Technology

As Starbucks has proven for years, few retail interactions are more tailor-made for mobile payment than coffee sales. But when U.K.-based grocery chain Marks & Spencer launched its own coffee loyalty app in a 58-store trial in London, it chose to keep its menu much simpler.

By linking mobile payments with money transfers, Western Union created a new use for Apple's mobile wallet. But it must still rigidly conform to the basic requirements of an Apple Pay transaction — without a bank account, there is no payment.

Small business alternative lender Biz2Credit has added Fortis Payments to its roster of payment partners.

Apple's mobile wallet has been out for just four months, and already it has shaken up the way mobile payments operate at the point of sale. It has faced pushback from some merchants and banks, but it has also popularized new forms of security and other payment technology.

While Visa and MasterCard aren't yet applying the same level of pressure for tokenization security as they are for EMV-chip cards, the card networks' CEOs are clear that this technology is their new expectation for e-commerce.

Green Dot Corp. plans to start offering credit lines to its customers, a move that likely foreshadows how new regulations will reshape the prepaid card industry.

MyECheck has reached an agreement to buy the electronic payment software platform developer Seergate.

Several wallet apps already let restaurant patrons order ahead for takeout and/or pay without waiting for a waiter. A Ukrainian company called Settle takes this concept a step further by also allowing customers to skip the wait for a table.

Federal Reserve officials suggested that anonymous payments and the technologies powering digital currencies could inform broader plans for reshaping the U.S. payment system.

Google reports a dramatic increase in mobile shopping, suggesting the channel is now mainstream for consumers.