The folks at InspirePay just did a classic Dwolla implementation with the Dwolla off-site gateway. 

InspirePay is pretty slick. The platform was built to easily provide anyone a simple way to receive money online. What makes InspirePay unique is that they allow you to get paid in whatever way is easiest for your donors, friends, or customers. It’s kind of like an www.About.me for payments.

Learn more about InspirePay here

Yep, it’s time… time to dominate your questions via interactive webinars hosted by myself (Biz Dev Guy) and Ian Zimmerman (Customer Support Whiz), and a few other members of the Dwolla crew.

We are beginning to curate topics for quick 15 minute info-based sessions, as well as some more in-depth 30 minute segments. This list isn’t final, but here’s what we’re thinking:

• Dwolla 101: Merchants & Online (30min) w/ hosts Sam & Ian
• This is for those that have a Merchant account and would like to get familiar with all that Dwolla offers.
• Dwolla in 15 minutes: A 50,000 foot view of Dwolla and You. w/ hosts Sam & Ian
• Never heard of Dwolla or just not sure what to do now that you have an account? Want to learn the basic basics? This one is for you.
• POS integration with Dwolla (15min) w/ hosts Sam & Ian
• For restaurants, coffee shops, and retail stores, this webinar will show you how to integrate Dwolla payments into your current POS system.
• Dwolla API: Integration Tips (30min)w/ hosts Sam & James Armstead
• For developers and those integrating with our API, this webinar will start high-level and quickly mine down to a code-level discussion.
• Dwolla for Non-Profits (30min)w/ hosts Sam & Ian
• You’re money is doing good. Shouldn’t it go as far as possible? This is a market-specific webinar that will focus on educating non-profits on how to use Dwolla and make the most of our services and technologies.
• Creating Enthusiastic Customers that Pay with Dwolla (30min)w/ hosts Sam & Ian
• Learn how to market, educate, and convert your customers to Dwolla in your store, online shop, or at your non-profit.
  

So, here’s what you can do to help: If your interested in participating in a Dwollinar, fill out the form below and let us know what you’re interested in seeing.

Hub Pages have been an extremely popular feature ever since we introduced them back in May of 2010. When enabled from the “Add/Remove Features” tab in the Dwolla Dashboard, Hub Pages provide users and merchants a slick landing page to collect online payments. No technical mumbo-jumbo, no additional fees, just a simple two-click process to create an easy-to-share URL to start collecting payments immediately.

Lately, however, they’ve fallen to the wayside as we pushed forward and emphasized new innovations. A facelift was needed.

As I mentioned above, you can follow along with us by logging in and heading to the “Add/Remove Features” section in your online Dwolla Dashboard. Here you’ll find the ability to turn on and off your Hub Page, customize it a bit, and learn more.

Big changes:

• Social networks added
• Custom descriptions added
• Custom names /urls/ added (i.e. https://www.dwolla.com/hub/812-602-4485 can now also be https://www.dwolla.com/hub/jslampe).
• It just looks a lot better
• Supports Instant payments.

Social networks

If you want, you can now also use your Hub Page to point to your social communities. This means that whenever someone visits the landing page they will have the ability to check out your social profiles, as well as pay you.

Linking to your Twitter and Facebook profiles is incredibly easy. You just log in and enable the option. Here is what it looks like in the “Add/Remove Features” page.

Custom Descriptions

When someone hits your hub page it could be for a lot of different reasons. You could be selling tickets, using it as a landing page for collecting fantasy football fees, or even as a simple storefront. Either way, there is now a nice little spot for you to describe what you’re doing.

Modifying the information here is also pretty darn easy. Just log in and type what you want to say.

Custom Names

Prior to this update, the URL for Hub Page looked something like https://wwwdwolla.com/u/812-123-4567. This required users to memorize their Dwolla ID #. Well, things just got a little easier. Now you can customize the link:

And make it easily viewable at http://dwolla.com/hub/bpmilne

Before

After

Collect Instant Payments

Instant is still in BETA, but for those that do (and will) have access to the technology, you may want to use it at someone’s Hub Page. So, if you have Instant, you’ll notice that it’s now a payment option in the Funding Sources’ drop down menu. (In this example, Jordan is sending me money using Instant)

What do you think? Did we miss anything? Let us know what you’d like to see in the next iteration of the Hub Pages by posting in the comments below this post. As always, we’re listening.

