Used by member banks to electronically transfer funds directly from sending bank through the Federal Reserve to the Merchant's bank.

A form of electronic payment. Funds or payments can be transferred electronically in two ways: by wire transfer or through an automated clearinghouse. Wire transfer is an online, real-time payment system designed to handle large-dollar, time-critical payments, mostly between large banks. ACH, in contrast, is designed to be an "electronic check." It is typically used to process high volumes of relatively small-dollar payments for settlement within one or two business days. ACH transactions are settled in a manner similar to the way checks are settled: The clearinghouse takes all ACH files received daily from its member banks, sorts them by the originating bank (the bank where the check was cashed or deposited) and the paying bank (the bank against which the check was drawn), totals the accounts, and credits or debits appropriate accounts accordingly.

A financial institution that maintains the merchant credit card processing relationship and receives all transactions from the merchant to be distributed to the Cardmember Banks.

Smaller financial institutions that contract to become an issuing and/or acquiring agent of another member bank.

An organization that issues American Express® cards and acquires transactions, unlike Visa and MasterCard, which are Associations.

The procedure an Acquirer may use to resolve a complaint with a Card Issuer on behalf of the establishment. Use this procedure after a good faith collection attempt has failed.

MasterCard International, Visa U.S.A., or Visa International, which are licensing regulatory agencies for bankcard activities.

Approval by, or on behalf of, the card issuer to validate a transaction for a merchant or another affiliate bank. An authorization indicates only the availability of the cardmember's credit limit at the time the authorization is requested.

A number issued to a participating merchant by the Authorization Center that confirms the authorization for a sale or service.

An organization that electronically communicates a merchant's request for authorization on Credit Limit credit card transactions to the cardmember's bank and transmits such authorization to the merchant via electronic equipment or by voice authorization.

The person who signs for a particular credit card; credit card authorization should be given to only this party.

Automatic capture of transaction in terminal and bank transmission at appointed time.

The amount of credit available on the cardholder's credit line after the current balance and outstanding authorizations have been calculated.

The average dollar amount of a merchant's credit card transactions.

In 1996, VISA/MasterCard headquarters introduced a new regulation requiring all businesses who manually key in the majority of their credit card transactions to have a special fraud prevention feature on their credit card processing equipment. This feature is referred to as an address verification system (it checks to see that the billing address and zip code given by the customer matches the credit card). If you opt not to use AVS, VISA and MasterCard will not support your transactions and will charge you an additional fee on those sales.