Mobile Payment Magazine

USAID Grants Aim to Help Create Mobile Banking System in Afghanistan

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“In 2002, fewer than 200,000 people in Afghanistan had access to telephones. Today, some 15 million Afghans use mobile phones and a full 85 percent of the population lives within the combined network coverage of the four major telecommunications companies. This technological leap connects Afghans to each other and to the economy in ways that were unimaginable just a few years ago,” the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Rajiv Shah said recently in Kabul when announcing three USAID grants for further technological innovations, totaling more than $2 million.

The wide availability of mobile phones opens up possibilities for finding new solutions to challenges that Afghans face every day. These three USAID grants aim to help create a mobile banking system that all Afghans could use.

The Afghan Education Minister recently highlighted the urgent need for mobile payments when a staff member of the Education Ministry was killed while transporting cash in northern Afghanistan to pay teachers. In fact, thousands of Afghan teachers had to wait months to get paid due to the difficulties and dangers of transporting money. “I am delighted that USAID is able to help seed a partnership between the Afghan Education Ministry and a mobile phone operator to begin paying teachers . . . thus ensuring that they get paid in time, and more importantly, that no Education Ministry employee loses his life for a duffle bag of cash,” Administrator Rajiv Shah said.

The second grant is designed to connect the new Afghan electricity utility with mobile phone billing and payment for electricity service. “Delivering electricity to all Afghans will require a revenue model that will sustain operations, motivate more public and private investment, and expand Afghanistan’s energy grid so that fewer communities live in the dark,” Administrator Rajiv Shah said.

The third grant funds a partnership of another telecommunications company with a micro finance consortium whose clients are predominantly women. “Running loan extensions and repayments over mobile phones significantly reduces the need for loan officers and clients to travel. This cost savings can be passed on to the customers, making credit more affordable,” Administrator Rajiv Shah concluded. “I am proud that United States Agency for International Development is able to help unleash Afghan innovation.”

Source: VOA News

CHARGE Anywhere Announces PA-DSS Application Certification for Windows Mobile

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CHARGE Anywhere a provider of secure mobile payment and payment gateway solutions, announced today certification with Payment Card Industry Standard Security Council’s (PCI SSC) Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS) program (previously called the Visa Payment Application Best Practice (PABP) Program) for version 2.0.0.17 of the CHARGE Anywhere Payment Application for Windows Mobile.

With CHARGE Anywhere Payment Application for Windows Mobile merchants can effortlessly turn any Smartphone or Tablet into a fully functional and secure point-of-sale terminal. The Windows based credit card processing solution allows businesses to securely process and manage credit card transactions from their mobile devices.

“Certification with Payment Card Industry Standard Security Council’s Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS) program demonstrates CHARGE Anywhere’s ongoing commitment to maintaining a secure and reliable platform that assists merchants in protecting themselves against unscrupulous hackers intending to steal valuable information,” said Paul Sabella, President and CEO. “CHARGE Anywhere is pleased to be able to offer our customers products and solutions that meet the industry’s highest level of security.”

The PCI SSC developed the PA-DSS based upon the Visa Payment Application Best Practices (PABP) to direct software vendors to create and maintain secure payment applications to reduce vulnerability of merchants and minimize data breaches. Compliance with the PA-DSS is determined based upon data and information developed by an evaluation of the application by a Payment Application Qualified Security Assessor approved by the PCI SSC. Today the adherence to PCI DSS is mandatory for banks, processing centers, financial organizations and merchants working with payment brands.

CHARGE Anywhere’s distinct mobile point-of-sale solution for iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, Windows Mobile, Java and Brew Platforms, allow users to process payments securely and in real-time. The exclusive solution allows users to capture and download mission critical business data above and beyond traditional credit card data such as signature, invoice number, employee number, tips, GPS location and more. CHARGE Anywhere’s solution also has the capability to eliminate the need to store paper receipts with electronic signature capture, storage and retrieval.