The law has been in effect for several months now but it seems the war isn’t over. The Electronic Payments Coalition is back on the campaign trail to repeal the Durbin Amendment. This time they’re offering proof that consumers are not receiving the savings they were promised.

Without recapping all of the particulars, the news was rampant with misinformation and the chronology of events is difficult to remember. That’s why we have memorialized it with articles that covered the developments of it since December, 2010. How did the war play out? Read below:

Electronic Payments Industry Changing Forever – All points bulletin | December 17, 2010 | In it, we slammed the Federal Government and Senator Dick Durbin for a law we believed would lead to the extermination of the entire banking system. We predicted that rewards on debit cards would immediately disappear, as would the entire concept of debit cards themselves over time. We also surmised that quality, fraud protection, and assurance would suffer.

Debit Card Costs May Be Put on the Consumer – Don’t Make Us Pay | February 18, 2011 | We discovered Dontmakeuspay.org, an organization representing consumers in the fight against debit fee regulation. We encouraged people to sign up.

Congressman Steve Israel Replies to Our Concerns About Debit Card Reform | February 22, 2011 | We signed the dontmakeuspay.org petition and received a letter back from Congressman Steve Israel.

Say Goodbye to Debit Cards | March 11, 2011 | We acknowledged that our predictions were coming true. JPMorgan announced that consumers would likely face a spending cap of $50 – $100 per purchase when using their debit cards.

Debit Interchange Fee Study Act: A Few Good Senators Try to Stop the Madness | March 17, 2011 | At this point our inbox had filled up with emails from people accusing our website of being a secret front for the major banks. The term ‘astroturfing’ came up more than a few times. In our article on this day, we reminded the public that banks employed millions of average Americans, and that they would likely be the ones to suffer if regulations forced monetary losses. We praised the Senators who were trying to muster up support for a bill to put the Durbin Amendment on ice for a few years, while the impact of reform could be studied further. The bill was not successful.

Debit Card Rewards Go the Way of the Dinosaur | March 23, 2011 | JPMorgan announced they will terminate rewards on debit cards for all of their customers as a result of the Durbin Amendment. This affirmed one of our original predictions.

Wells Fargo, Chase, SunTrust Cancel Debit Rewards Program | March 28, 2011 | More of the big banks followed suit.

Interchange Regulation and Reduction | April 16, 2011 | We presented evidence that reform would fail by outlining what happened in Australia when they enacted similar regulations ten years earlier. Small businesses did not save money and consumers did not benefit.

Debit Card Fee Reform is Gaining Steam in Canada | April 18, 2011 | Inspired by the U.S., The Canadian Government Begun Taking Another Crack at Limiting Debit Interchange Fees.

Save My Debit Card Video Finalists | May 9, 2011 | We covered the results of the competition held by dontmakeuspay.org. Some of the videos made by consumers to save their debit cards were pretty funny.

Debit Card Fee Reform to be Finalized June 29 | June 28, 2011 | We made our final prediction on what the interchange cap will be.

Blackjack! 21 Cent Debit Card Interchange Fee Plus 5 Basis Points | June 30, 2011 | Regulations were written as Federal Law. Many sections of the original legislation were clarified, specifically that the fee cap is limited to interchange, the amount card issuing banks make per transaction. There is no cap on the fees that retailers pay at the point of sale. The only party that appears to have been affected are the card issuing banks. Acquiring banks and merchant service providers are not required to lower fees or to pass down the savings to retailers.

And the Misinformation Continues | July 12, 2011 | BusinessWeek had just featured a story about a small restaurant owner that was thrilled that her debit card fees would soon be only 21 cents per transaction. We blasted the story as being factually incorrect since the law did not place any cap on the point of sale. We highlighted the fact that so much misinformation had gone around, that retailers did not realize that interchange fees are the fees acquiring banks pay to card issuing banks. Merchant service providers still control the amount retailers pay. They are not required to share the savings at all. Our e-mails to BusinessWeek did not receive any response.

15,000 Exempt From The Debit Card Interchange Fee Standards | July 14, 2011 | 15,000 banks were apparently exempted from the debit card reform law because they had less than $10 billion in assets. It becomes evident that the law will have strange consequences since it only applies to the largest banks.

