Know Your Payments Mix
In the U.S., we’re all used to PIN debit transactions. Due to the presence of at least two competing networks on every debit card required by the 2011 Durbin Amendment, merchants with the right expertise are able to route these transactions to the lowest-cost network. But PIN authentication isn’t always an option. That’s why, until the PINless breakthrough, debit routing optimization meant working predominantly with your in-store, domestic, PIN-authenticated debit transactions: analysing each of these payments down to the BIN level, determining the available networks, and using these data insights to secure and execute an optimal routing order. But not all domestic networks are created equal. Germany’s Girocard network is similar to the U.S.’s in the sense that it has (albeit due to technical limitations rather than business practices) historically only been available for in-store, domestic debit transactions. But it too is undergoing a transformation through its rising online availability via Apple Pay.² In contrast, if we look to markets like Denmark, online payments have long been a staple of accepting the Dankort network. In France, the ability to route to the local network can even extend to credit transactions, and to commercial cards , opening up a wide array of opportunities for volumes which may have gone untapped in the U.S. In Asia-Pacific, the story gets even more complex; Australian merchants, for example, can generally only access the local Eftpos network for contactless transactions, making them the polar opposite of their PIN-prompting American counterparts. The first step in generating a global routing strategy is therefore to know your key channels of acceptance, as well as the popularity of domestic networks across all of your markets. Who knows, the same type of payment made in a different jurisdiction may have multiple routing options that competitors are already taking advantage of.