Source: PR Newswire

Wausau Financial Systems Signs New Financial Institutions to Mobile Remote Deposit Capture Service

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Wausau Financial Systems, a provider of payment and receivables processing solutions, has announced that three financial institutions, Citizens & Northern Bank, NewDominion Bank and Farmers State Bank of Calhan, selected its mobile remote deposit capture (RDC) solution, from its Deposit 24/7 Suite. Wausau’s RDC suite includes branch, merchant, consumer and mobile capture points, allowing for secure check depositing from any location.

Mobile banking continues to gain momentum, as more consumers press for the flexibility it offers. A recent study from Javelin Strategy & Research found 25 percent of Americans want to use their mobile devices to deposit checks, indicating consumer readiness for mobile remote capture offerings. The same study notes that despite the consumer demand for mobile RDC, only three of the 10 largest financial institutions in America are offering the service.

Citizens & Northern Bank selected Wausau’s mobile RDC solution to further differentiate its services and attract new customers with secure mobile check deposit capabilities.

“Our customers have shown they not only respond to, but embrace, technology. Given our rural footprint, we determined that mobile RDC would be a great fit,” said Shelley D’Haene, Cash Management Coordinator of Citizens & Northern Bank, an independent bank with 26 branches in Pennsylvania and New York. “Once we made the commitment to deploy mobile RDC, we found Wausau as the sole vendor that could provide a solution seemingly tailor-fit to our needs, easy for our customers to use, and with the robust risk monitoring capabilities we desired.”

Wausau’s risk monitoring functionality allows financial institutions and their clients to securely enjoy the benefits of RDC while complying with the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC) guidelines. The risk monitoring module in conjunction with Deposit 24/7 Mobile includes features such as duplicate detection, velocity and dollar limits, as well as image analytics. With these features, risk management teams can better monitor and control risks associated with mobile RDC.

NewDominion Bank wanted to ensure it could implement mobile RDC for its customers, while continuing to monitor, mitigate and prevent security threats and maintain regulatory compliance, efficiency and financial performance.

“For NewDominion Bank, risk monitoring played a large factor in our selection, and WAUSAU offered us the most comprehensive reporting and monitoring tools, easing our insecurities around mobile,” said Tracey McLean, director of sales, marketing and retail operations for NewDominion Bank, a community bank headquartered in Charlotte, N.C. “Wausau’s understanding of FFIEC standards and proven track record of ensuring compliance make it and its mobile RDC solution truly stand out.”

Wausau’s mobile RDC solution allows customers to integrate with their mobile banking platforms, initiate mobile-deposit sessions and deposit checks remotely with a smart phone, while automatically correcting distortions and providing instant and thorough communication with the bank. Further, it provides the financial institution a competitive advantage, expanding its services beyond each branch’s four walls.

“As more and more financial institutions build branches in our market, our mobile RDC offering will help us retain customers who otherwise may have considered an institution closer in proximity to their home,” said Randy Pieper, CEO for Farmers State Bank of Calhan, a three-branch institution servicing the Eastern Colorado area since 1916. “Essentially, with Wausau’s solution we have eliminated the need for a branch on every corner, because now there’s one on every cell phone. We see this appealing to our existing client base, which includes many area businesses where checks are the primary currency, as well as the upcoming generations of customers.”

“The market for mobile RDC technology continues to grow, and small financial institutions are leading the charge as first adopters to differentiate their services from larger competitors in their markets. We’re excited to partner with the likes of Citizens & Northern Bank, NewDominion Bank and Farmers State Bank of Calhan, and deliver a mobile RDC solution that helps expand service beyond a physical branch, without sacrificing security or efficiency,” said Sam Golbach, vice president of product management for Wausau Financial Systems.

Wausau is currently expanding its Deposit 24/7 Suite to provide the small and mid-tier business markets a receivables hub that accepts checks and electronic payments via Automated Clearing House (ACH) and credit card. Wausau plans to add the ACH functionality to its merchant application this fall and credit card capabilities by early 2012.

