The Discover Spending Monitor, measuring consumer confidence in the economy, hit the lowest levels in June since January 2012. Down 4.8 points to 90.7 in June, those with the perception the U.S. economy is improving dropped 4 percentage points to 29% in June while 53% now rate the U.S. economy as poor-up 3 percentage points…
American Express released its network roadmap to advance EMV chip-based contact, contactless and mobile payments for all merchants, processors and issuers of American Express-branded cards in the U.S. American Express will work alongside other industry participants to drive interoperability across the U.S. and other countries and support chip-based technology for chip and PIN, chip and Signature, contactless and mobile transactions. With this, by April 2013, processors must be able to support American Express EMV chip-based contact, contactless and mobile transactions and beginning October 2013, merchants will be eligible to receive relief from PCI DSS reporting requirements if their POS acceptance locations re enabled to process American Express EMV chip-based contact and contactless transactions. By October 2015, American Express will institute a Fraud Liability Shift (FLS) policy that will transfer liability for certain types of fraudulent transactions away from the party that has the most secure form of EMV technology. U.S. fuel merchants will have an additional two years, until October 2017, before the FLS takes effect for transactions generated from automated fuel dispensers.
North American Bancard added Tracy Metzger as chief information officer. Tracy’s executive experience features roles as CIO, CTO and president over the past 20 years. Metzger has been credited with increasing sales, decreasing costs and growing margins and comes to NAB from TGate Payments, a cloud computing payment processing Platform as a Service (PaaS) company, where for two years he served as president and chief technology officer. Tracy served eight years as president and CTO at payment processing and technology company Abanco International and was CIO at Gate Gourmet, the second largest global airline catering company, and vice president of technology strategy at Concord EFS, a credit/debit card transaction processing and settlement services provider.
C-SAM mwallet infrastructure platforms, software, tools and development services, appointed Barbara Ballard VP Customer Experience and Marketing to expand and oversee C-SAM’s marketing, customer experience, and user experience processes. Ms. Ballard brings to C-SAM over ten years of innovation and leadership in mobile user experience, drawing on her past engagements across the entire mobile ecosystem. She has worked with mobile startups, mobile operators and companies in numerous related verticals in between. She authored the book, “Designing the Mobile User Experience” in 2007.
Capital Bank has selected the Fiserv “Premier” bank platform and outsourced processing services. Until now, Capital Bank’s accounts were processed by an independent vendor that licensed Premier from Fiserv, but the bank has now chosen to deepen its relationship with Fiserv by outsourcing its account processing through a Fiserv service center. This will let the bank to benefit from a direct relationship with Fiserv, and take full advantage of the features available in Premier and related Fiserv solutions. As additional factors in its decision, the bank cited usability, integration and the Premier system’s scalability, which will be used to keep pace with Capital Bank’s growing footprint. The bank chose a comprehensive suite of Fiserv solutions that includes Consumer and Commercial Credit Full Service for credit card management, Retail Online™ and Business Online™ for online banking, Mobiliti™ for mobile banking, AccountCreateSM for online account opening, CheckFree® RXP® for retail and small business bill payment and Popmoney® for person-to-person payments.
Bristol County Savings Bank has signed a long-term renewal agreement for FIS’ core account processing, which will continue to power the bank’s front- and back-office operations. FIS is a leader in delivering core processing solutions to the community bank market. The comprehensive features of FIS’ core platforms enable financial institutions to increase operational efficiency and productivity and to mitigate risk. In addition, the flexible and easy access to customer information provides community bankers the ability to forge stronger relationships with their customers, leading to increased growth and customer retention. The bank also implements FIS’ remittance processing, eBanking, electronic funds transfer (EFT) and Business eBanking treasury cash management.
PSCU is the first to issue VISA Prepaid EMV cards in the United States. Several PSCU credit unions will begin issuing the new cards later this summer and more than a dozen credit unions plan to deploy prepaid EMV cards this fall. Prepaid EMV cards deliver full debit card functionality and are designed for credit union members who are working, traveling, living or studying in Canada and Europe and other regions where EMV technology is the preferred method for payment processing. These versatile cards also contain a magnetic stripe for use in the U.S. Chip authentication is proven to reduce transaction fraud and positions credit unions to avoid VISA’s liability shift to issuers, which is scheduled for 2015. Value can be loaded onto the cards from a web site, IVR, branch, using debit/credit cards, account transfers from checking/savings accounts or through direct deposit.
Gemalto has acquired a controlling interest in Plastikkart Akıllı Kart İletişim Sistemleri Sanayi ve Ticaret A.Ş. (Plastkart), a regional leader in personalization services and smart card production based in Turkey. Plastkart is a public company, listed on the Istanbul Stock Exchange. Gemalto will now apply to the Turkish Capital Market Board (CMB) in order to fulfill its obligation to make a public offer for the remainder of the shares that it does not already own.
SGB-Bank has selected First Data as its exclusive provider of card issuing and payment processing services, responsible for managing the ATM network on behalf of the newly formed financial institution. First Data will provide services relating to the issuance of debit, credit and contactless cards by the bank and providing payment processing services, including switching services and settlement services for domestic and international card transactions. In addition, First Data will provide fraud monitoring and ATM network management services. In the coming months, First Data will work with SGB-Bank to implement a 3D Secure system that provides enhanced security for Internet payments by generating additional authenticating passwords for cardholders.
Fime, a global leader in consulting and market integration testing services for NFC solutions expanded in Asia with the opening of its NFC mobile test laboratory in Seoul, South Korea and will accommodate the growing demand for EMV testing of NFC mobile phones. FIME will work with mobile device manufacturers and network operators to provide integration testing and certification services, ensuring that NFC-enabled handsets are fully interoperable and compliant with industry standards and EMV payment specifications prior to market release. The new facility will complement FIME’s existing network which includes ISO 17025 accredited laboratories, and research and development centres in France, Taiwan, Canada, India and Dubai which serve the company’s global customer base.
Datalogic Automatic Identification and total solutions provider of bar code readers, data collection mobile computers, RFID and vision systems, has announced the full integration of Datalogic Automation, Accu-Sort Systems and PPT Vision to form a single entity set to elevate the Group’s global position in the Industrial Automation market. This strategic development within Datalogic Group follows the recent acquisitions of both PPT Vision and Accu-Sort Systems, which instantly doubled Datalogic’s presence in the Industrial Automation market. The integration also confirms the company’s vision to attain a global leadership in this sector, by delivering high quality, innovative products and distinct solutions.
MasterCard and Deutsche Telekom announced a European partnership to furnish mobile payments for Deutsche Telekom’s 93 million mobile customers. The first consumer roll-out will take place in Poland later this year. Also this year German consumers will be introduced to mobile payments, initially in a trial with mobile phone tags and cards, continuing into the first half of next year with a mobile wallet service which will also be open to other issuing banks and partners. Deutsche Telekom will issue the MasterCard products via its subsidiary company ClickandBuy, the owner of an e-money licence. Products will also be launched in other European markets.