PayTech


Africa’s mobile revolution stands in the balance

Why are different parts of Africa experiencing widely different levels of success with mobile banking, despite years of experience in Kenya? Panellists at the IPS conference in London offered a range of explanations

Viewpoint: Prepaid Cleared for Takeoff in Russia

Forget politics. As Russia moves its way toward a cashless economy, prepaid cards will thrive amid increasing demand from different customer groups, development of a regulatory framework and increasing interest from retailers building loyalty programs.

Stop selling and start listening, say corporates

Banks don’t really understand the needs of corporates and are often so busy focusing on selling that they forget basic customer requirements, according to speakers at the IPS conference in London this week

Vodafone launches M-Pesa in Romania

Mobile money service M-Pesa has launched in Romania, bringing an idea hugely successful in Kenya to a European Union member state for the first time.

Company on the Move: Contact Solutions, Frost & Sullivan Award

Contact Solutions, a Reston, Va.-based provider of cloud-based customer self-service solutions, has been awarded the Customer Value Leadership Award for Best Practices Research on hosted interactive voice response solutions by business consulting firm Frost & Sullivan.

People on the Move: Ari Horowitz and George Zirkel, TabbedOut

TabbedOut, an Austin, Texas-based provider of an app enabling consumers to open, review and pay their restaurant and bar tabs from their mobile phones, has hired Ari Horowitz as executive vice president, strategic partnerships and corporate development, and George Zirkel as chief revenue officer.

People on the Move: U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, New Memoir

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has written a book, “A Fighting Chance,” which chronicles her life from growing up in Oklahoma to her work establishing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to her 2012 election to the U.S. Senate.

Global move towards real-time payment systems

In this supplement we share our experiences of implementing real-time payments systems and take an in-depth look at the success of Faster Payments in the UK. We also examine the challenges and benefits that real-time payments can deliver to banks and consumers as well as the advantages real-time technology can bring to government and businesses to support the wider economy and society as a whole.

SIA and Orange champion mobile POS in Europe

Orange Business Services and technology infrastructure provider SIA have done a deal aimed at encouraging European banks and merchants to manage more payments via mobile point of sale terminals.

CFTC calls for international swaps data sharing deal

Global standards and approaches to regulation need to focus more on removing risk from the financial system rather than on compliance – but to do so international regulators will need to harmonise their efforts and embrace technology to a much greater degree.

Board Says eBay, PayPal ‘Better Together’ (March 25, 2014)

eBay Inc.’s board of directors says spinning off PayPal in an IPO would not be in the company’s and investors’ best interest, resisting a call from activist investor Carl Icahn—a 2 percent owner of eBay—to sell all or part of PayPal.

Viewpoint: Dept. of Education Student Debit Card Report Doesn’t Make the Grade

Heading to college is all about the quest for knowledge. Part of that process is learning to use fact-based, impartial research to reach educated conclusions. Unfortunately, the March 10 Department of Education’s Inspector General’s report, “Third-Party Servicer Use of Debit Cards to Deliver Title IV Funds,” doesn’t make the grade.

EBA Clearing reports uptick in SEPA payments

EBA Clearing has reported that market participants are gradually adapting to SEPA, with peak day volumes on its Step2 clearing platform above 100 million SEPA credit transfers and SEPA direct debits.