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31Jul/12

European Square Rival iZettle Forced to Stop Accepting VISA in Denmark, Finland and Norway

By Martin Schuppelius
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iZettle has to stop processing Visa card payments in Denmark, Finland and Norway where it currently trials its mobile card payment service. The company has released a statement on its official blog, announcing that Visa Europe is forcing iZettle to stop accepting Visa payments on August 1. iZettle will continue to accept MasterCard and AmEx in those countries.

Sweden-based iZettle provides a mobile payment service that enables merchants to accept credit card payments using an iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch. The company is often referred as the European version of (more…)

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11Jul/12

Payment News – July 11, 2012: Stripe, Telefonica Visa Partnership, Mobile Payment Joint Venture Oscar, Streetpay

By Gary Merrett
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Payment Startup Stripe Gets $20M Funding

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Telefonica and Visa Partner for Mobile Money Service in Europe

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UK Mobile Payment Joint Venture Project Oscar to Start Soon?

UK carrier mobile payment joint venture – formed by Orange, Deutsche Telekom, Vodafone and Telefonica – Read more…

Mobile POS Payment Service Streetpay Partners With E-Plus

Read more… (in German)

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21Jun/12

Online Merchant Guide: How to Accept Credit Card Payments – Part 1

By Martin Schuppelius
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Over the years, credit cards have become the most popular payment methods for online purchases worldwide. Although new payment solutions like PayPal or Bitcoin are gaining traction, credit cards have established as default e-commerce payment method. This is particularly the case for international transactions – there is almost no way around credit cards for online merchants that want to sell international. In this article we take a closer look at the credit card payment ecosystem. The next article will focus on how to choose a merchant account and payment service provider.

How credit card processing works

Credit card processing involves several parties, the customer, the bank that issues the credit card to the customer (issuing bank), the merchant, the merchant bank (acquirer bank) and last but not least the credit card network (e.g. Visa, MasterCard or American Express). In most cases online merchants also use a 3rd party payment service provider (PSP) that bundles a variety of payment methods and acts as a gateway that can connect to multiple acquiring banks and credit card associations. Furthermore a PSP can offer additional services such as risk management, reporting, fraud protection and multi-currency support.

Credit Card Processing: Authorization

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30Apr/12

Visa to Launch Digital Wallet Service V.me in Europe

By Martin Schuppelius
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last year and is now moving into the European market.

Similar to PayPal, V.me by Visa enables customers to store their credit card details into a digital wallet. Instead of entering their payment and shipping details every time they want to shop online, users can use V.me for the checkout process. The service is not limited to Visa cards; MasterCard, AmEx and Discovers cards are also supported. According to Visa, V.me will also provide features beyond payments such as transaction alerts, promotions and reward programs. “Our intention is that V.me will ultimately be able to incorporate any or all of our new payment technologies, allowing our members to deliver the best possible payments experience whether face-to-face, online or in a mobile environment,” said Mariano Dima, Executive VP of Product and Marketing Solutions at Visa Europe.

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7Mar/12

Mobile World Congress 2012 Roundup: Mobile Payment Trends

By Martin Schuppelius
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Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona. The congress is organized by the GSM Association (GSMA), the global industry association of mobile operators and related companies. It is not just about presenting the latest mobile devices; it is also about showing the future of mobile technology.

Mobile Payment

BOKU Accounts service allows subscribers to make payments online, in-app, and in-store anywhere MasterCard is accepted. At the same time Facebook is starting to cut out mobile payment providers of the transaction cycle. Facebook’s CTO Bret Taylor announced during his MWC Keynote that Facebook is partnering with major mobile network operators (including AT&T, Deutsche Telekom, Orange and Telefónica) and will provide its own carrier billing solution. At present Facebook uses third party providers such as BOKU or Zong to process mobile payments.

Traditional financial service companies are going mobile:

  • Visa and Vodafone announced at the conference to join forces and develop a mobile payment platform based on Visa prepaid accounts.
  • Money transfer giant Western Union (in cooperation with mobile operator WIND) is going to launch a mobile money transfer service in Italy.

Innovative mobile payment services presented their latest developments:

  • iZettle’s mobile payment solution that allows users to accept card payments using their iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch gains traction and is expanding into tree new countries.
  • Mobile payment start-up boxPAY launched and presented an in-app payment service for Google’s Android platform.

Near Field Communication

recently published a set of industry specifications to enable the development of secure and ubiquitous mobile NFC services.

  • Smartcard and digital security companies such as Giesecke & Devrient showcased their NFC-services at the MWC.
  • The Logic Group and ViVOtech announced to work together to enable customers to shop via their NFC-enabled smartphones.
  • Mobile payment joint venture ISIS has teamed-up with BarclayCard, Capital One, and Chase.
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5Mar/12

Virtual Goods Spending in the U.S. to Exceed 2$B Says PlaySpan Study

By Martin Schuppelius
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More than $2.3 billion of virtual goods were purchased in 2011 (up nearly 30% from 2009) in the U.S. according to PlaySpan’s latest study of virtual goods purchasing trends. According to the study, one in four consumers bought a virtual good in 2011, spending $64 on average. Not surprisingly, young males still dominate the business – almost 50% of males under 24 have purchased a virtual good in 2011. The survey has been conducted by Frank N. Magid Associates in early January of 2012.

