ePayment Solutions Merchant Services Blog

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There's no reason that almost everything in your wallet can't be handled by your smartphone.

In some circles, the notion of a smartphone acting like a credit or debit card is fascinating, and you see story upon story about mobile payment-enabled smartphones and the potential rise of PayPal, the telcos, and such as the new payment processors. Who cares? Even if Visa and MasterCard were somehow to let go of that billion-dollar processing business, you're merely replacing one financial processor with another.

The fact that a smartphone could act as a card is an inconsequential change. You still have to carry a wallet, and as long as that's the case, a simple plastic card remains easier to use, given that the technology for reading them is universal and all the proposed mobile alternatives require new, often separate, readers and work only with certain vendors -- you'll still be carrying plastic for the other banks' and merchants' systems. As a friend recently said, payments can't get more mobile than they already are.

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More people are using credit cards over debit cards, and that's pushing growth at MasterCard and Visa, Sterne Agee analyst Greg Smith told CNBC Wednesday.

According to First Data, which processes information for the credit-card companies, credit-card use is up more than 10 percent in the third quarter, compared with 6 percent for debit cards, which takes payments directly from a checking or savings account.

"They've had a pretty good run," Smith said of credit cards. "Credit cards are a very good business. As you look ahead, debit cards are a little less profitable, so expect banks to push people to credit."

ATLANTA, Sept. 1, 2011 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- In preparation for the January 1, 2012 deadline, SecurityMetrics' new TIN Matching Service helps payment processing entities recover and match merchant tax identification numbers (TIN) and legal business names to streamline the matching process for a subset of SunTrust Merchant Service merchant clients that have not yet validated with Internal Revenue Service (IRS) records. SunTrust Merchant Services today announced it has selected SecurityMetrics' new TIN Matching Service to streamline the matching process for a majority of its merchants.

In accordance with new U.S. Government regulations originating from the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, payment settlement entities will be required to withhold 28 percent of daily gross merchant payment card transactions if a merchant fails to validate their TIN with their reporting entity. At present, many merchant TIN numbers remain unvalidated with banks, and unreported to the IRS.

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--MasterCard expects to win debit card share from Visa under new fee regulations

--Processed U.S. credit card transactions were up 6.5% in July and August, while U.S. debit card transactions were up 20.1%

--President of U.S. markets for MasterCard: Consumers are spending

(Updates with information about restrictions on debit card fees and processing volumes paragraphs 6 through 11)

 By Andrew R. Johnson Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES 

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--MasterCard Inc. (MA) is emphasizing products aimed at affluent consumers as well as emerging categories like prepaid cards and mobile payments to drive growth, executives said Thursday.

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Products and Services

ePayment Solutiosn brings you a vast array of innovative products and services that make us your single source for payment solutions.

ePayment Solutions is a leader in electronic payment processing, with an unparalleled set of products and services that enable merchants, financial institutions, businesses and government agencies to optimize payment processing efficiency.

Merchant Cash Advance Referral Program
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