Disruption and Innovation at the Point of Sale

by George Peabody | Apr 24, 2015

Surprising disruptions and unanticipated consequences abound in payments. Sometimes, it’s just a rule change that makes all the difference. In 2001, the NACHA rule enabling ad hoc web debits was put in place, primarily at the behest of banks who wanted to make it...

Let’s Just Skip Sig and Go to Chip and PIN

by jayd | Oct 28, 2014

Last week I was in Victoria, British Columbia doing one of our Glenbrook Payments Assessments. In anticipation of my trip to the North American Land of Chip andPIN, I had both a Visa and an Amex card reissued in the chip format. Neither of my issuers supported PINs on...

Is the Target Breach the Chernobyl of Payments?

by formadaadmin | Feb 27, 2014

Chernobyl is certainly at the top of the list of man-made disasters.  In light of recent events, I’ve been thinking that the Target breach has become the Chernobyl of the payments world. As a group, we Americans never thought that much about payment security – we...

How many payments professionals does it take to hire a bike? Three! (A story of Chip & PIN)

by Erin McCune | Jun 12, 2013

Bicycles are my preferred form of transportation so I was eager to explore London using the Barclay’s-sponsored bike share program. Unfortunately, you need a Chip & PIN card to rent a bike using the automated stands and all I have are U.S. issued mag stripe cards....

The Case for EMV Chip Cards in the US?

by scott | Feb 8, 2011

In one of my prior lives, I made the phone call that triggered what eventually became the industry standard for chip card deployment now known as EMV (Europay-MasterCard-Visa). That call was made almost 20 years ago. At the time, I was at Visa where we were spending a...