Credit

Long frustrated at being shut out of China's domestic credit card market, Visa Inc. may have found some leverage to help it gain access, according to Dow Jones.

The CPI Card Group is manufacturing the next-generation of mobile payment stickers for Discover Financial Services and MasterCard Worldwide, the Littleton, Colo.-based card producer announced last week. Both stickers use contactless technology from Inside Contactless SA.

More than 100 Ingenico S.A. point-of-sale terminals are afloat on 14 cruise ships operated by Costa Cruises as part of an initiative to enable travelers to use a “Costa Card” for their onboard purchases, Ingenico recently announced.

Efforts to create a common set of requirements for so-called “end-to-end” encryption moved forward last week when the Secure POS Vendor Alliance released its End-To-End Encryption Security Requirements.

Chase Card Services, a division of JPMorgan Chase & Co., has launched the Continental Airlines OnePass Plus Card and added new benefits to its existing Continental Airlines Presidential Plus Card. Both cards will provide cardholders with travel benefits and more options to earn and redeem Continental OnePass miles.

Global mobile-payment services provider Mobibucks Pvt. Ltd. has inked a strategic-partnership deal with Emirates Net Systems LLC, an official from the Abu Dhabi-based information-technology provider tells PaymentsSource.

Paymate Pvt. Ltd. plans to introduce its Green Money Transfer service to Sri Lanka by the end of this year, an official from the Mumbai-based mobile-payments provider tells PaymentsSource.

Issuers in Europe are rolling out payment cards featuring built-in display screens that offer improved security and can provide access to balance information — but there are major hurdles that make it unlikely any banks would offer the technology in the U.S. anytime soon.

Lawmakers will return from their week-long Memorial Day recess this week right in the middle of a human scrum – hundreds of credit union executives crossing hundreds of retailers arguing over a key provision in the bank reform bill that would introduce government oversight of the market for cards interchange.

MasterCard Worldwide on June 3 introduced an application designed to enable cardholders with Apple Inc. iPhones to initiate person-to-person funds transfers between MasterCard accounts. But thus far just one U.S. banking company is supporting the service.

Credit card direct-mail solicitations from major issuers increased sharply during the first three months of this year, driven in part by a resurgence in rewards card and balance-transfer offers, according to new data Mintel Comperemedia released this month.

Visa Inc.'s rule on using only its clearing system for international transactions on dual-currency credit cards has existed for many years, and it applies for all Visa cobranded credit cards, Visa said in a statement to PaymentsSource.

Local governments, universities and charities in the United Kingdom may use First Data Corp. to manage their credit cards issued to employees now that the Atlanta-based company is an approved supplier to these types of organizations, First Data says.

Bus passengers in the United Arab Emirates city of Sharjah now may use smart cards to pay their fares, an official for the Sharjah Public Transport Corp. tells PaymentsSource.

China Mobile reportedly is delaying deployment of an RF-SIM contactless-payment technology based on a standalone 2.4-gighertz frequency and instead is adopting SIMpass, a contactless card that uses a 13.56-megahetz radio frequency and that is fully compatible with the widely accepted Near Field Communication standard.

A growing number of mobile payments companies are promoting systems that charge purchases to users' phone bills rather than credit or debit cards.

The final provisions of the Credit CARD Act take effect in August, but issuers are still in the dark about several key requirements that will affect how they calculate penalty fees.

American Express Co. has inked a deal in which China Merchants Bank will issue a new dual-currency AmEx credit card designed for Chinese travelers. The card will support transactions in both Chinese yuan and U.S. dollars.

Yespay International Ltd. this week announced plans to offer U.S. merchants assistance in upgrading their point-of-sale systems to accept EMV chip-and-PIN cards. In doing so, the London-based services provider hopes to reduce their exposure to fraud by alleviating the need for holders of chip cards from other countries to initiate transactions using signatures and the cards’ magnetic stripes.

Target Corp. on June 3 announced a new rewards program designed to drive more transactions to its branded payment cards. Customers paying with a Target credit or debit card will receive a 5% everyday discount at the point of sale on all purchases.