Category Archives: Tips

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Scan vs. Swipe: The Benefits of NFC Payments

With its Apple Pay product, Apple is kick-starting the scan vs. swipe revolution that credit card and mobile wallet companies have been trying to usher in over the past few years. Scanning, which allows brick-and-mortar businesses to be more competitive with ecommerce ones, was made possible through the development of near field communication (NFC)­—a technology that allows ­two devices to communicate and exchange information with one another wirelessly.

Stores and businesses equipped with NFC technology can scan a customer’s card or smartphone for payment instead of swiping their credit card through POS systems. So how do NFC payments benefit you and why are merchant services companies promoting it?

ABTK-small-blog-image-ScanVSSwipe-1 Ease of Use

NFC is easy for both retailers and customers to use. Set up and installation is simple and your merchant services provider can answer any questions you have. Consumers simply scan their credit card or smartphone for payment. For smartphone users, there’s the extra benefit of not having to carry multiple store and credit cards in their wallets. They can pre-load all payment information to a mobile wallet app on their smartphone.

Cost Reduction

Businesses that want to offer NFC payments as an alternative to traditional credit card processing will have a one-time cost of purchasing the readers. Readers are reasonably priced and can be obtained from your merchant services company. Reduced paper product use will save you money and attract customers who prefer to do business with environmentally conscious companies. Aside from the purchase of the reader, NFC payments can cost you less annually than standard credit card processing.

ABTK-small-blog-image-ScanVSSwipe-2Payment Processing on the Go

Since there are no paper receipts requiring signature, payment processing via NFC is much faster. Businesses equipped with NFC readers can handle more customers in a day than those with standard POS systems. Customers who like the ease of online payments will be drawn to businesses that offer self-service NFC readers at their checkouts. Service professionals and salesman in the field who have mobile merchant accounts can also take advantage of NFC.

Advertising and In-Store Marketing

NFC lets customers quickly and easily redeem coupons and gift cards, and add to loyalty reward programs—benefits that are unavailable with traditional credit card processing. Besides these wins for customers, you can use NFC to offer discounts for and promote your products and services. Retailers can also take advantage of NFC’s in-store marketing capabilities. As customers near certain products or areas in a store, NFC can send targeted coupons or product information to their mobile devices. Through various mobile programs and apps, customers can trade discounts and offers with other users.

Improved Security

Magnetic stripe readers are subject to counterfeit cards and skimming. Enhanced security technology that can eliminate these types of fraud is compatible with NFC’s wireless communication, but not with magnetic stripe readers. Reduced fraud means fewer chargebacks and more profits for merchants.


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5 Reasons Why It’s Easier Than You Think For Your Business to Accept Apple Pay

Apple’s new mobile payments service, Apple Pay, allows consumers to use certain mobile devices to make payments in an easy, secure and private way. Here are a few benefits.

ABTK-small-blog-image-ApplePay01 1. Better Than a Mobile Wallet

Apple Pay isn’t exactly a traditional mobile wallet, it’s a mobile payment enabler, and that makes it easier to use for customers. Users can keep their current credit cards without worrying about having to store money in a separate digital account. It’s one advantage that Pay has over mobile wallet systems like MCX–a retailer effort to enter mobile payment markets that requires users to create an entirely new account.

2. Touch-to-Pay is Simple and Speedy

Perhaps most importantly for users, Apple’s touch-to-pay system works, and works fast. You touch your phone to a sensor (this helps remove NFC interference issues) and tap the iPhone’s main button. Sometimes a PIN is required, but the process is fast and dependable. This compares favorably to options like CurrentC, the latest MCX project that works with less dependable and unnecessary QR codes.

ABTK-small-blog-image-ApplePay023. Timing is Everything

Apple is well-positioned to see quick growth in Apple Pay. Mobile payments have been around long enough for most users to become acquainted with them; currently, they have an estimated 42% of American smartphone users and a large Passbook customer base to draw from. Perhaps even more importantly, Apple has released Pay just ahead of the massive upgrades that U.S. merchants will need to make to their credit card systems–upgrades that could go a lot more smoothly if merchants also upgraded to Pay at the same time.

4. Start Big, Go Small

When Apple first announced Pay, it opened with compatibility for around 220,000 stores in the United States. This is a fairly small start, but it shows Apple’s intent: Start with the big guys, then expand outward into smaller retailers and chains as Pay evolves. By first recruiting more of the top 100 retailers in the U.S., Apple has given Pay a momentum boost right out the starting gate. People are already used to it, and retailers are already working on management systems for it.

