Drivers are feeling the sting of rising gas prices, with the cost of regular gas up 15 cents a gallon just in the last month. Convenience chain Cumberland Farms hopes it can ease the pain with a new app that offers a 10 cent per gallon discount at the pump.
There's a new wave of plastic filling the middle ground between credit cards and debit cards: refillable cards -- or prepaid cards -- that act like a hybrid of both. They're an attractive option for consumers -- and a convenient way for banks to sidestep recent consumer protection laws.
Merchants have long sought the right to charge customers more for paying with a credit card, which would help them defray the cost of accepting plastic. That's currently banned by Visa and MasterCard, but deal in the works could change that.
Feel like you're getting gouged at the gas pump amid rising prices? You actually are if you're using a debit card. Despite last year's banking reforms, gas stations have yet to pass along more than $1 billion in debit card transaction fee savings to consumers.
Bank of America learned pretty quickly last month that customers think $5 a month is too much to pay to use a debit card. But is there such a thing as a reasonable bank fee? One in three people say they're prepared to walk away from their financial institution to avoid a fee, a new survey reveals.
New rules proposed by the Fed for debit card transactions may mean consumers end up paying more to use their cards, while big retailers save billions. The rules would sharply limit the transaction fees sellers pay, so banks could recoup that money from buyers.
PayPal is aiming to launch an improved micropayments service by the end of this year. It hopes a bigger volume of tiny online purchases will be unleashed if buyers can pay as they go, instead of making a big upfront payment to be debited down.
The smartphone revolution is about to upend another business: credit card processing. With Google's new Android pay-by-phone app and Square's new transaction hardware for iPhones, your plastic could become obsolete.
The massive regulatory revision touches almost every aspect of the financial industry. In addition to rules aimed at trimming risk-taking among banks, the package prominently includes several new protections for consumers.
