Payments Consultant

Today the Fed has issued their proposed interchange regulations.  They boil down to three key proposals:
1.  The Fed gutted interchange by setting prices at least 80% lower than today.  They proposed two choices for interchange prices, which amount to a giant win for retailers and a commensurate loss for issuers:  Either a flat $0.12 cap, or a [...]

M-Paisa is a mobile payments scheme in Afghanistan modeled after the wildly successful M-PESA in Kenya that was launched in 2007 and now boasts over 12.5m subscribers.  From the mobile carrier Roshan paying it’s employees to the Afghan National Police force distributing salaries (and in some cases bumping salaries up to fend off the Taliban), this [...]

This week saw the announcement that Nokia is shipping their C7 smartphone with Near Field Communications (NFC) hardware capability and the promise of an NFC software upgrade coming soon. in the past, I’ve posted on Remote Mobile Payments, developments on the rumored AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile consortium, and opinions on how the parties should approach [...]

Amidst all the hype, politics and lobbying in the Durbin Amendment interchange fees debate, is a little-noticed component that could have a big impact on the state of payment technology in the US.  I believe the changes offered by the House and accepted by Durbin and the Senate could lead to regulations that force the US [...]

2010 is the Year of Mobile Payments. Apple news, acquisition rumors and lots of investment news have kicked off 2010 in a big way for mobile payments.

Check out this opinion piece from Visa:
Industry Opinion
New code for debit, credit cards leaves consumers out
Toronto Globe and Mail
I’m not sure what is more interesting, the overall subject, the article by Visa (and the fact they wrote one), or the comments. I was surprised by the number of comments on what seems [...]

First of all, I would be remiss in this post if I didn’t start by sharing my condolences and most heartfelt sadness for the Haitian people who have suffered so much, and everyone who has suffered because of this terrible tragedy. My wife and I were in Phuket two days before the Tsunami of [...]

Billing Revolution announced a major mobile payments deal today with Retail Data Systems (RDS), North America’s largest provider of POS systems. This is a big deal, because it’s the first major announcement I’ve seen where a point of sale provider can actually integrate into the consumer’s experience on the mobile phone. The Billing [...]

Today, the House of Representatives passed the Data Accountability and Trust Act, which sets national standards for the protection of consumer’s personal information like payment card numbers. More government regulation a good thing? Actually in this case it is.