Fintech

Taking mobile payments to new heights, MasterCard Worldwide soon will conduct a test of contactless-based payments at 30,000 feet, enabling passengers to purchase refreshments using its contactless PayPass technology aboard planes from WestJet, a Calgary, Alberta-based airline.

CHICAGO–The mobile-commerce market is littered with various wallet models, acceptance devices and applications, and this is forcing merchant-service providers to seek out ways to bring the elements together to help retailers maximize the channel’s potential, notes one mobile-payments executive.

The Beijing branch of China Telecom Corp. Ltd. has begun enabling customers to make payments using their China UnionPay cards over its mobile network as part of a pilot that launched Oct. 20.

A flood of overdraft cases has streamed into the Miami courtroom of U.S. District Judge Lawrence King over the past two years, but a recent ruling by panel of federal judges may have turned off the spigot.

Omni Community Credit Union is encouraging members and nonmembers to switch to its debit card with a drawing to win $250 in free debit card purchases each month for a year.

The Indian Finance Ministry has approved in principle allowing white-label ATMs, potentially resulting in more ATM deployments in rural parts of the country, according to local media reports.

Roughly half of adults in major global markets are interested in mobile payments because of the ease and simplicity they offer, but significant doubts persist about mobile-payment security, according to a study of consumers in the U.S., Canada, Great Britain, Germany and Malaysia released in early October.

The recent spate of credit card portfolio sales is helping boost more than just the buyers and seller. The behind-the-scenes players are seeing potential opportunities, too.

DENVER – Public Service CU on Monday said it has been approved to serve an additional 900,000 residents in Adams and Weld counties.

PHILADELPHIA – Sb1 FCU has converted to a community charter serving about 640,000 residents in the city of Philadelphia.