Normally, if a debit transaction is approved, payment is guaranteed, since debit cards don't bounce.
The payments industry has chafed at this contention, arguing, for instance, that, unlike checks, approved debit transactions don't bounce.
Credit or debit cards won't work because relatively few people have them.
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"We are out there to help customers and they want cash -- debit cards aren't working everywhere, some places you need cash, " Hassell said.
The pact doesn't apply to debit cards, which have grown in popularity for small-value transactions.
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The debit-card fee wasn't the only revenue idea Bank of America shelved late in 2011.
Instead, many say that the companies that process their debit-card transactions aren't passing on the federally mandated savings, or are raising fees on other services.
It also reduced swipe fees on debit card transactions but it didn't address swipe fees for credit cards.
The government website promoting the shift ( godirect.org) says the department may issue prepaid debit cards to people who don't sign up by the deadline.
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Still, prepaid debit cards targeted at teens haven't broadly caught on, says Tim Sloane, a vice president with Mercator Advisory Group, which researches the prepaid market.
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It decided not to test a plan in which customers who were about to make a debit-card purchase but didn't have enough in their account would have gotten an alert giving them the option of buying overdraft protection.
BillMeLater, for example, doesn't require a credit card or debit card number, but it does ask for a customer's Social Security number and date of birth.
The new language does relieve uncertainty for Visa and MasterCard by clarifying that the measure wouldn't restrict the fees that the debit-card processing networks charge to banks.
If you just need basic checking, bill pay, ATM access and a debit card, search for accounts that don't charge fees if you're below a minimum balance or fees of 25 cents or more for each check written.
"We've helped develop the debit-payment mechanism, and someone saying, 'We don't want to pay for that, ' forces us to rethink things, " Joe Price, Bank of America Corp.
But I couldn't access my Bank of America account online and had to call collect to cancel my debit card.
Visa and MasterCard wouldn't directly comment on Mr. McCrohan's conclusions, but have said they would change debit-card fees, known as interchange, in response to new federally regulated caps.
Unlike credit scoring systems (like Fico) that can't see the layer of activity below credit card and loan payments, Fiserv tracks consumer accounts, debit card payments and online bill-pay habits.
Square technology won't replace Starbucks's main cash-register systems but its software will eventually process all credit and debit transactions at 7, 000 of its U.S. stores.
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