After a turbulent week, Visa has underlined that it anticipates a resolution to its disruptions with Amazon, after the ecommerce giant halted its acceptance of UK transactions from Visa credit cards.
The group cited high transaction fees as the reason for the decision, with it elevating long-standing grievances between merchants and banks.
Commenting this weekend, Visa CEO Al Kelly told the Financial Times: “Clearly, we’re in a challenging negotiation. What’s different here is that Amazon unfortunately decided to take the negotiation challenges that we’re having public and oddly has chosen to threaten to punish consumers.”
Furthermore, it’s a move that many have stated has been elevated by Britain’s departure from the EU, with the limits on interchange fees no longer applying to the EU.
David Maisey, CEO at MultiPay Global Solutions, however, stated his belief that the decision will force consumers to reconsider the fundamentals of retail.
He said: “Amazon is once again making people rethink the fundamentals of retail. Payment is a crucial part of the process which has for a long-time revolved around card providers and the fees they charge.
“Even the arrival of mobile payments like Apple Pay and Google Pay did not disrupt card processing in the same way that today’s news will do. With Amazon questioning Visa’s fees, you can be sure that other retailers are now looking at them too.
“Card providers are not going to disappear any time soon, thanks to their huge market and mindshare with customers. However, Amazon is firing the starting gun on a race for new payment methods. The good news is that the technology exists for retailers to offer new payment methods.
“Many existing Android payment terminals can already take new alternative payment methods like instant payments. With just a quick software update they are ready to go.
“For the consumer, it’s just as easy. Instant payment can be done by a mobile app that reads a QR code generated by the merchant device. Once scanned this triggers the payment, which goes directly to the retailer’s bank account, without any card fees being charged.”
