Contents tagged with Credit Card News

  • B2B suppliers accepting commercial card payments

    July 25, 2009
    As reported in a recent U.S. Banker article titled P-Cards Have Promise, approximately 16 percent of B2B suppliers accept commercial cards for U.S. B2B payments citing Interchange fees as a factor limiting p-card growth.  

    We have found through our extensive work in the B2B payments space that many businesses who are accepting commercial card payments are not qualifying for the lowest Interchange rates available.  For those businesses who don't accept commercial cards, a misunderstanding of costs is often the reason. Two of the most common problems business face is not having the proper merchant account pricing structure and using the wrong payment processing technology. 

    For many small businesses, they started accepting commercial cards because a large customer … more

  • Card Number Truncation on Merchant Receipts

    July 08, 2009
    Update: March 2011

    There are federal laws, various state laws and association rules which require merchants to truncate the cardholder copy of receipts.   It is the merchant's responsibility to comply with applicable laws and regulations regarding truncation.  Please check your POS and terminal receipts to insure you are in compliance.

    Seven (7) states have passed legislation that requires merchants to truncate both cardholder and merchant receipts.  The states are:

    New Mexico - as of 01/01/2004

    Wisconsin - as of 08/01/2005

    Colorado - as of 01/01/2006

    Tennessee - as of 01/01/2007

    California - as of 01/01/2009

    Alaska - as of 07/01/2009

    Nevada - as of 07/01/2009

    Washington State - as of 07/26/2009

    Additional states have legislation in progress which may … more

  • Visa Implements U.S. List of Registered Independent Sales Organizations

    July 08, 2009
    Vantage Card Services, Inc. is a registered Visa ISO.  Merchants can now verify compliance status on Visa’s U.S. List of Registered Independent Sales Organizations, available at www.visa.com/isolisting.

    Many Independent Sales Organizations (ISOs) are unregistered.  The public nature of Visa’s new U.S. List of Registered Independent Sales Organizations will encourage banks and merchants to obtain information on ISOs to ensure a better understanding of their business partnerships.  Now that listing information is readily available to merchants, the hope is that fewer unregistered ISOs will be allowed to solicit merchants. 

    In addition, the payment applications that merchants use and that ISOs sell, implement and support should also be on Visa’s list … more

  • Healthcare Merchant Account Scam Alert

    June 23, 2009
    Medical professionals should be aware of a scam currently being perpetrated by unethical merchant account providers. Outbound calls are being placed to medical practices accepting credit cards claiming that they must reprogram their credit card terminal to be HIPAA compliant.

    Vantage has received numerous calls over the last few days from our healthcare clients inquiring about these calls and asking, “Are credit card transactions covered under HIPAA?”

    According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services website, transactions conducted between subscribers or patients and health plans or health care providers are not transactions for which the Secretary of Health and Human Services has adopted standards.

    If an individual (i.e., a subscriber or a patient) uses his or … more

  • Interchange Bill Reintroduced in Congress

    June 09, 2009
    H.R. 2695, The Credit Card Fair Fee Act, was reintroduced with slight differences from its 2008 version.  The bill would grant limited antitrust immunity to Interchange rates negotiated between merchants and Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. with a representative of the U.S. Department of Justice attending the negotiations.

     

    U.S. Rep. John Conyers Jr., the Democrat who chairs the House Judiciary Committee introduced the bill saying “It is not an attempt at regulating the industry and does not mandate any particular outcome; this legislation simply enhances competition by allowing merchants to negotiate with the dominant banks for the terms and rates of the fees.”

     

    Right now small and mid sized businesses pay the same Interchange fees as larger chains.  … more

  • myRealRate featured by Microsoft

    June 06, 2009
    myRealRate is making news on the official Microsoft Silverlight site http://silverlight.net/.

    A showcase of next generation experiences using Silverlight, myRealRate allows you to compare your real rate with other merchants and discover your true costs for accepting credit cards. 

    http://myRealRate.com uses Silverlight, a rich internet application development environment, to deliver peer-to-peer knowledge sharing, which helps business owners better evaluate their merchant services.

    What is the average cost for accepting card payments in your industry? Are your merchant card processing fees above average or below average?  How can you lower your Real rate?  Find the answers here.

      more

  • The PCI Compliance Fee Gouge

    June 04, 2009
    Just like everything else, a lot has changed since our original post on this topic on June 4, 2009.

    Today the card associations require that all merchants regardless of size validate Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS) compliance with this data protection standard.

    Compliance with PCI DSS has always been very important to protect your business. It’s only the validation requirements that have changed. The fees being charged for PCI Compliance are not uniform throughout the industry. Some merchant account providers charge monthly, some annually and some both and these fees can really start to add up.

    Merchants need to be aware of how and when PCI fees are billed to avoid being gouged with excessive fees. Merchants should also know that they may choose to … more

  • PCI 360 Education Program

    June 02, 2009
    The MasterCard Academy of Risk Management has introduced a complimentary initiative to raise awareness and promote the adoption of PCI. The program provides a holistic and informative platform for participants to increase their understanding of PCI DSS through sessions led by payment industry and data security experts.

    The PCI Merchant Education Program provides a complete view of the PCI DSS through a series of on-demand webinars designed for merchants. These events are designed to:

    Gain the knowledge needed to become PCI compliant

    Learn directly from industry security experts

    View recorded webcasts on your own time

    Take advantage of materials to educate your team and new employees  

    The current course curriculum includes:

    PCI Perspectives: A … more

  • GAO to Investigate Merchant Interchange Fees

    May 28, 2009
    According to The Washington Post, The Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act that President Obama recently signed into law includes a provision to investigate the fees that businesses pay to allow their customers to use credit.

    The The Government Accountability Office (GAO) is supposed to report its findings to Congress in six months, along with any recommendations for legislation. The agency is charged with examining whether merchants are restricted from revealing the fees to customers and to what extent merchants are permitted to discount for cash purchases.  It will investigate the ability of merchants of varying sizes to negotiate interchange fees and exactly what costs are incorporated into the fees.

    The GAO issued a report last year on the impact that … more

  • When will next generation payment technology arrive?

    April 30, 2009
    While the payments industry is trying to improve security measures around the existing mag-stripe technology, its inevitable that an entirely new technology will be needed.  Right now the focus is on updating from one outdated mag-stripe terminal to a new, better, more secure, mag-stripe terminal.  However, as discussed in Smart Card Talk, there is almost unanimous agreement that the security model for payments in the U.S. is broken.

    The main fundamental weakness of the industry: we have no way to prove identity between the consumer and the merchant.   Fraud rates in the U.S. are on the rise and the situation is only getting worse.  Law enforcement cannot keep up with growing and more sophisticated cross-jurisdiction investigations or prosecute offshore criminal … more