A new Center for Responsible Lending survey finds that U.S. consumers overwhelmingly want to be asked their preference before a bank or credit union enrolls them in a program to cover debit card purchases when they do not have the funds. READ MORE

PULSE has signed an agreement with Acculynk under which PULSE will test Acculynk’s PaySecure Internet PIN debit technology in a pilot program. The pilot will involve selected PULSE merchant and financial institution participants and is slated to begin in the second quarter of 2009. READ MORE

In this morning's USA Today, Kathy Chu examines the practices of US banks with respect to how they handle overdrafts on checking accounts, how they clear checks, and more. She lists automatic enrollment, high-to-low clearing, confusing statements, and other practices as reasons consumers need to be careful about managing their checking accounts and debit card usage. Included in the story is a survey of the overdraft practices of the top 10 US banks.

Diners Club International, a business unit of Discover Financial Services, in conjunction with Discover, and SIX Multipay, a leading Swiss-based payment services provider, have announced that they have signed a long-term merchant acquiring agreement. This is the first multi-country, acquirer agreement to further European acceptance of Diners Club and Discover Network cards. READ MORE

• New Aite Group Report: Fraud Management at U.S. Retail Banks and Credit Unions: An Ever-Moving Target
• Digital Transactions: Pulse Becomes Third EFT Network to Agree to Test Online PIN Debit
• CNET: AOL's Shortcuts.com coupon service goes mobile
• Mobile Banker: Mobile-Payment Partnership Could Give Momentum to NFC - re: Orange/Barclays in UK
• Elephant Talk Communications, Inc. to Enter the Credit Card Fraud Prevention Market
• American Banker: Flaws Found in Biometric System
• GiftCards.com Removes Monthly Gift Card Fees For One Year
• Denise Richardson: A Credit Card Industry Insider Shares Truths; Why He Left After 20 Years
• Digital River and PLAYXPERT Sign Joint Marketing Agreement
• SafPay Inc. Releases Virtucard, a New Online Cash-Based Payment Option for High-Risk Merchants
• Bloomberg.com: Citigroup May Sell Redecard Shares at 19% Discount
• Computerworld: Visa slaps payment processors over breaches, defends PCI rules
• San Francisco Chronicle: BART plans to introduce TransLink Card in June
• InformationWeek: How iPhone 3.0 May Revolutionize The Smartphone Industry
• WorkCompEDI Announces Agreement with Aon eSolutions for Electronic Billing Services
• MarkMonitor Announces AntiFraud Solutions, Combining Proven Antiphishing and Expert Antimalware Capabilities
• The Financial Services Club's Blog: Millions of Contactless Cards