With the internet flooded with e-commerce businesses, you need to focus on marketing and growing your brand in order to stand out. But are you still stuck with those necessary…
Tag: merchant services
Has “The Future” of Payments Arrived?
For those of you watching your memes and social networks, this week marked Back to the Future Day, that October day in 2015, when Marty McFly travels from 1985 to try and right the future…
Simplify and Secure Your Payments With (Free!) Visa Checkout!
Visa has rolled out its free “Checkout” service for customers and merchants, to help make the act of paying even easier, and more secure. Essentially, Visa Checkout is a digital payment service that lets customers use a single, secure sign-on across channels and devices using a their preferred payment method.
Are Cards More Cost Effective For Merchants Than Cash?
A new study from financial analysts at the Aite Group says that handling both Debit and Credit cards is more cost effective for merchants and retailers than handling cash.
According to details in the Credit Union Times, the report, “Tender Truths: The Real Cost of POS Transactions in the U.S., found debit cards the least expensive method of payment for merchants, costing significantly less per transaction than cash or cards.It broke down the costs of different payment types across three broad retail sectors: specialty retailers, quick service restaurants and convenience stores.”
Consumers Happier, While Symantec Resigned to Security Breaches
An interesting array of tea leaves to read and report on this week. The first “leaf batch” comes from the folks at Nielsen. Yes, “Nielsen” of TV rating fame, but they report on all kinds of consumer trends and “ratings.” Recently they issued a report stating that consumer confidence ‘round the world had climbed to pre-recession levels in the year’s first quarter. That confidence had “ended on a flat note in 2013,” their article said, “but signs of a brighter sentiment were right around the corner. With an index score of 96 in the first quarter—the highest level since first-quarter 2007, that optimism was validated.
After The Breachin’: Chip-and-Pin Comes to Target
As was pointed out about the recent Heartbleed security hole that was so pervasive, it presented a chance — bad as it was — for a lot of companies to reinvent and update their security protocols, for consumers to opt in for “double login” options on various accounts (a password and a PIN, say), and for the general level of security, web-wide, to be enhanced.
“Bank Loans Down — Merchants Turning To Cash Advances”
As your roaming correspondent(s) on matters both pecuniary and payment-based, we often find ourselves in the field to get a look, first-hand, at how the “economy” — which is to say, that system of human activity and trade involving goods, services (and various intentions) is faring.
Holiday Spending Up, Card Use Being Encouraged
We realize we’re not even into the actual “Twelve Days of Christmas” yet, but already holiday spending trends are being compiled and assessed. A recent survey from Citi indicates that holiday spending may land on the “up” side this year, after all. According to the survey, “twenty-nine percent of Americans estimate they will be spending more than $1,000 this holiday season, up from 22 percent in 2011. Amongst those planning on shopping for the holidays, Americans will spend an average of $968, up $60 from 2011.”
What Are the Benefits of a Merchant Account?
If you are starting a business, or currently own one, you need business merchant services so that you can accept debit and credit card payments from your customers.
Just a few of the ways that a merchant account helps your business are:
