EPX COO Advises on Internet Merchant “Rules” at Electronic Commerce World
For Immediate Release
Highlights of Presentation, “Knowing the Rules that Regulate Online Payments” and Directions for Getting Your Free Copy
New Castle, Del (June 4, 2001) – “The Rules” of accepting online payments range from protecting customer data to making product information details clear and accurate, according to a presentation given by Electronic Payment Exchange (EPX) COO Scott Martin last Friday at the Electronic Commerce World Spring Convention in Santa Clara, California.
At the show, Martin discussed issues every e-tailer should be aware of, in order to comply with both Government and Bankcard rules designed to protect the consumer. For example:
· A high number of complaints about a company at consumer protection agencies, and/or a high ratio of consumer-reversed transactions, known as chargebacks, is often a sign that the company either gives misleading information about their product or service - including product, shipping, pricing and return information - or has poor customer service.
· Visa has recently implemented 10 “best practices” for security that all Internet merchants that accept Visa cards must follow. These range from requiring merchants to use a firewall and encrypt stored data to avoiding use of vendor-supplied defaults for system passwords.
· Visa and MasterCard have specific guidelines for website layout. For example, websites should clearly and prominently display: the corporate office address and phone number; customer support contact information with a customer service telephone number and email address; order processing and delivery information; all pricing fees and charges; the cancellation, refund and return policies; as well as security and privacy statements.
· Merchants with more than one website should establish a separate company number for each site at their merchant account bank, and each company number should use a descriptor that matches the respective web site. This way, the descriptor that appears on the consumer’s billing statement will match the website name - rather than the main corporate name - resulting in less confusion when he/she receives his/her billing statement.
· The Federal Trade Commission Mail Order/ Telephone Order Rule also applies to Internet merchants. Last July, seven major e-tailers were charged with violating the rule and paid fines that totaled $1.5 million for alleged failure to ship merchandise in the time-frame promised, and failure to provide proper notification to customers. A copy of the Mail/ Order Telephone Order rule may be found online at the Federal Trade Commission’s website, www.ftc.gov
· If a company outsources customer service, fulfillment or any other part of their operations, they should be sure to select a reliable vendor and track performance. To illustrate this point, if a company promises their customer a product in 7 days and their fulfillment service doesn’t deliver, that company has still broken the FTC’s Mail Order/ Telephone order rule, and has created a dissatisfied customer.
For more information, or to request a free copy of Martin’s presentation, please send an email to jwarren@epx.com, and write “the rules” in the email subject line. Include your name, title and company name in the body of the email.
About EPX
Founded in 1979, EPX is a full-service payment processing company, which specializes in enabling businesses to accept credit card, debit card and electronic check transactions. Notable EPX milestones have included: processing the first Internet credit card and electronic check transactions, developing the first real-time transaction reporting website and creating the first merchant financial risk transfer processing guarantee for banks. EPX has a vast array of clients, from small businesses to Fortune 500 companies, and currently processes over $5 billion in Internet transactions a year. For more information visit www.epx.com.
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Contact:
Jennifer Warren
Electronic Payment Exchange
(302) 326-0700 extension 2131
jwarren@epx.com
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