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Since Square launched back in 2009, the credit card industry has, in many ways, been turned on its head. Credit card acceptance is more prevalent and less expensive than ever. But with the nationwide switch to chip cards coming in October 2015, we might see another major shift in the way we conceive of in-person payments, and […]

Back in September 2014, Apple finally did what technophiles have been clamoring for it to do for ages: It added an NFC chip to its newest-generation smartphone, the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Suddenly, you could just tap your phone to complete a payment, with no need to dig through a wallet, using the Apple Pay […]

There is a lot of buzz surrounding First Data’s tablet-based POS products: Clover Station, Clover Mini, and Clover Flex. Now there’s even Clover Go, a mobile POS solution. But unlike with most iPad POS systems, you can’t just download the app and test out the POS. You have to buy the complete hardware package to see Clover in action. This has led many merchants to places like eBay, looking for a deal. Unfortunately, it has also led predatory merchant services companies to sell business owners more than they bargained for.

Square (see our review) led the way for the mobile processing boom, so it’s no surprise that the company was the first to market with a headphone jack chip card reader ahead of the October 2015 nation-wide shift to chip cards. While most other mobile processors are biding their time and telling customers that a chip card solution […]

  I spend a lot of time at conventions and arts-and-craft fairs, helping a friend sell her merchandise. It’s a good opportunity to meet other vendors and talk shop, which is not only a great source of ideas for new merchandise, but also a good way to compare notes on how to run a business. That’s exactly […]

eBay is almost single-handedly responsible for championing PayPal (see our review) and transforming it into the world’s premier online payments option. The online auction marketplace scooped up the fledgling company back in 2002, and after more than a decade together, they’re ready to call it quits. Later this year, PayPal will spin off from eBay and become […]

Starbucks has been making the wrong kind of headlines lately thanks to a string of security breaches involving the accounts of their mobile app users. The hackers drained money from users’ accounts and transferred the balances over to fraudulent gift cards. As the Starbucks app is often held up as an example of a successful […]

As payment technology—as well as payment liability law—advances, merchants will soon be faced with increasingly complex POS transactions. These changes will affect not only mobile payments, but traditional plastic transactions as well. Navigating the evolving payment landscape will present some costs as well as potential benefits to merchants. Hardware/Software Adoption The mobile wallet industry is […]

Any online gambling site is likely familiar with the problem of the 7995 — the merchant category code (MCC) that has been associated with gambling transactions since the days when all online gambling was banned. Now, with New Jersey, Nevada and Delaware allowing it to various degrees, the lack of distinction has been a problem for […]

Watch out, merchants: Dubbed “PoSeidon” by Cisco Security Solutions, this malware is a new type of trojan that specifically targets POS (point of sale) systems, nabbing the credit card information of your unsuspecting customers. Cisco stated in a March 2015 report that POS malware attacks are on the rise, affecting businesses both large and small. […]