the Pico-Pay technology to determine if it can help them improve their web business and usage. Pico-Pay(tm)... Read more »
- MasterCard “Signage” Requirements - February 14, 2002
MasterCard has issued additional regulations about the displaying of sign, decals, or images on websites. They are concerned that regional debit card acceptance decals (STAR, SHAZAM, PULSE, and others) are leading consumers to believe that MasterCard cards can only be used along with the local debit cards. Here are some of the situations that MasterCard... Read more »
- Cardholder Security Statement Required - February 14, 2002
If you are accepting credit card orders via your website you must have a security statement explaining that your cardholder information is protected and will not be sold or otherwise shared. Visa is spot checking web sites for compliance with this rule, and fining offenders. Refer to the Visa Merchant website at http://www.usa.visa.com/business/merchants for details and other... Read more »
- Contact Centers Save Money With Real-Time Credit Card Authorization - December 26, 2001
Delayed credit card authorizations mean lost sales to contact centers, but most don’t know the steps they can take to save both money and increase customer goodwill. A newly-issued Best Practices paper – Contact Centers: Payment Processing Operating Efficiencies – published by CyberSource Corporation, a leading provider of risk management and electronic payment solutions, presents... Read more »
- Merchant Concern About Online Credit Card Fraud Rises Significantly - November 26, 2001
Online credit card fraud continues to be a growing concern, and online merchants are taking more precautions than ever before, according to results of the just completed 2001 Online Fraud Report. The survey – sponsored by CyberSource Corporation, a leading provider of risk management and electronic payment solutions, and independently conducted by Mindwave Research –... Read more »
- Cell Phone Payment Processing with Swipe Terminal - November 15, 2001
AIRCHARGE releases Revolution NPK. Swiped credit card transactions on CDMA networks with the Kyocera QCP-6035 Palm phone. AIRCHARGE has added a new product called the Revolution NPK. The Palm™ OS based solution is built off of the Kyocera QCP-6035 Palm phone that has converged cell phone with PDA, and now credit card processing. All in... Read more »
- Patner Your Way To Success - April 13, 2001
By: Jim Conley II, MerchantSeek.com I’m sure at the starting point in your online business venture you’ve thought of gaining lots of traffic for your site and generating high profit margins. Each of us has dreams of “making it big” on the Internet, but the fact is, working at it alone makes it so much... Read more »
- Implement Multiple Payment Acceptance Faucets - April 13, 2001
By: Jim Conley II, MerchantSeek.com It’s a known fact that offering credit card acceptance on your website is crucial to your online success. Is it enough, though? In some cases probably, but don’t forget, there are many people who don’t own a credit card. And some don’t feel safe providing credit card information over the... Read more »
- How to Harness the Power of eBooks - April 6, 2001
(Editor’s Note: Normally I like to write my own articles, but on my search for detailed information on ebook marketing I came across Mike Fortin’s article on ebooks. It was so good I decided to use it as this week’s feature article instead of my own. So sit back and enjoy!) The underlying drive behind... Read more »
- Why Retail & Internet Merchant Account Rates Differ - April 6, 2001
By: Jim Conley II, MerchantSeek.com Many merchants are confused as to why merchant account rates, particularly the discount rate and per transaction fees, differ between Retail, Internet and Mail Order/Telephone Order (MOTO) businesses. In the retail brick-and-mortar world, orders are completed face-to-face. If a customer pays by credit card they simply swipe their card through... Read more »
- Profiting From Pay-Per-Click Search Engines - March 16, 2001
By: Jim Conley II, MerchantSeek.com Search engines come in all shapes, sizes and forms. There are your free-submission type search engines like AltaVista, Excite and Google. Then there are your pay-for-inclusion directories like Looksmart and Yahoo. Lastly, you have pay- per-click search engines. GoTo.com being the most famous of them all, pay-per-click search engines have... Read more »
- How Credit Card Transactions Work - March 16, 2001
By: Jim Conley II, MerchantSeek.com This is a new section I’m starting. It will appear in every issue of MerchantNewz from this point on. The purpose is to give pointers and other important information relating to payment acceptance. What better way to kick off this new section than to give a simple explanation of how... Read more »
- Part 3: Setting Up A Successful Affiliate Program - March 9, 2001
This is the last part of the series on “Encourage Repeat Sales & Customer Loyalty.” For the past two weeks we looked at how to set up your opt-in mailing list, what types of content to include in your publication, and how to gain and keep subscribers. If you missed those issues you can view... Read more »
- Be Genuine! - March 9, 2001
I had no idea what in the world to “talk” about this week for the editorial section until Wednesday night. I frequent a web marketing forum (message board) several times a day and help people with their payment acceptance and e-commerce questions. On this particular evening I had a post directed to me saying my... Read more »
- Part 2: Encourage Repeat Sales & Customer Loyalty - March 2, 2001
Last week we focused heavily on how to write your newsletter, what content to include, and how to effectively distribute your publication in a timely and efficient manner. If you missed the first part you can check it out here: http://www.merchantseek.com/merchantnewz/022301.htm You’ll find that publishing your own newsletter will be invaluable to both you and... Read more »
- Making & Using Effective Pop-Up Windows - March 2, 2001
Everyone is familiar with pop-up windows. They are usually filled with advertisements and are usually closed before they even have a chance to load. Most people view them as annoyances and will sometimes even leave the site they are on if one appears. But what if I told you there was a way to use... Read more »
- Part 1: Encourage Repeat Sales & Customer Loyalty - February 23, 2001
There are a few good ways to get repeat sales and increase customer loyalty. The one strategy that I want to focus on this week is starting your own opt-in newsletter. Now don’t cringe or click the delete key. Having your own opt-in newsletter is critical to your online success. That’s one of the reasons... Read more »
- Maximize Your Message Board/Newsgroup Postings - February 16, 2001
Newsgroups have been around since two days before dirt was new. But still today they can be a decent marketing tool for your business. Times have changed though, and just like with search engines, you shouldn’t focus a majority of your time on posting to newsgroups. There are thousands of them out there, most of... Read more »
- Make An Announcement - February 16, 2001
Since this week’s feature article is shorter than what I normally put out, I thought I would combine two great marketing techniques into one issue. So this week you’re going to get a double dose of great ways to promote your website. A few issues back I talked about using news releases to announce new... Read more »
- Forget SPAM, Use Direct E-mail Marketing - February 9, 2001
E-mail can be a very powerful and effective marketing tool, when properly used. Unfortunately, all too often many abuse this great tool by shooting out unsolicited “spam” e-mail to large numbers of people who haven’t asked to receive it. While spam is cheaper then targeted, opt-in e-mail it’s much less than stellar performance is not... Read more »
- Going Back to the Basics - February 9, 2001
With the announcement earlier last week of Go.com (formally the search engine, Infoseek) leaving the Internet and eToys.com firing the rest of it’s staff and packing up, it makes you wonder why so many dot-coms are failing. I have the reason for you, they skipped the basics and thought they had to spend millions in... Read more »
- Part 2: Setting Up A Successful Affiliate Program - February 2, 2001
Last week we looked at the planning stages of setting up an affiliate program. Perhaps you spent this past week doing just that. Maybe you already have an affiliate program but would like to know some great ways of supporting your affiliates. Either way you should find this article beneficial to developing that successful affiliate... Read more »
- Link Rot: The Silent Website Killer - February 2, 2001
Link rot invades more websites than you can shake a stick at. It shows visitors that maintenance is not very high on your list of priorities. This could be the reason why so many of your visitors slip through the cracks to other websites. It’s time to crack down on link rot. I would suggest... Read more »
- Part 1: Setting Up A Successful Affiliate Program - January 26, 2001
Affiliate programs are an extremely hot topic in the area of viral marketing on the Internet and can reap you huge profits, if effectively run. An affiliate program is where you reward people for marketing your products and services. Just as I mentioned last week with news releases, you might not be in the position... Read more »