Virtual goods are a booming business and have become a mainstream topic. Big brands have entered the market: Virtual goods monetization platform PlaySpan was acquired by credit card giant Visa last year. “Consumer acceptance of virtual goods represents a huge growth opportunity, not just for game publishers, but for all digital content companies,” commented Karl Mehta, founder of PlaySpan.

Check out PlaySpan’s Virtual Goods Trends Report:
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25Jan/12

Visa Now Processing €1 in Every €7 Spent in Europe

By Gary Merrett
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annual report 2011.

This growth now means that €1 in every €7 of consumer spending in Europe is on a Visa card, up from €1 in €8 in 2010 and €1 in €18 in 2000. The company also reported that the fraud losses on Visa cards in Europe reached an all-time low. In 2011, fraud was accounting for less than four cents in every €100 spent.

The credit card giant has issued of 30 million contactless cards and launched its first mobile payment services in 2011. ”We expect this growth in electronic payments to continue during 2012 when we will be launching mobile payments and our digital wallet services. These new services, that are a key part of our future of payments strategy, will revolutionise consumers’ everyday shopping experience to the extent that by 2020 we predict that over half of all Visa transactions in Europe will be on a mobile device,’ commented Peter Ayliffe, Chief Executive of Visa Europe.

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12Jan/12

Visa Certifies New Smartphones for NFC Payment

By Gary Merrett
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payWave, Visa’s mobile app for NFC-based payments at the point of sale. The credit card giant has certified four BlackBerry phones, the Samsung Galaxy S II and the LG Optimus NET as payWave compatible devices available for commercial deployment.

Visa payWave is a payment feature available on Visa cards and certain NFC-enabled mobile phones allowing customers to make transactions by using contactless Near Field Communication (NFC) technology. Instead of swiping consumers wave their card or phone in front of a compatible reader at the point of sale. For most transactions under $25, there is no need to sign a receipt, entering the PIN, or handing the card to the cashier. The transaction processing doesn’t change; the purchase is authorized, processed, and billed the same way it is with traditional purchase methods. The new certified devices host the Visa payWave application on a secure SIM card and feature NFC technology. They have been tested by Visa to ensure secure transactions which are compatible with the global standard for chip-enabled payments.

This is an important step for Visa as its rival MasterCard is also moving into mobile payments with its PayPass service. Certifying new smartphones will help Visa to increase its user base and gain traction in the emerging market of NFC-based transactions.

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6Jan/12

2012 Set to be the Tipping Point for Contactless Payment Says Visa Study

By Martin Schuppelius
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Contactless Barometer report, a benchmark study looking at consumer attitudes to new payment methods. The study shows that consumers value the convenience and ease of contactless payments but also points out that the current relatively low acceptance levels in some markets is still preventing usage from becoming mainstream.

According to the study, 77% of contactless users agreed or strongly agreed that contactless technology would ultimately become more commonplace than cash as a payment method. 78% also agreed that contactless will be instrumental in bringing mobile contactless payments to market in the near future. Mark Austin, Head of Contactless for Visa Europe commented: “People with experience of contactless cards are starting to see it as the first step to the arrival of mobile payments. The tipping point to more mainstream acceptance will be availability: the more chance consumers have to use their contactless cards, the more enthusiastic their response becomes. For us, London 2012 will be a major tipping point in the UK, with thousands of new contactless terminals installed across the Olympic venues to make payments as easy and convenient as they can possibly be.”

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3Jan/12

German Bank LBB Launches Mobile Payment Trial with Visa payWave for iPhone

By Martin Schuppelius
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Landesbank Berlin (LBB), in cooperation with Swiss Post Solutions, started a pilot project to provide contactless iPhone payments via Visa payWave in Germany. Berlin-based LBB is the largest credit card issuer in Germany (with over 2.2 million cards issued). The bank plans to implement contactless payments via mobile phones nationwide by the end of this year.

As the iPhone doesn’t support Near Field Communication (NFC), LBB is issuing an iCaisse phone case which holds a microSD-card and a NFC-antenna. The credit card information necessary for the authentication of a transaction is stored securely on the microSD-card. The payment is triggered by an iPhone-App. The customer can choose between two different methods: on automatic mode, amounts of less than 25 Euros are authorized without password entry, on manual mode, the previously defined password has to be entered for each payment.

Dr. Tilo Schürer, head of direct marketing Landesbank Berlin AG commented: “Our customers can test the new payment method and can see the benefits themselves. Due to the increasing proliferation of smartphones they will be used quite naturally for payments in the future – this saves our customers valuable time and enables them to use their credit and prepaid cards even easier.”

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