Past Articles
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MAG 2022 Mid-Year Conference and Tech Forum
Feb 25, 2022The MAG held the 2022 Mid-Year Conference and Tech Forum at the Hyatt Regency in Atlanta, GA, and virtually February 14-17. The successful event brought together merchants and industry partners, and speakers covered a range of timely payments topics.
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8-Digit BINS: Who Would Have Thought 2 Little Numbers Could Cause This Much Grief?
Feb 10, 2022Back in 2016, the International Standards Organization (ISO) announced a forthcoming change to the length of the Issuer Identification Number, also known as IIN or Bank Identification Number (BIN), due to the increasing number of card issuers in the market and the expectation that there would eventually be a shortage in the available supply of BINs. While the standard change had several impacts, the most prominent for merchants is that the existing fixed-length 6-digit BIN standard will be converted to 8-digits.
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Infographic: 8-Digit BINs
Feb 9, 2022Merchants, and the industry overall, will experience significant challenges if there is not a solution to properly identify the BIN at the point of sale (POS). The PCI Security Standards Council recently updated their FAQ#1091 in January 2022 to allow visibility to the first eight digits of a PAN on 16-digit cards. The update to the FAQs is extremely tight with the April 2022 requirements.
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MAG releases Merchant Payments 202, a new eLearning course!
Feb 2, 2022The Merchant Advisory Group is excited to officially introduce Merchant Payments 202: Exploring Card Types and Products, an eLearning course designed to enable the learner to effectively analyze and manage the payment card products a merchant accepts. At the end of this course, learners will exhibit knowledge of how to optimize the card product mix to successfully achieve their organization’s payments, customer relationship, and expense goals.
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Payments Policy: A look back at 2021 and high expectations for 2022
Jan 11, 2022Arguably the most exciting thing to happen in payments policy in 2021 was the Federal Reserve’s proposed rulemaking to clarify the debit routing provision of Regulation II to apply to all online transactions. Merchants have said for years that ALL debit transactions should have routing choice; however, they have faced many hurdles routing debit transactions in the ten years since the law was enacted.
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The Joy of Gifts. A Gift of Joy?
Dec 30, 2021Holidays bring joy to many – including sellers as ‘tis the season’ for sales – traditionally a LOT of sales. One always popular gift is gift cards. Who hasn’t bought or received one during the holiday season, or throughout the year for that matter, to recognize other celebratory occasions? While many have joy in receiving these gifts, shouldn’t we all share that joy by selling those gifts? Let’s hear more.
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Payments…the “Pandemic Effect”
Dec 27, 2021Rewind twelve months and some aspects of life and business look very similar to the end of 2020, while other aspects have changed. We hear the continued urge to wear a mask, get vaccinated, and be aware of in-person and indoor gatherings. The Covid-19 virus, and its variations, created what I call the “pandemic effect.”
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Creating a Payments Strategy
Dec 22, 2021Today, merchants are faced with a plethora of choices on not only how consumers pay but how to ensure the payment is valid. Developing a strategy will help you both prioritize initiatives and gain alignment within the organization. The end of the year is a great time to either revise or create a new payments strategy document.
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MAG Announces New Digital Access Membership
Dec 20, 2021The Merchant Advisory Group (MAG) recently added a Digital Access Membership option for merchants with under $1B in revenue. This new opportunity gives more merchants access to MAG’s networking, education, live and recorded webinars, and best practice resources.
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Join Us at the MAG 2022 Mid-Year Conference and Tech Forum
Dec 20, 2021Plans are well underway for MAG’s upcoming 2022 Mid-Year Conference and Tech Forum that will take place February 14-17, 2022, in Atlanta, GA. We look forward to welcoming both Mid-Year Conference and Tech Forum attendees back in-person at the Hyatt Regency.
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Coming Soon - Merchants Payments 201: Managing Your Payments Program
Nov 30, 2021Earlier this year, the MAG launched its first eLearning course, Merchants Payments 101. We will also release Merchants Payments 201: Managing Your Payments in 2021. Merchant Payments 201 is the first in a series of five 200-level courses that will dive deep into topics like card products, fraud and chargebacks, touchless payments, and debit routing.
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BNPL: Adding Another Acronym To Our Payments Vocabulary
Nov 15, 2021Buy Now, Pay Later, or BNPL, is a service offered by providers that allows consumers to purchase goods or services and to pay them off over an extended period of time, the length of which can vary from a few weeks to much longer. A short-term loan, consumers typically can pay off their purchases interest-free and with relative ease. Third-party companies offer these ‘pay over time’ arrangements to consumers, and services can be directly integrated with merchants or not. Many of the providers claim that BNPL services extend a line of credit to consumers who may be hesitant or otherwise unable to make a purchase and, as a result of access to the credit, may ultimately spend more and more frequently with the retailer.
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MAG Brings APAC Merchants Together
Nov 8, 2021The Asia Pacific region is undergoing a payments transformation. MAG Asia-Pacific (APAC) Executive Director Yash Yadav shares her insight into what she believes are the top three challenges and tips for merchants on how to handle them.
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The Magnetic Stripe Retirement Plan is Real!
Oct 8, 2021In the summer of 2020 I had suggested the major underperformer of magnetic stripe call it a day and retire. As more modern, relevant, and better performing technologies come to market, we need to embrace them and let go of the non-performers.
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Cryptocurrency, Stable Coin and Central Bank Digital Currency, Oh My
Sep 16, 2021You can’t open the news without reading a story on cryptocurrencies, but how will it affect the future of payments? While the environment is changing daily, I hope this article will give you an overview of the different types of digital currencies and how they may develop from a payments acceptance perspective.
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Stronger Together
Sep 9, 2021The MAG holds so many key purposes and opportunities for our members: education, advocacy, networking, collaboration, and the list goes on. All of these are important to ensure the merchant community understands the issues facing us in the industry as well as the implications behind industry changes that can otherwise seem benign.
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MAG Tech Forum Provides Unique Opportunity for Payments IT Professionals to Learn and Network
Aug 19, 2021As a new Director of Tech Engagement at MAG, I am excited to bring my learnings, knowledge and experience to our merchant members and sponsors. We will expand our Tech Forum offerings, digging deeper into best practices for infrastructure, product integration, security, vendor selection, and many other areas of payments technology. Expanding the scope of analysis and information, as well as finding more opportunities to engage with product development, will further merchants’ ability to evolve and adapt, and I look forward to our journey together.
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Here’s Why Account Takeover is Trending and What to Do About It
Aug 13, 2021Fraud losses continue to rise, and account takeover is leading the pack. As criminals become more sophisticated, so too must the methods you use to stop them.
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Becoming frenemies with delivery super apps
Aug 3, 2021COVID-19 has fundamentally changed our lives, in many ways permanently. One of the profound changes we are seeing is in the way consumers purchase goods and services: increasingly the store is delivered to the customer rather than the other way around.
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Mobile Payments Conference (MPC): The Digital Commerce Event
Aug 3, 2021Join MPC from August 17 - 19, 2021 to hear industry experts speak about the latest technology trends and share insights into the future for the digital commerce industry.
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