- Minor URL Mistake Can Cost You - January 26, 2001
Are you one of the many people who instead of typing out the full URL of a website just type in: domainname.com? I quite often find myself doing this and so do many other people. Now let me ask you this, how often when you type in a URL that way do you get sent... Read more »
- Extra! Extra! Read All About It! - January 19, 2001
Getting the media’s attention can give your site exposure like you’ve never seen before. News releases, most commonly referred to as press releases, are documents that inform reporters and editors about announcements that you believe to be newsworthy. News releases are far more effective than most current advertising because of the fact that they are... Read more »
- New Year’s Resolution, It’s Not Too Late - January 19, 2001
We’re well into the middle of January now, but that doesn’t mean it’s too late to make a few New Year’s resolutions for your business. Why not spend some time in an evening thinking about and writing down what you would like to do to make your business more successful? Consider the topics of customer... Read more »
- Banner Advertising Downfall? - January 12, 2001
Are banner advertisements really losing their effectiveness? In some ways, yes they are. No doubt you’re probably one of the many people who tune out banner advertisements, myself included. Though I do have to admit that there are times I do find some intriguing ones that I click on. Which ones are those and why?... Read more »
- Low Cost E-zine Advertising - January 5, 2001
Locating effective, low cost marketing techniques that will work for your business can be difficult. More often than not, finding a low cost promotion solution is a lot easier than finding one that is both low cost AND effective. For marketers who don’t have a whole lot of capital to work with e-zine advertising can... Read more »
- The Power Of Informative Articles - December 15, 2000
Writing for publicity is actually one of THE most effective ways to promote your business. This tactic you may be familiar with but haven’t allotted the time to implement it in your marketing campaign. Let’s take a look at what makes it so effective and how you can use it to boost traffic to your... Read more »
- Making Your First Impression - December 8, 2000
Everyone knows the power of the first impression. You’ve taken this into consideration when you developed your website. You’ve also heard about how the typical Internet user only visits a few sites each week, and that many times they are referred to new sites by word of mouth. Now think about your website and ask... Read more »
- Are Search Engines Worth ALL Your Time? - December 8, 2000
Chances are this is not the first time you’ve read an article mentioning search engines. You know, the ones that talk about meta tags and keywords and all that jazz to get you higher rankings? Well, is all the search engine buzz really worth ALL your marketing time? I can answer that for you in... Read more »
- Is PayPal Safe For Sellers? - December 1, 2000
X.com PayPal is an online payment service provider. PayPal blew in on the Internet scene about a year ago. Their slogan was “Free safe way to send and receive payments online.” Recently, PayPal instituted a business type of account requiring bank account verification and promising that a verified business account would never be subject to... Read more »
- 10 Ways To Improve Your Website Sales Copy - December 1, 2000
There are a number of ways to make improvements on your website sales copy. You do have persuasive sales copy don’t you? Only about 10% of the e- commerce websites on the Internet actually incorporate good sales copy. This weeks article will focus on 10 ways that you can improve your sales copy. If you... Read more »
- Avoid Credit Card Fraud & Chargebacks - November 17, 2000
Merchants need to avoid credit card fraud at all costs. It goes without saying getting hit by fraudulent orders affects the bottom line of any business. I was reading an article a while back about one of the bigger travel agencies on the Internet who wasn’t able to get out of the red ink simply... Read more »
- 5 Ways To Optimize Your Sales Growth - November 17, 2000
I visit a number of web sites every day and time and time again I see some of the most basic mistakes being made. Even though the mistakes may be small ones, they can have a MAJOR impact on your sales and even your businesses credibility. Today I’m going to share with you some tips... Read more »