PayPal Cooks Up Success with Bistros, Food Trucks (April 1, 2014)
PayPal is expanding its reach by getting on the menu as a payment option at small bistros and food trucks around the world that are switching to tablet-based POS systems.
Payments
Apple Co-Founder Wozniak Talks ‘Creative Misbehavior’ at InComm Partner Alliance (April 1, 2014)
Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak, the technical guru behind the original Apple computers, kept nearly 1,000 attendees at InComm’s annual Partner Alliance spellbound with his tale of how a “geeky, electronics kid,” driven by his passion to solve problems and compulsion to engage in “creative misbehavior,” led to a famous partnership with legendary Steve Jobs.
M-Pesa Enters Europe with Romanian Launch (April 1, 2014)
Mobile payment service M-Pesa has arrived in Europe with its launch yesterday in Romania, following expansions into other countries, such as Egypt and India, in recent years.
Survey: Mobile Apps Could Improve Customer Care Woes (April 1, 2014)
Mobile-based customer care is failing to meet the needs of users, who still suffer from many of the same old issues, along with some new problems that have cropped up more recently.
NACHA Pushes for Same-Day ACH Payments with Three-Step Plan (March 31, 2014)
NACHA wants to help move the U.S. toward same-day ACH payments using a phased approach to replace today’s sluggish system that can take three to five days for electronic payments to clear.
Green Dot Shifts Cash Reload Strategy to Focus on Swipe (March 31, 2014)
Green Dot Corp. is in the midst of a national rollout of a swipe reload service aimed at making reloading cash onto a prepaid card more convenient, efficient and intuitive.
India’s Central Bank Tightens Prepaid Regs (March 31, 2014)
The Reserve Bank of India has updated its rules covering prepaid products, which it says will help combat money laundering and fraud.
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.
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.
IRS Says Digital Currency is Property (March 27, 2014)
The IRS has ruled that Bitcoin and other digital currencies are property, not currency, and will be treated as such for tax purposes.
Survey: Consumers Spend Double Via Mobile, But Security/Privacy Remain Barriers for Non-Users (March 27, 2014)
The good news for mobile payments is that consumers in the U.S. and Europe are spending double when they initiate payments via their mobile devices or online, according to a survey released this month from Bain & Company.
Brazilian Bank, Telco Make NFC Play (March 27, 2014)
Brazilian mobile network operator Claro has partnered with Bradesco, one of that country’s largest banks, to create an NFC-based mobile payment service.
Walmart Opts Out of Interchange Case Settlement, Seeks Damages in New Lawsuit (March 27, 2014)
Walmart this week opted out of the $7.25 billion settlement Visa and MasterCard reached last fall over interchange fees and filed its own antitrust suit against Visa.
PBOC Rethinking Mobile Payment Caps (March 26, 2014)
China’s central bank said it’s open to modifying a proposal to place limits on mobile payments after e-commerce firms and consumers objected to the restrictions.
NTIS Issues Interim Final Rule on Access to Death Master File (March 26, 2014)
The National Technical Information Service today has issued an interim final rule establishing a certification program for access to the Social Security Death Master File. The DMF is a tool used by many industries as a means to thwart fraud.
Monitise Lands MasterCard Partnership/Investment, Overhauls Business Model (March 25, 2014)
MasterCard is working with U.K.-based Monitise plc to develop and deploy mobile wallets and digital payments around the globe.
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.
Amex to Create Business Travel Division JV for $900 Million Investment (March 25, 2014)
American Express is creating a joint venture for its Global Business Travel division (GBT), in which the card network will share ownership of the JV with an investor group led by New York investment firm Certares.
CFSI Shows ‘Compass Principles’ in Action with NetSpend, Banking Up (March 25, 2014)
The Center for Financial Services Innovation (CFSI) shared proof last week that its Compass Principles for improving the quality of prepaid cards work.
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.
Breaking News: Appeals Court Interchange Ruling a Big Win for Fed
The Federal Reserve Board has earned a major victory in its long-running legal battle with a group of merchants over its rules implementing the Durbin Amendment, including caps on interchange fees for debit card transactions.
CFPB Seeks to Standardize Prepaid Fee Disclosures (March 20, 2014)
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is developing a new fee disclosure format for prepaid cards, ahead of new rules on the topic the agency expects to propose this year.