Source: Wausau Financial Systems

AIB Launches Mobile Banking Site

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AIB today announced the launch of its new mobile banking webdsite, which has been tailored specifically for use on smartphones. More than 650,000 of AIB customers actively use AIB Internet Banking and the bank has seen significant growth in the numbers of customers accessing their Internet Banking using their smartphones.

Services available on AIB Mobile Banking allow customers to:

  • View Account Balances
  • View Mini Statements and the ability to view recent transactions
  • Make payments to:
    • customers’s own accounts
    • other accounts in Republic of Ireland
    • Utility bills such as ESB, Eircom & VHI*
    • Credit Cards
  • Mobile Top Up’s to Vodafone, O2 Meteor and eMobile
  • View Payment and Mobile Top Up Logs

*Accounts must be previously set up on AIB Internet Banking

AIB will shortly announce the launch of Mobile Banking apps for iPhone and Android smartphone users. The site and apps were developed in house by a specialist team in AIB. A multimedia communications campaign will be launched to support this initiative with online and social media forming a key part of this campaign.

According to Robert Mulhall, Head of Direct Channels, “The number of smartphones in Ireland is growing at a rapid rate. Customers are demanding that all service providers evolve with this trend to provide their services in a means that is increasingly convenient to them. Banks are no different. We know that our customers are already using their smartphones to access Internet banking while on the move. This development meets the needs of our customers now and gives them the convenience of banking at a time that suits them.”

Source: AIB

PaymentOne Announces 7 Day Payout for Mobile Payments

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PaymentOne today announced PayOne FastPay, an industry-first mobile payments program that guarantees disbursements to merchants in as fast as seven days, dramatically reducing the typical 60-90 day waiting period for payouts required by carriers and other mobile payment vendors.

Merchants and publishers have long been frustrated by extended wait periods to receive their cash from mobile payments providers, often as much as 90 days.

In contrast, because of its long-standing carrier relationships and strong financial position, PaymentOne is able to dramatically reduce these wait times for its merchant customers. The PayOne FastPay program is the first in the industry to remove the industry standard 60-90 day wait times and guarantee qualified digital merchants their cash settlements in as fast as seven days.

“In addition to offering the broadest global reach and best merchant payout rates in the industry, it’s also important to ensure our customers have reliable and rapid cash flow,” said PaymentOne executive vice president Brad Singer. “PaymentOne tells consumers to ‘put your wallet away and use your phone number to pay’; we tell our merchants you should not have to wait to get paid or worry if your money is safe.”

In an effort to provide the best financial returns and eliminate risk for its customers, PaymentOne has established the Financial Services Group (FSG) within the company. PayOne FastPay is just the first in a planned set of innovative financial optimization and risk elimination programs the FSG will unveil for PaymentOne’s global merchants.

“For more than a decade PaymentOne has been a principal market leader in carrier billing, and is recognized as pioneering the business model as the industry knows it today,” said Yankee Group senior analyst Nick Holland. “To eliminate risk, merchants should look to proven vendors like PaymentOne. Accelerating mobile payment settlement cycles adds significant value to clients, and showcases PaymentOne’s continued innovation and market leadership.”

Card.io Credit Card Processing System Gains Traction with Developers

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card.io, a mobile commerce company founded by two former AdMob employees, Mike Mettler and Josh Bleecher Snyder, today announced its credit card processing system has gained traction with iOS developers leading the company to launch a similar SDK for Android. card.io’s free mobile payment solution allows consumers to take a picture of their credit card to process payments, without any extra hardware. Since its iOS platform launch in June over 80 apps have integrated the card.io SDK, with more than 750 new developers signed-up.

“Developers are all looking for the same thing when it comes to commerce; a frictionless consumer experience,” said Mike Mettler, founder and CEO of card.io. “Getting such a wide variety of apps to integrate our iOS SDK in less than three months has gone beyond our expectations and has set the stage for our Android availability today.”

card.io’s solution has huge appeal across several industry verticals including e-commerce, local, retail, ticketing, travel, and daily deal apps. Some active apps sending card scans using card.io are Venmo, a social payments platform, Merchant Billing, a billing, payments and processing company, and Qthru, a retail application that is geared toward improving the way people shop.

