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TSYS Acquiring Solutions, a unit of Total System Services Inc., is touting kiosks running on its KioskPass software as a product for independent sales organizations to sell. "We don't have the distribution channel to get this to the marketplace," Robert J. Philbin, TSYS Acquiring president, tells CardLine sister publication ISO&Agent Weekly. "The ISOs do." Developed by Infonox Inc., a company that TSYS bought last year (CardLine, 11/3/08), KioskPass software enables consumers to use kiosks to withdraw money, cash payroll checks, transfer funds, pay bills, receive prepaid gift cards and deposit checks via a remote deposit capture service. "Many 'mom-and-pop' merchants are doing this on the counter already," says Ashim Banerjee, TSYS Acquiring chief information office for information technology. "It's just a small step to move it to the kiosk." TSYS contends the estimated 55 million unbanked consumers are the primary kiosk customers, Banerjee says. However, TSYS may have difficulty convincing ISOs, which are more accustomed to merchant-account sales and are reluctant to take on kiosk sales until enough merchants ask for them. "We haven't found kiosks to be profitable enough for our agents," says Bob Schoenbauer, president of Capitol Payment Systems Inc., an Annapolis, Md.-based ISO. Analyst Francie Mendelsohn estimated in February there were 1.2 million kiosks in North America, with 90% of them deployed in the United States. Philbin is not too concerned about ISO reluctance. "All of what we're talking about right now will leap frog today's kiosks," he says. "We have to train our clients to see the possibilities." TSYS Acquiring has not yet officially branded the KioskPass software and hardware bundle, a spokesperson says. TSYS works with a variety of kiosks manufacturers, which it would not name. TSYS says KioskPass can operate on machines using Microsoft Windows-operating system. TSYS says it is developing a way to adapt KioskPass to run on ATMs made by Germany-based Wincor-Nixdorf AG, Dayton, Ohio-based NCR Corp. and North Canton, Ohio-based Diebold Inc. TSYS Acquiring will provide all of the hardware, installation and customer support, Banerjee says. A merchant with a kiosk already can buy just the software if the existing kiosk is compatible with KioskPass, TSYS says. TSYS declined to provide pricing for the product, but says ISOs are able to mark up the price to generate revenue, and, in some cases, an ISO could see a revenue share, a spokesperson says.
