IZettle, the social payments company making card acceptance possible for Europe's small business owners, today announced that its mobile payments service is now available in Mexico as a result of the Swedish company's global partnership with Banco Santander.
Former Visa executive, Luis Arceo will lead iZettle's Mexican operations as managing director.
And, for the Mexican market, iZettle today announced the launch of a brand new mini Chip & Magstripe card reader for Apple or Android phones and tablets, that allows small businesses to accept both chip card and magnetic stripe card payments.
"Starting today, anyone selling anything in Mexico can take card payments - chip or magstripe - quickly and safely using their smartphone or tablet," said Jacob de Geer, co-founder and CEO of iZettle, whose mobile payments service is used in seven European countries. "This is the start of big change for Mexico, where accepting card payments has never before been an affordable option for new or small businesses."
Mexico is iZettle's first expansion beyond Europe, and has allowed the company to establish the necessary infrastructure to soon provide its mobile payments services to small business owners throughout the Americas.
"This is a very important day for us," said de Geer. "Shifting from local to global operations in financial services in less than three years of operation is a major accomplishment from our perspective."
iZettle takes just minutes to set up, and works with all major payment cards. With iZettle there's no subscription fee, set up fee, monthly fee or minimum. Instead, iZettle merchants pay 3.75% of each transaction when using a chip card, and 4.75% of each transaction with magstripe cards. iZettle then electronically deposits payments in the seller's bank account.
Sweden's Financial Supervisory Authority regulates iZettle, whose services are EMV (Europay, MasterCard and Visa) approved and compliant with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). In Mexico, iZettle is subject to the Mexican regulatory requirements as it applies to payment facilitators, card networks and acquiring banks.
Jorge Alfaro Lara, Deputy General Directotor of Payment Systems at Banco Santander Mexico said that Banco Santander is constantly innovating to offer new alternatives to help SMEs grow their business. "This partnership extends our offering of payment methods available on Banco Santander's platform globally, and strengthens our position as the leading bank for SMEs. We are pushing the boundaries of banking with relevant technological innovation that helps small and medium businesses."
Banco Santander is the largest financial group in Spain and Latin America with significant positions in the United Kingdom, Portugal, Germany, Poland and the U.S. northeast.
"In MasterCard we are convinced to promote the development of mobile solutions that allow to receive card payments that meet global standards of operation and safety. Mexico has a great potential for growth in terms of card acceptance and the increasing use of smartphones is a great opportunity to expand the number of businesses that accept card payments, which is aligned with our vision of a World Beyond Cash", said Ricardo Ibarria, Senior Vice President and regional Head of Acceptance for Latin America and the Caribbean.
Added Mario Luna, Visa Mexico's business development leader for Merchant Relations and Acceptance: "mPOS solutions make it easier for merchants of all sizes to accept card payments, and innovative solutions such as iZettle support the migration of cash payments to electronic payments. iZettle recently joined our Visa Ready Partner Program, designed to provide innovators with an easy way to collaborate with Visa and ensures their mobile commerce solutions are approved for use with Visa payments."
iZettle's app for accepting card payments is now available in Mexico for download free of charge from Apple's App Store or Google Play. iZettle's new Chip & Magstripe card reader sells for $499 (MXN) from the iZettle website. Special discounted pricing is available to Banco Santander customers.