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And is not the problem partly driven by the issuers who in general (but changing) run the schemes and sit on their boards and decide what to do - who set the interchange rates and keep them as high as they can for as long as they can, and let the schemes take the flack for their decisions. Surely what is also needed is for the balance of power (and attention) within the schemes to migrate away from the issuers and much more towards the acquirers and the retail community. Were they to do this, then the rates would have been driven down and the schemes woudl be reacting faster to, anticipating initiatives and moving markets more towards the retailer community and solving the problems associates with cardholders needs at the point of payment. Wheras now, we have a situations where people like Apple !!! are setting the strategy challenges on the Payments Industry agenda. 

@Jim - indeed - and especially the case in the presence of dominating worldwide duopoly. This has long-needed to be addressed commercially (the dupopoly not the interchange issue per se), and all the small payment initiatives that are evolving are either destined to fail or very much sit on the 'rails' of the duopoly; or get purchased by M/V - or A. This whole duopoly thing, as much as we love M/V most certainly leads to complacency, the absence of directional leadership and initiativitis rather than 'strategic direction' or trailblazing.

What makes thinks now quite exciting is that we have had THREE major announcements in the last 48 hours: Apple setting direction through its NFC / Tokenisation / EMV standard endorsement, MasterCard mandating EU NFC, and Visa addressing tokenisation. And this all seems to link to a 3rd party (Apple) doing something dangerous for the Dupoloy.

Interesting how Apple just completely changed the context of precisely this type of discussion. It has introduced xFA (where we cannot be sure what x vale is yet), introduced tokenisation 'at a stroke', and maybe even reversed interchange - a lot of the details are unclear, but this will disrupt the market and turn our thinking a lot as details and the market evolves.

@Brendan - Please note (in the article) that MasterCard reduced them in accordance with the ruling 7 years ago. This appeal simply endorses what happened then, and prevents them going up again (as if they could). 

This is more of a psychological 'lose' for MasterCard than anything else; but some might also say that it also rather more reflects the outcome of their decision to withdraw its operations in EU and migrate everything to the USA. 

@Peter Bove - I do not think that Visa is the best place for innovation at all, nor the best party to manage, co-ordinate or implement new technologies. But with a void in leadership coming from UK Plc (APACS, Payments Council, Banks collectively) or indeed the impossible task of getting this from EU or globally what are we to do. I believe that it is a real mistake for us (all) to allow schemes to manage innovation and/or direction because they move at the speed of the lowest-common-denominator (and that appears to be the USA at the moment!). BUT, who else is laying out a vision? I do not believe that this is Visa either (as Visa Inc or as Visa EU), but Peter Bayley and Jonathan Vaux (and behind them others I am sure SE/SP etc.) have stepped up to the podium on this one and started a debate with some leadership. So, the industry should, after picking itself up off the floor, 'run with the batton'. I would struggle to disagree with most (if not all) of the criticisms above; but that is NOT THE ISSUE HERE. Visa executives have 'stepped up to the plate' - we should not either knock them off their feet - nor should we throw last week's supper / or this year's 'pig's ear' at them. We should move forward, with the debate and the innovation and the thinking and the collective leadership ........... etc.

Sorry about all the analogies - especially the American one!

Good points. Why the anonymity?

@Peter Bove.  Putting aside the issue that Visa does not really process anything itself...... If they did just that, then the consumer experience wouldn't get better or quicker; new technologoes would go nowhere, fraud and other losses would rise, new payment solutions would cease and we would all start demanding closure of the schemes in less than 5 years. In general, if we do not move forward then we move backwards, and if we keep doing that then we die. It is that simple.

So summarising the above commentaries - they seem to have drifted 180 degrees away from the issue raised by Visa people and in summary are broadly based upon a criticism of Visa products, Visa motives, Visa products, Visa infrastructure and Visa revenues today. Does this mean that no-one thinks that Visa shoudl be thinking about the infrastructure and strategy for the payments industry, that we shoudl let this be dictated by the Visa Inc people rather than letting the Europe Visa people work on a strategy; and that we should just stop progress in the absence of anyone else coming up with or being able to direct an industry strategy? Anyone?

A fantastic announcement from Visa people - about the future, i.e. a vision on what should be happening and where the industry should be. This is a debate about the future infrastructure that is needed - i.e. to facilitate payments beyond EMV and beyond anything that exists today.

The debate is needed and the planning is essential to drive global payments solutions forward properly.

Discussing the drawbacks that are inherrent in the design of today's solutions whatever they might be - or for whatever they were introduced for is not really part of this debate. VbV/3DS was a solution delivered to cure a sudden immediate need for a market solution in the short term - and is only transient. NFC is a solution for a small and narrow part of the transaction - that simply has not worked (for again many reasons) as well as it was expected. Neither is this about unblocking / blocking cards in the traditional sense - but more about the transactional certification using behavioural analytics built upon an infrastructure that is 'new' secure using what we have learned from EMV and knowing what is needed in 'the new world'.

These are all issues or real substance that need debating, and are clearly issues with substantive emotion and depth attacahed to them. However, they are all issues that lie outside of the 'strategy thinking' about the underlying infrastructure needed for tomorrow that is presented in these blogs. The comments thus far are the things that a strategic architecture - if designed properly - will wipe out over night. So we all need to be delighted that this is where the debate is moving to and for Peter / Jonathan for starting this. 

Critical review of this is very valid, but the debate needs to be at a strategy level. There are many more relevant questions that people like Peter and Jnathan should be challenged with. These all now relate to how to define the strategic solutions, how to agree them, how to INCLUDE all the parties involved from issuers, acquirers, technology companies, processors and of cours cardholders and retailers; but also regulators and governments centrally and globally. The thinking also needs to have not only a end-game vision, but a series of carefully planned milestones and agreed ways forward. These are the big challenges that will need to be addressed and where the challenge should be. However, the first stage has begun - and the important stage at that - i.e. setting down the vision for the future. Well done Peter Bayley and Jonathan Vaux.