“card.io reduces the number of taps for adding a credit card by 20,” said Andrew Kortina, co-founder of Venmo. “That means 20 fewer opportunities for a typo, and happier customers.”

card.io is backed by angel investors Michael Dearing of Harrison Metal, Jeff Clavier and Charles Hudson of SoftTech VC, Manu Kumar of K9 Ventures, Alok Bhanot (former VP, Risk Technology at PayPal), and Omar Hamoui (CEO and founder of AdMob).

Source: PR Web

Google Launches Mobile Wallet

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In May Google announced its mobile wallet, which uses NFC for tap and pay, in collaboration with Citi, MasterCard, Sprint and First Data.

According to a recent blog post, Google is releasing the first version of the app to Sprint, so Google Wallet will be available on Sprint Nexus S 4G phones.

With the app, customers can pay with a Citi MasterCard credit card and the Google Prepaid Card, which can be funded with any of credit cards.

Osama Bedier, Vice President of Payments wrote in a recent blog post that “Visa, Discover and American Express have made available their NFC specifications that could enable their cards to be added to future versions of Google Wallet.

Source: Official Google Blog

Mobile Payment for iPhone to Launch in South Korea

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South Korea’s telecom titan KT Corp. said Monday that it will roll out a new service for Apple Inc.’s iPhone, which will turn the smartphone into a mobile wallet for wireless financial transactions.

The country’s second-largest mobile operator plans to introduce a new smartphone case for the iPhone based on near field communication (NFC) technology, which allows a wireless exchange of data within a 10 centimeter range, it said. The NFC case will enable users to make credit card payments or pay subway fees by simply waving their iPhone over an electronic reader, KT said. [Read more…]

Luup Integrates with Temenos T24 for Mobile Payment Platform

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Luup today launches the first universal mobile payments platform. The launch is the result of the integration of the Temenos T24 core banking application and Microsoft BizTalk with Luup’s mobile payment services platform.

Luup CEO, Martin Wilson, explained: “We believe that Luup’s new payment platform heralds a major shift in the mobile payments sector. Through Luup, banks have the opportunity to serve corporate and retail markets using a single universal mobile payments platform. They can now offer mobile payment services in developed and emerging markets anywhere in the world through any mobile device and on any network. This is an industry first.”

The integration of market leading applications with Luup’s platform enables Luup to provide the most advanced mobile payments managed service available. It combines the scale to deal with large transaction volumes with the mission critical standards that banks require to meet regulatory and security requirements.

Martin Wilson continued: “Financial institutions require the capabilities, reliability and scalability of a bank-grade platform to capture a significant share of the predicted $426 billion market. As the only independent global provider of mobile payments, we have created an international remittance eco-system for banks and corporates, connecting senders and receivers of funds across the globe.”

For its solutions Luup has further developed leading technology from Temenos and Microsoft, including Microsoft BizTalk, to provide several business-enhancing functions.

Mark Gunning, Global Director, Banking Solutions at Temenos explained: “T24 is the most technically advanced core banking system available, used by hundreds of banks worldwide. Its integration into Luup’s universal platform for mobile payments means that financial institutions now have the unprecedented opportunity to get the mission-critical standard they expect – on the ubiquitous mobile channel. This co-operation between Luup and Temenos creates the most flexible, cost effective and scalable mobile solution on the market, which enables Luup’s customers to meet the challenges and opportunities of tomorrow.”

In addition, Luup’s managed service model enables banks to implement the service easily and at low cost and to scale-up as customers’ demand for mobile payments increases even further. There are already over 5 billion mobile phone users worldwide and the figure is constantly growing.

Karen Cone, general manager of Worldwide Financial Services at Microsoft Corp., commented on the announcement: “Mobile payments are set to change the shape of the payments world. Microsoft technology is used throughout the payments value chain – from payments channels like Windows Phone to mission-critical processing workloads. By running its solutions on Microsoft’s SQL Server and BizTalk Server, Luup provides its customers with workflow management and dynamic interfaces that offer enhanced management of payment services.”