EU Cybersecurity Directive Gets OK from European Parliament (March 20, 2014)
European Parliament has voted to adopt proposed cybersecurity rules requiring organizations to meet new security standards and share information in case of security breaches.
NFC Forum: HCE Provides ‘Additional’ Means to Perform NFC Transactions (March 20, 2014)
As Host Card Emulation (HCE) gains momentum and questions continue about whether mass acceptance of NFC technology will ever come, the NFC Forum has issued a position statement on HCE, which emulates an NFC card in the cloud, eliminating the need for a secure element and trusted service manager for NFC applications, such as payments.
APEX: PacSun Case Study Illuminates Corporate POV on Payroll Programs
Seeking a more efficient and cost-effective method of paying underbanked employees, clothing retailer Pacific Sunwear of California turned to ADP’s ALINE Pay electronic payroll platform, which has since become a cornerstone of the company’s payroll operations.
2014 Paybefore Awards Ceremony Photos
During the All Payments Expo (APEX) in Las Vegas March 3-5 2014, Paybefore announced its Best-in-Category and Industry Achievement winners for the 2014 Paybefore Awards. Check out the photos.
Blog: The NFC Tragicomedy: Where the MNOs Went Wrong (March 2014)
As momentum builds for HCE, MNOs may be left wondering why they’re getting cut out of the mobile payments value chain. While GSMA has been pushing NFC adoption with great force, the problem is that this force encouraged MNOs to go solo.
Blog: Square Cash: Fast, Cheap and Easy
Design of Square Cash’s caliber is not cheap. Finding a way to move money faster than conventional methods is not cheap. Is Jack Dorsey’s media darling gathering press and praise at the expense of sound strategy? Or, is Square Cash more than the very few screens that meet the eye?
Google Wallet Regroups, Positioning for HCE Push (March 18, 2014)
Google Wallet is making another course-correction to keep up with fast-moving mobile payments technology.
Western Union Integrates with Nigerian Mobile Payments Service (March 18, 2014)
Western Union is continuing its global expansion in mobile payments, announcing a new mobile money transfer service for Nigeria.
LevelUp Powers Payments App for Smartwatch (March 18, 2014)
Mobile payments with a flick of the wrist are here.
Viewpoint: Better Disclosures Are Good for Consumers and Industry
Legislators and companies, such as MasterCard, are introducing standards for prepaid card disclosures that help us all.
Visa Europe: Contactless Booming in U.K., across Continent (March 17, 2014)
Holders of contactless Visa cards in the U.K. made 94.3 million contactless purchases in 2013, a surge from the 25 million made in 2012, according to data from Visa Europe.
TAS Group Unveils Card 3.0 Card Management Platform (March 17, 2014)
Payments technology company TAS Group, based in Italy with U.S. headquarters in Las Vegas, recently launched its Card 3.0 Card Management Platform in the U.S. to offer program managers greater customization capabilities, down to the cardholder level, and quicker time to market for new programs.
China’s Central Bank Proposes Curbs on Third-Party Payments, Halts Product Rollouts (March 17, 2014)
China’s central bank last week released draft rules that would limit the use of third-party payment systems, including the payment operations of Alibaba Holding Group and Tencent Holdings Inc.
Fiserv Inks Agreement with MasterCard for Debit EMV Solution for Accel Network (March 13, 2014)
Fiserv Inc. has opted to make MasterCard’s U.S. common debit application identifier (AID) available for its Accel debit network, as another piece falls into place in the U.S. debit networks’ EMV transaction-routing puzzle.
Prepaid Earns High Marks on CFSI Scorecard (March 13, 2014)
The Center for Financial Services Innovation (CFSI) gives the prepaid industry an A-.
Wheels in Motion for Digital Currency Regulation in N.Y. (March 13, 2014)
The New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) has begun accepting applications from firms looking to set up digital currency exchanges and will issue proposed regulations on digital currency in the coming months, the agency said.
Relationships between Big and Small Firms Can Be Rewarding, If Challenging
Developments in retail financial services are bringing together large financial institutions and more entrepreneurial, but much smaller, startup companies. While both groups benefit from partnerships—as those in prepaid have long known—there are challenges.
Industry Views: M&A on the Rise
We asked M&A experts to tell us what to expect in the coming months, specifically around prepaid, mobile and emerging payments. They all agreed on one thing: Change will continue to be the norm.