ABTK-small-blog-image-ApplePay035. Security is More Important Than Ever

Apple Pay dodges many security vulnerabilities by utilizing tokenization. This helps reduce the amount of sensitive data transferred and makes that data as useless as possible to hackers. It also introduces new security in the form of Touch ID and similar features. In a world where big seller databases are being hacked increasingly often, this is a welcome benefit for all users.


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5 Payments Processing Resolutions To Ring In the New Year for Your Business

With 2015 on the horizon, business owners need to be aware of rapidly-evolving trends in payment processing. The goal is still the same: Make the POS experience as painless as possible for customers–but the methods to get to that goal have gotten more advanced. Here are 5 resolutions you can make for the New Year to help ensure your POS solutions are as flexible and painless as possible.

1. Embrace Mobile

Everyone carries a mobile device–and if you tend to do a lot of business at conventions, tradeshows, fairs, or away from your storefront, you need to have a way to process credit card payments.

The convenience afforded by mobile payment solutions can’t be overestimated.

ABTK-small-blog-image-DEC-mobile-devicesFurthermore, many customers are now forgoing their wallets altogether in favor of mobile wallets–like Apple Pay. In addition to processing payments through mobile devices–you can also accept payments from mobile devices.

2. Stay On Top of Countertop Terminals

While mobile payments are changing the way customers pay, countertop terminals are here to stay. Make sure you’re talking regularly to your payment processor to ensure that the traditional technology you have to service your customers’ purchases is the latest and greatest.

3. Protect Yourself

In today’s increasingly digital world, hackers have a lot of targets available to them. As such, data breaches and the compromise of customer credit cards is on the rise. This makes getting data breach protection absolutely essential.

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Tokenization can help as well by replacing the actual credit card information with a “token” value that can be used by a business for accepting payment, but it will not be able to be used by anyone else. This, naturally, eliminates the need for merchants to keep the sensitive data that can be compromised, which is a big help for businesses and their customers.

4. Spruce Up Your Shopping Carts

If your business utilizes online shopping carts, you will need some way to process credit card and debit card payments. There is a variety of gateways available to help you create a smooth shopping cart experience for your customers.  A quick conversation with your payment processing rep should help illuminate your options.

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5. Ask About ACH

Some businesses might want to give customers more options than simply paying with a card, especially if your business deals with large transactions. This is where ACH payments come into play.

Accepting electronic checks will allow businesses to save time, given that businesses will not have to wait on checks to arrive, but it will also protect you from fraudulent checks. Many ACH services today combine the service with payment processing, giving you the best of both worlds in the process.


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Fake “Order Confirmation” E-mails On the Rise During Holidays

As if consumers didn’t have enough to worry about this holiday season. A recent report from Krebs On Security outlines how shoppers may experience a spike in phishing attempts via fake “order confirmation” e-mails which appear branded with the logos and imagery of widely-trusted retail outlets. Some more detail about this particular series of phishing attempts:

According to Malcovery, a company that closely tracks email-based malware attacks, these phony “order confirmation” spam campaigns began around Thanksgiving, and use both booby-trapped links and attached files in a bid to infect recipients’ Windows PCs with the malware that powers the Asprox spam botnet.

A basic rule of thumb applies: If you don’t recognize where the e-mail is coming from or don’t remember making a purchase at a retailer that sends you an “order confirmation” e-mail, don’t click on the link.


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How Holiday Shopping Has Changed in 2014

For many retailers, Black Friday sparks the beginning of their busiest period of business: Holiday shopping. Especially this year–when Black Friday sales were already underway as early as November 1. It’s just the tip of the iceberg. Forbes reports that post-recession savvy shoppers have changed the rules of the holiday shopping game. So how can you make the most of this potentially very lucrative time of year?

Know your window of opportunity. Did you know that you get ABTK-small-blog-image-NOV-1almost a month–28 days, to be exact–to make the most of your holiday shoppers?

• Mobile payments are the key. Most of your shoppers might use cash or plastic, but one way to help speed up long check-out lines? Mobile payments.* ABTK-small-blog-image-NOV-2

Reward savvy shoppers. Price-matching will remain a key element of staying competitive with shoppers.

Each shopper matters. Black Friday shoppers will spend, on average, $399/person.

• Apple Payers and Google Walleters will spend more. In fact, they may spend up to 17% more than customers not utilizing mobile wallets.

•  Protect yourself. With such heightened sales activity during theABTK-small-blog-image-NOV-3 holidays, the risk of data breaches is especially high. Do you have an action response plan in place?

*Need some help with this? Click here.

 

 


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