Chase Paymentech, an online payment processing company, recently released an outline of the final rules from the Durbin Amendment (AKA Section 1075 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act). The new rules were decided by the Federal Reserve Board on June 29, 2011 and go into effect October 10, 2011.
The rules follow:

Rule #1 – Debit interchange fees are capped at 21 cents per card transaction, plus five basis points upon ticket amount, plus one cent for card issuers who have implemented fraud prevention procedures.

Rule #2 – Debit transactions must be able to be routed through two unaffiliated networks and merchants can designate preferred routing.

Previously implemented rules noted in the Amendment:

• Companies have the right to set a minimum amount ($10.00 or less) for which they will accept credit cards (not debit cards) as payment options.

• Merchants have the option to offer discounts for cash payments, but cannot favor one card over another.

To view the Chase Paymentech overview, click here:  Durbin Amendment: Understanding the Federal Reserve Board Rules

ChargeLogic is certified on the Chase Paymentech platform. Visit the ChargeLogic website for secure payment processing solutions.

Cybercrime has become an issue for some small and midsize businesses because of the low level of difficulty to hack into their systems. The two main reasons for this is that many companies don’t have the budget for expensive, high-powered network defenses and services or they have small or non-existent security departments on staff.  Here are some tips from Hugh Thompson of businessweek.com for small and medium businesses to increase company security:

• Hard disk encryption for laptops.
• Consider moving to the “Cloud”.
• Have employees go through security awareness training.
• Have employees go through password reset.
• Lock the company’s mobile devices.

ChargeLogic ensures company safety by encrypting payment information. Follow these tips and use ChargeLogic in order to maximize your company’s safety so you can run your business worry-free.

View the original article at: http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/tips/archives/2011/07/protect_your_business_from_cybercrime.html

Chase Paymentech, an online payment processor, recently released their take on an information supplement from the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) specifically for Mail Order/Telephone Order (MOTO) companies. The PCI SSC publication touches on the subject of protecting payment data given over phone calls. Many companies that record phone calls for different purposes may be putting customer payment information at risk if they do not follow PCI SSC requirements. Chase Paymentech summarizes the steps that MOTO companies should take to ensure that they do not violate PCI SSC requirements.

To view the Chase Paymentech overview of the PCI SSC Information Supplement, click here:
Chase Paymentech: Protecting Telephone-based Payment Card Data

To view the original PCI SSC Information Supplement, click here:
PCI SSC Information Supplement: Protecting Telephone-based Payment Card Data

Yesterday, the Federal Reserve set the cap on the fees banks can charge merchants for processing debit cards. The new cap of 21 cents per swipe is much lower than the current average of 44 cents per swipe. Lower swipe fees will allow retailers to lower their prices which will benefit customers. Prior to the fee cap, banks had raised fees and cut reward programs in anticipation to losing revenue due to the upcoming implementation of the cap. It is uncertain whether they will retract those actions since they were done while anticipating a lower fee cap. One thing that is certain, however, is that the credit card companies benefited immediately as the stock for Visa and Mastercard soared about 11 points each.

Read the full article at http://consumerist.com/2011/06/fed-reserve-swipe-fee.html

On June 14th, 2011, Adam Davidson and Zoe Chase of NPR’s Planet Money reported on The Credit Card Black Market.   With the help of Keith Mularski, a cybercrime agent with the FBI, this incredibly interesting podcast takes us into the underworld of websites that sell millions of stolen credit cards to criminals. Modeled after websites like eBay, criminals are able to obtain memberships to these websites that sell stolen credit card data. To access these sites and be granted membership, applicants must have two criminal references to verify their status as a criminal.

The credit card information that is sold on these sites is typically stolen in two ways:  skimming and hacking.  Skimming is often achieved using a small electronic device called a skimmer that attaches to swipe machines to collect large amounts of credit card data. Skimmers can be found in places like gas stations, convenience stores, and ATM machines.  A copy is made of the credit card information and is transmitted via text message. Criminals also obtain credit card information by hacking store and bank databases. Using either of these techniques, thousands of credit cards can be stolen every day without a single person knowing. Losses from this type of fraud are usually covered by banks who write off nearly three billion dollars a year, but often times the credit card merchant ends up covering the losses. While three billion may seem like a lot, it is dwarfed in comparison to revenues generated by processing fees. Therefore, despite the losses due to fraud, the economic incentive is still there for banks to encourage consumers and businesses to use credit cards as much as possible and not to hinder them by adding more modern security technologies like those employed in Europe.

