On the web:

• Connect your loyalty programs, offers and more to Google Wallet with the Wallet Objects API - "Save anything to Google Wallet: Integrate your loyalty programs, offers and more into Google Wallet. Users can save these items directly to their Google Wallet for easy use."
• Fast and easy checkout for Android apps selling physical goods and services - Google Commerce - "...our new Google Wallet Instant Buy Android API … makes buying in native Android apps fast and easy."
• Google Is Rebooting Its Troubled Digital Wallet On The Web - ReadWrite - "Google has long aimed to become a payments player. It knows that many of its searches drive people to e-commerce sites where they conduct transactions. …"
• The Feds Are Cracking Down On Mt. Gox (Not On Bitcoin) - Forbes.com - "…the Department of Homeland Security has some issues with how Mt. Gox is running its American operations."
• Give me that old bitcoin religion - PandoDaily - "To engender this trust, and tamp down the threat of counterfeiting, it relies on an ingenious combination of transparency and anonymity."
• Surprise! Prepaid debit cards actually a good deal for consumers Red Tape Chronicles - "Prepaid debit cards, long synonymous with frustrating or even exploitative fees, are suddenly a pretty good deal."
• Mobile Payments Startup ZooZ Debuts In-Ad Payments (Yes, “Ad” Not “App”) - TechCrunch - "With in-ad payments, mobile users will be able checkout by tapping once on a visible banner ad within a mobile app…"
• Visa concessions on card fees: a step in the right direction - EuroCommerce - "EuroCommerce will continue to campaign for a regulation which removes excessive interchange fees, not only cross-border but also on all domestic markets."
• Payleven and MICROS spawn a cloud-based point-of-sale system with Chip & PIN support - The Next Web - "The cloud-based POS system works via 3G, 4G or Wi-Fi and comes with integrated Chip & PIN card payments functionality, as well as automatic sales and card history transactions reconciliation."
• UK's Faster Payments is five years old - Financial Services Club Blog - "The UK's Faster Payments Service (FPS) celebrated its fifth birthday on 8th May."
• Google Wallet’s high turnover - Mobile World Live - "Google has been losing its payments executives at a surprising rate since its launch in the autumn of 2011."

On the wires:

• Federal Court Reinstates $203 Million Judgment Against Wells Fargo For Misleading Consumers On Posting Of Debit-Card Purchases That Resulted In Unexpected Overdraft Fees - "The case before Judge Alsup was brought on behalf of California Wells Fargo customers who, from November 15, 2004 to June 30, 2008, incurred overdraft fees on debit card transactions as a result of the bank's practice of sequencing transactions from highest to lowest."
• Visa Cuts Europe’s Swipe Fees But Continues to Stiff U.S. Merchants & Consumers - Merchants Payments Coalition - "U.S. merchants and consumers pay the highest fees in the world to credit card companies and banks to swipe their cards because of unfair price-fixing within the industry."
• Monitise Launches MPOS Payment Service - "The new white-labelled mobile payment service helps banks, mobile operators and acquirers offer their business customers the ability to accept card payments on a mobile device..."
• CHARGE Anywhere Launches EMV MPOS Solution at BlackBerry Live - "In integrating a Bluetooth enabled EMV/Chip & PIN smart card reader with a BlackBerry smart phone, CHARGE Anywhere, continues to lead the way in providing secure, innovative payment solutions"
• Vantiv and NCR to Bring Powerful Mobile Point-of-Sale Solutions to Small Businesses - "The multi-year agreement will focus on developing exclusive new solutions and expanding both companies’ innovative technology platforms to deliver personalized customer experiences that help smaller merchants compete more effectively against larger competitors."
• Tyfone Connected Smart Card Solution Fixes Cyber Security and Biometric Vulnerabilities - "Tyfone’s CSC solution operates much like the traditional plastic smart card systems already in widespread use, but has a much smaller physical footprint and uniquely has the ability to connect to any mobile device, tablet or PC."
• New C-SAM Applet Development and Testing Services Enable Rapid Rollouts of NFC-Enabled Mobile Commerce Products and Services
• APWG Report: Mobile Device Crimeware Evolves into Global Criminal Marketplace in Response to Mobile Payment and Banking Expansion - "The sprawling mobile devices marketplace has spawned an industrialized mobile financial fraud plexus that today drives increasingly sophisticated criminal technical innovation to exploit the mobile devices explosion"

The UK Payments Council has "relaunched its Sort Code Checker online tool, extending it beyond Faster Payments to cover Bacs, CHAPS, cheques and paper credits. By inputting the sort code of the account a payment is being sent to, a customer can see whether the account can receive a Faster Payment, Bacs Credit or CHAPS payment. Customers will also be able to see if an account allows a Direct Debit instruction to be set up and if a cheque or paper credit can be paid into the account through the clearings. The Checker, which stores all the UK’s 20,000 sort codes, can be found on the UK Payments website." READ MORE »

Over on PaymentsViews.com, Glenbrook's Carol Coye Benson takes a look at the UK's Faster Payments Service. Carol spoke with David McFarlane, Company Manager, CHAPS Clearing Company about FP - and said she was surprised by much of what he said: FP is not what you thought!

APACS has announced the volume and value figures for the first three days’ operation of the new Faster Payments Service, launched on Tuesday, May 27. "In total, between just after midnight on Tuesday 27th May and today at 12.45pm, 318,405 faster payments have been processed to a value of £200,127,682.03. This equates to around 90,000 payments a day, 3,750 payments an hour – one every second – with an average value of over £625 per payment." READ MORE »

APACS has confirmed that the infrastructure for the new Faster Payments Service is now live, with payments from midnight being processed through the new system. According to APACS, by 7 AM this morning 898 payments had been made with a value of £461,383.43. READ MORE »

APACS has published new materials to help customers wishing to benefit from the new Faster Payment Service as it begins its rollout on May 27th . APACS has produced a new, downloadable advice guide, How to use the Faster Payments Service , along with an online easy-to-use sort code checker. Customers can input any UK sort code to check whether it is able to receive Faster Payments. More sort codes will be added over the next few months as the service is rolled out. All these materials are available from www.apacs.org.uk. READ MORE »

In the UK, Barclaycard and InterContinental Hotel Group (IHG) have announced the launch of the Priority Club Rewards Visa credit card. READ MORE »

APACS has confirmed plans for the launch of the new Faster Payments Service on May 27th. Beginning then, the FPS founding banks will be gradually implementing their own plans to deliver the new service to their customers. According to APACS, 'the new service will benefit customers by speeding up one-off payments made over the internet or by phone, reducing the current three-day clearing timescale to enable these payments to clear within hours, not days. For the very first time it will also be possible to make these payments all day every day.' READ MORE »

UK payment services companies Voca and LINK Interchange Network have announced their intention to merge to create VocaLINK with the combined company expected to handle over 8 billion payment transactions this year.

Eiger Systems has announced that its BANK WIZARD and BILLER WIZARD solutions have been enhanced to support banks implementing the UK Faster Payments initiative, which is designed to deliver same day clearing for electronic payments.