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Canadian Merchant Industry News

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Industry News

Visa certifies slew of new smartphones for mobile payment app

By Louis Georgakakis

Visa has certified a number of new smartphones for its payWave POS system.

11/01/2012 - Payment technology giant Visa announced this week it has certified a number of NFC-enabled smartphones for use as mobile payment devices. In a statement released Tuesday, Visa reported that a slew of handsets from Samsung, LG and Research In Motion will be equipped for use with Visa's mobile application, payWave, for transactions at the point of sale.

The announcement marks another step in the direction of widespread mobile payment adoption, which has been slow to come due to considerable logistics dilemmas and barriers to entry.

All the new devices certified by Visa host the payWave app on a secure SIM card and feature near field communication (NFC) technology, Visa reported. NFC is a communications standard that allows mobile devices to transmit secure financial data to contactless point-of-sale terminals.

"This is an important step for Visa, its financial institution partners and the mobile industry," said Bill Gajda, head of mobile at Visa. "In addition to issuing plastic magnetic stripe or chip-enabled payment cards, financial institutions can now consider offering their accountholders a way to transform their smartphones into fully functional mobile payment devices."

Canadian Bankers Association develops blueprint for mobile payments

15/05/2012

The number of smartphone owners in Canada now represents half of all wireless users, and many retailers have already installed point-of-sale terminals enabled with the technology that can accept mobile payments.

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EMV payments cards more widely circulated

11/05/2012

Merchants that have not yet invested in point-of-sale terminals capable of accepting EMV-chip cards might feel more pressure soon, since the number of cardholders is growing. Data recently released by EMVCo reported that 45 percent of all cards in the world contain EMV microprocessing chips

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Retailers want mobile POS systems, study shows

02/05/2012

The surveyed merchants believe the mobile credit card processing devices will help them provide better customer service and greater payment convenience since they won't be restricted to the front of the store.

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