Don’t Make Us Pay Goes Quiet | August 7, 2011 | The dontmakeuspay.org consumer movement appeared to have been a secret front for the major banks. A closer look revealed that there may never have been a consumer movement at all.

Revenge for the Durbin Amendment | October 3, 2011 | Bank of America announced a plan to charge their customers a $5 monthly fee to use a debit card.

Don’t Make Us Pay is Back At it Again | October 21, 2011 | Months after the “consumer movement” disappeared, it appeared to rise again when they sent out a mass e-mail.

Where’s the Debit Discount? | December 11, 2011 | The Electronic Payments Coalition (EPC) released a report that illustrated consumers were not experiencing the savings that retailers had promised they would pass down when the debit card fee cap went into effect. The EPC is the same group behind the dontmakeuspay.org movement.

Law to Reduce Debit Card Fees to Retailers Has Opposite Effect | December 12, 2011 | The new law was found to have caused certain retailers to pay higher debit card fees than previously. Retailers began learning that they may not be getting the savings they thought they had won.

As the multitude of corporate and government purchasing agents begin to move from paper to purchasing cards (P-Cards), the resellers must become very knowledge in how the contractual process works between purchasing agents and their suppliers. In addition, for resellers to be successful in the marketplace, they must become the dependable expert and assist the suppliers through the education and setup processes when establishing their Level III processing program.

With the recent introduction of Level III payment processing by eProcessingNetwork, ePN’s focus is to help resellers identify with, and understand the purchasing agents and the issuing banks that promote purchasing card programs, and of course the end-recipient – the suppliers. By using Level III Card Processing, businesses can accept Business-to-Business (B2B) payments and qualify for the lowest interchange rates available, which can substantially reduce their processing fees and allow them to successfully cater to the needs of corporate customers.

In recent years the buyer’s accounts payable (AP) departments have become advocates of purchasing cards to help streamline processes and reduce operational costs. Currently, the buyer bears the cost of the payment – for example, the costs associated with check processing within their organization. Conversely, when the supplier accepts payment via a corporate or purchasing card, they have to absorb the transaction fees associated with the payment. Up until recently, this is one reason why many suppliers resisted accepting card payment from their buyers. With credit tightening up over the past few years thereby impacting company cash flows, and with attractive Level III interchange rates, B2B payments are starting to accelerate as the value-proposition of purchasing cards is better understood.

That’s where partnering with a trusted gateway processing provider such as eProcessing Network can help. As the leading independent payment gateway and software development company in the Electronic Payment Processing Industry, eProcessing Network understands that many businesses are being presented with Corporate and Purchasing cards for payment of purchase orders and invoices, most of which can be costly to process. By incorporating Level III – Enhanced Data processing technology into the ePN online terminal, more businesses can process online B2B transactions quickly, gain better cost-efficiencies, and still use the enhanced transaction data in conjunction with the detailed, real-time reporting tools that are a standard feature of the ePN product.

Contact ePN today for more information on how Level III Processing can work for you at 800-296-4810 or visit us online at www.eprocessingnetwork.com

Article originally featured in Marc Beauchamp’s newsletter
surviveandthrive.biz

• Your Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN)
• Your Legal Business Name
• Your Legal Business Address
• Your Business Organization Type (e.g. Corporation, LLC, Partnership, Sole Prop., etc.)

MSPs are required to report gross revenue, so chargebacks and refunds are included. The official ruling states:

Section 6050W(a) provides that each payment settlement entity must report the gross amount of reportable payment transactions for each participating payee. The proposed regulations defined gross amount as the total dollar amount of aggregate reportable payment transactions for each participating payee without regard to any adjustments for credits, cash equivalents, discount amounts, fees, refunded amounts, or any other amounts.

And if your tax information doesn’t match, the IRS will withhold 28% of all your payments starting on January 1st, 2013, whether it’s your fault or not. Once that happens, your MSP can’t refund you and all issues must then be handled with the IRS directly. If you haven’t received any kind of alarming notice that your information doesn’t match, this warning doesn’t apply to you. Although, it can’t hurt to call your account representative to confirm that all information is up to date and verified. Better safe than sorry.

If you didn’t know about this law, now is a good time to read up on the dense technicalities of it in this 520 page document.