Posted by Lisa Hochgraf
I wrote my post "Card Fraud is a Two-Way Street, or Is It?" right after a Dallas taxi driver told me he and his company regularly lost money on credit card payments because they didn't have a way to process transcations "live." In that post, I called on credit unions to help members and small-business owners alike by providing such services.
But it turns out that Visa USA and partner Creative Mobile Technologies are first in this undertaking.
The partners have started equipping New York City taxi cabs with readers able to accept both Visa payWave transactions and traditional card swipe transactions. Using the system, passengers can add a tip to the fare, and no signature is required for transactions under $25.
If you were eyeing up card payments in taxis before the Visa USA announcement, you might not want to compete in that arena anymore. But you might still want to be in the payments card game somehow. Visa research shows more and more consumers want to use a payment card for purchases under $25 for convenience (73 percent), efficiency (44 percent) and speed (39 percent).
I've been talking about payments in taxi cabs so far. But the bigger picture of choosing your niche is clearly also at play. In fact, it's got to be pretty difficult trying to gauge market entry these days. I'd like to hear from you: How are you deciding which of many possible needs your should CU fulfill? And how are you deciding when to start?
