Transaction Network Services Inc.’s enhanced payment gateway will enable merchants in the United Kingdom and Ireland to process various payment types through a single system while adding an additional layer of security to card-not-present purchases, the company reported on Feb. 23.
The upgraded system, called TNSPay, is a “centralized gateway that merchants may connect into and process EMV chip-and-PIN, contactless, online, mail-in and over-the-phone transactions,” Dave Gibson, TNS director of product marketing in Europe, tells PaymentsSource. The contactless-transaction option is the newest offering; the gateway previous was able to process the other types of payments, he adds.
To help combat fraud and add another level of security to card-not-present transactions, TNSPay includes an integrated payment platform hosted by the Reston, Va.-based provider of high-speed data communication links to processors.
“The integrated platform is set up so that consumers’ card data are never actually entered into a merchant’s payment environment, leaving fraudsters nothing to steal,” says Gerry Grealish, TNS vice president of global product marketing. Instead, TNS uses tokenization technology, which saves a unique identifier of a customer’s card information within a merchant’s system, he adds.
The information, or “token,” is passed to the merchant’s payment system once the bank has authorized a transaction, Gibson says. The token enables merchants to set up recurring payments so consumers do not need to enter their payment information each time they make a payment.
“The actual card information is saved in our vault for later use,” Gibson notes.
For example, Continental Airlines Inc., which uses TNSPay as the payment gateway for its card-not-present platform, uses the token technology for its frequent flyer program, Grealish says. The airline uses a consumers’ frequent flyer identification number as a way to access credit card information, he explains.
Subsequently, because no card data pass through a merchant’s system, the scope of a merchant’s Payment Card Industy Data Security Standard compliance is reduced, Grealish says.
“This feature is especially beneficial for smaller merchants because becoming compliant can cost a large portion of their revenues,” Julie Conroy McNelley, an analyst with Boston-based Aite Group LLC, tells PaymentsSource.
Merchants also may save money because the payment gateway processes transactions across various payment types, McNelley says. Consolidating the processing into one system eliminates the need to use multiple vendors, which can save time and money, she notes.
Merchants may integrate a fraud module that produces different checks to combat fraud and reduce charge-backs, Gibson says. The fraud module offers Verified by Visa Inc. and MasterCard Worldwide SecureCode, address verification, card-blocking technology for bad cards, Internet protocol location look up, and integration with third-party fraud-prevention tools, Gibson explains.
Verified by Visa and MasterCard SecureCode use a “3-D Secure” protocol and require purchasers to register their cards with the brands to get a secure password to use with online transactions. Merchants also must use the 3-D Secure software on their e-commerce sites. If a merchant accurately processes and verifies a transaction through the MasterCard SecureCode or Verified by Visa password, it faces no charge-back risk.
Payment Gateway upgrades also include other services, such as payment card settlement, international payment connectivity and broadband payment services for in-store operations.
TNS offers a variety of pricing plans for different payment-volume levels, Gibson says, noting most merchants pay a one-time set up fee and use a pay-as-you-go approach. High-volume merchants usually pay a monthly fee but lower set-up fees. Gibson declined to comment on specific pricing, saying it depends on the merchant.
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