PA-DSS validated payment applications like ChargeLogic help secure retailers’ credit card data from skimming and hacking.  Each version of ChargeLogic has been independently audited using  the PCI DSS security guidelines to ensure customer safety while using their credit cards. Because ChargeLogic encrypts sensitive customer account information, credit card data is not left behind on hardware, making it very difficult to steal and making it less likely for the information to end up on a black market website.

Listen to the entire NPR Podcast here: http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/06/16/137181702/the-tuesday-podcast-inside-the-credit-card-black-market

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The U.S. Senate voted 54-45 in favor of rejecting a delay of the installment of the debit card fee cap on Wednesday. Retail prices are expected to go down and also some shopper loyalty programs are anticipated to become less appealing for customers. On the other hand, this vote is estimated to cost the banking industry billions of dollars annually. Banks such as Wells Fargo are anticipating a loss of hundreds of millions of dollars quarterly. Checking account and debit card programs are also expected to take a hit from this. Visa company shares went down 4% on Wednesday, however company execs are optimistic that they will adapt to the situation. Read the full article at http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2011/06/08/senate-rejects-bid-to-delay-debit-card.html?ed=2011-06-08&s=article_du&ana=e_du_pub&page=all

ChargeLogic announces the release of ChargeLogic Connect, a PCI validated payment gateway integrated with NAV. ChargeLogic Connect works with ChargeLogic and Microsoft Dynamics NAV to provide a fully integrated e-commerce solution.

With its industry-standard web service interface, ChargeLogic Connect enables integration with nearly any e-commerce solution and Microsoft Dynamics NAV with ChargeLogic. Once this link has been established, ChargeLogic Connect can authorize customer credit card payments for web orders using an existing merchant account.

Click here to register: http://www.chargelogic.com/Register.cfm?id=78

The U.S. Senate will be voting on a bill that proposes a delay of new rules passed last year that cap swipe fees banks can charge merchants. These new rules would be delayed for fifteen months and some have called the delay a bail out for Wall Street banks. The fees accumulated in a delay of these rules could supplement an extra $1.3 billion a month to America’s ten largest banks. Pending an unlikely 60 votes towards a filibuster, the bill will most likely be decided and denied sometime this week.   Read the full article at http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0611/56380.html.

To offer more flexibility to our customers, we have added Global Payments to the list of available payment processors.

Global Payments Inc. (NYSE: GPN) is a leading provider of electronic transaction processing services for merchants, Independent Sales Organizations (ISOs), financial institutions, government agencies and multi-national corporations located throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Spain, Russia and the Asia-Pacific region. Global Payments has low rates, dedicated 24/7 customer support, detailed and accurate billing, online reporting and comprehensive point-of-sale solutions. Special pricing is available for customers of ChargeLogic as well as a free competitive cost analysis for those customers who are currently processing with a competitor.

A Fortune 1000 company, Global Payments offers a comprehensive line of processing solutions for credit and debit cards, business-to-business purchasing cards, gift cards, electronic check conversion, check guarantee, verification and recovery including electronic check services, as well as terminal management.

Global Payments processes billions of transactions for over one million merchants with the utmost integrity for customers around the world. Speed and ease of use are essential attributes of Global Payments’ technology and are vitally important to our customers’ success. Even more important are the security and reliability of our networks. When customers connect with Global Payments, they connect to one of the safest, most secure transaction processing systems in the world.

With over 36 years of industry experience, Buddy Cooper and Vinod Jose will help you to find the best solution to fit the needs of your business. Contact them for more information or visit www.globalpaymentsinc.com.

Buddy Cooper: 443.394.2258 or Buddy.Cooper@globalpay.com
Vinod Jose: 443.394.2222 or Vinod.Jose@globalpay.com