Means of Payment in E-Commerce (Credit Cards and E-Money)

Once the web has spread and due to the great mass of users, firms with trade activity intesified their commercial tranzactions on-line. Thus the e-commerce implies e-payments which lead to creating e-money and implicitly some specific means of payment, all of these used with the aim of deployment and development of commercial tranzactions on-line.e-commerce, First Virtual, e-cash, Net-Cash

Prepaid cards: an important innovation in financial services

This paper describes the characteristics of closed-system and open-system prepaid cards. Of particular interest is a class of open-system programs that offer a set of features similar to conventional deposit accounts using card-based payment applications. The benefits that open-system prepaid cards offer for consumers, providers, and issuing banks contribute to the increased adoption of these payment applications. Using these cards, consumers can pay bills, make purchases, and get cash from ATM networks. At the same time, consumers who hold prepaid cards need not secure a traditional banking relationship nor gain approval for a deposit account or revolving credit. By offering prepaid cards, issuing banks may meet the financial needs of consumers who may not otherwise qualify for more traditional banking products and these banks may do so with a card-based electronic payment application that essentially eliminates credit risk for the bank.Payment systems

Developments, Issues, and Initiatives in Retail Payments

Innovations in basic information technologies, in payment applications, and in the availability of global markets, as well as substantial changes in financial sector policy, have fundamentally changed how the retail payments system in Canada operates. Principally, the volume and types of electronic payments have grown, and there is increased participation by diverse groups of financial and non-financial institutions as providers of retail payment services. The resulting policy problem for payment systems is how best to benefit from efficiency gains while managing payment risks. O'Connor examines the effect of the technological and legislative changes and the initiatives developed by the public and private sectors in such areas as the market arrangements for services; customer risks and costs for settling large-value retail payments; the security of payment information and the efficiency with which it is transmitted; and the effects of differing regulatory regimes on competition among providers of retail payment services.

The Federal Reserve's role in the payments mechanism and it's communication patterns

An abstract for this article is not available.Federal Reserve System ; Electronic funds transfers ; Payment systems

Personal on-line payments

The swift growth of e-commerce and the Internet has led to the development of a new form of electronic funds transfer—the personal on-line payment—that uses web and e-mail technologies to initiate and confirm payments. This article describes this payment instrument and the trends that have given rise to it. The authors explain that personal on-line payment systems are already providing a convenient alternative to checks, money orders, and cash, and may replace credit cards for some small-scale retail e-commerce. However, issues such as the interoperability of diverse systems and the systems’ inherent risks will continue to be central. The authors also suggest that although personal on-line payment systems are not likely to have a great impact on monetary policy, they do raise regulatory issues associated with consumer rights and protection.Electronic funds transfers ; Electronic commerce ; Payment systems ; Finance, Personal

A prototype mobile money implementation in Nigeria

Researchers have shown that majority of the populace in the developing nations are rural dwellers that do not have access to basic financial services and are poor. This class of people are peasant farmers and petty traders who rely mostly on remittances from their wards and relations in major cities and abroad to meet their financial obligations at home. The methods of remittances are encumbered with challenges. Mobile money is a tool that allows individuals to make financial transactions using mobile cell phones. Nigeria is one of the fastest growing telecoms nations of the world and the adoption of mobile money will help a great deal to solve the problems associated with remittances. In this paper, we present a short messages services (SMS) and unstructured supplementary service data (USSD) implementation of mobile money implementation in Nigeria modelled using Django and Python as the programming language, MySQL as the data store and Apache hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) as the Web server. The system made comparative analysis with M-PESA implementation in Kenya: the first mobile money implantation in Africa. Furthermore, the system was tested among a selected few of the populace to evaluate the usability of the design. Findings revealed that the prototype implementation is user-friendly and can be used by all without many problems except for the illiterate populace; hence, the need to have a combined bank and agent-based implementation. This approach will help with time to reduce the number of unbanked populace, which is currently at 80%

The Paperless Letter of Credit and Related Documents of Title

A normative analysis of paperless letters of credit that will categorize the various transactions and delineate the boundaries and relative standing of the competing sets of rules is now appropriate. The analysis will suggest when an official rule is needed and what its character should be