Luup operates in developed and emerging markets, and offers financial institutions and corporates the opportunity to reduce costs and introduce new income streams. In global markets, Luup enables banks to offer new mobile services for their corporate customers, whilst amongst large unbanked populations in emerging countries, a branchless mobile banking service is being created to address the financial inclusion agenda.

Martin Wilson concluded: “Our independence, continued innovation, global reach and the desire to continue to deliver products that meet the needs of banks and their customers means that we are in the perfect position to help financial institutions capture new revenue from the rapidly growing opportunities available from mobile payments. Our expertise and strategic partnerships means that Luup is ideally placed to develop and extend its leading position in this market.”

Source: PR Newswire

Parkmobile Partners with Citi for Mobile Payments Service

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Parkmobile USA, Inc., a leading provider of cashless parking solutions to municipalities and parking providers around the world, has selected Citi to offer new, more comprehensive mobile payment services to Parkmobile’s customers.

With the new Parkmobile solution, motorists running to catch a train, plane, ferry or appointment can bypass the parking pay station and complete their parking transactions by mobile phone. Parkmobile has selected Citi to provide global payment management services, leveraging its world-class virtual prepaid account capabilities.

“We selected Citi because of their broad and deep experience managing payments for both individual consumers and complex public sector and government organizations,” said Albert Bogaard, CEO of Parkmobile USA, Inc. “By leveraging Citi, we can continue to focus on expanding our core business and advance cashless parking payments technology, while Citi streamlines and integrates the management of payment transactions and brings new innovations in digital payments to our service model.”

Washington DC, The District Department of Transportation (DDOT) and Parkmobile piloted 1,000 parking spaces in 2010 and has implemented Pay by Phone parking services at all of the approximately 17,000 on-street metered spaces in the District of Columbia. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) launched Parkmobile services for its riders in July 2010. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Parkmobile also implemented Pay by Phone parking services for commuters in June 2011.

To use Parkmobile’s service, drivers register for free by setting up an account at www.parkmobile.com , where they can also download a mobile app. Once registered, customers can use the mobile app, the internet, or a 1-800 number to pay for parking. The mobile apps for iPhone, Android and BlackBerry are very easy to use. At that time, they can set up a virtual card account, provided by Citi, through which they can initiate and manage their parking payments. Their account can be loaded via a credit card, debit card or bank account transaction. Once registered, they can use a downloadable mobile application, mobile website or a toll-free phone call to initiate parking payments.

“We are proud to join forces with Parkmobile to meet the needs of parking service providers across the U.S.,” said Gary Schneider, Head of Public Sector Product for North America. “Parkmobile is the premier mobile parking company with market-tested solutions and whose forward-thinking approach to mobile payments closely aligns with Citi’s. This ‘next-generation’ parking concept exemplifies how, through strategic partnerships, we can advance these goals and also bring innovative mobile solutions to both our municipal clients and their customers,” said Schneider.

Smart parking is part of a broader Citi for Cities strategy that aims to harness capabilities and experiences across Citi globally to help municipalities become more efficient, facilitate commerce and modernization, and empowering citizens to access services that enhance livability and prosperity.

Citi Prepaid Services, a division of Citi’s Global Transaction Services, is a leading provider of innovative corporate prepaid solutions. Through a consultative approach, Citi Prepaid provides clients with comprehensive electronic payment programs that reduce costs, enhance operational efficiencies and provide an unmatched user experience. Leveraging an extensive payment platform and proprietary prepaid technology, clients around the world depend on Citi Prepaid’s custom programs for all types of payments including compensation, promotions and disbursements.

Global Transaction Services, a division of Citi’s Institutional Clients Group, offers integrated cash management, trade, and securities and fund services to multinational corporations, financial institutions and public sector organizations around the world. With a network that spans more than 100 countries, Citigroup’s Global Transaction Services supports over 65,000 clients. As of the second quarter of 2011, it held on average $365 billion in liability balances and $13.5 trillion in assets under custody.