Photo: blogs.teradata.com — *Photo: blogs.teradata.com*

By Beverly Brooks

In early 2012, Desjardins, one of the largest cooperative financial groups in Canada, selected Optimal Payments, a leading global online payments provider, to develop a customized online solution that Desjardins could offer its etailers. When initially launched, Optimal Payments’ NETBANX® payment gateway provided Desjardins’ online retail merchants with real-time transaction processing that included hosted and non-hosted payment pages, access to a virtual terminal, flexible reporting and comprehensive fraud management tools. Also included were customized fraud-parameter settings, tokenization (process of substituting a sensitive data element with a non-sensitive equivalent, referred to as a token, that has no extrinsic or exploitable meaning or value) and 3D Secure (protocol designed to be an additional security layer for online credit and debit card transactions developed with the intention of improving the security of Internet payments).

Since 2012, Optimal Payments has enhanced its customized solution for Desjardins to incorporate the ability for in-store retailers to accept payments made by customers wishing to use a financing option, known as ‘Accord D’. This option is available through the customer’s Visa Desjardins credit card or through the retailer’s private-label card. Currently, more than 7,500 retailers across Canada offer the Accord D financing program.

A renewed agreement with Desjardins, which Optimal Payments announced on September 18 of this year, enables Desjardins’ etailer clients to accept Accord D transactions from their customers through their websites. Other new features in the recent enhancement include the ability to accept payments using various scheduled billing methods (recurring billing) and through automated batch uploading.

The process to sign up for this new service is relatively easy for any merchant. Desjardins Card Services and Optimal Payments carry out many of the administrative steps, including all necessary credit checks. To complete the implementation phase, Optimal Payments provides the merchant with a one-hour training session on the online administrative module, in addition to superior support in setting-up Accord D on their merchant account. Optimal Payments’ customer support (24/7) rapidly responds to all merchant needs ensuring seamless service on an ongoing basis.

These enhanced Internet payment solutions not only make it easier for Desjardins’ etailers to offer online payment services to their customers across Canada, they also provide the assurance of high security. Optimal Payments has a long-standing reputation for delivering secure, comprehensive solutions and their focus on innovation has allowed them to remain at the forefront of online payment processing, to continuously develop its platform to support emerging payment options and to protect merchants against the continuously evolving forms of online payment fraud.

The NETBANX platform is used by thousands of companies around the globe to provide secure online processing of credit cards, debit cards, direct debit, and online banking as well as a multitude of alternative payment options that are preferred in international markets. Etailers also depend on the NETBANX proprietary ‘risk rules engine’ and customizable fraud screening tools to minimize their fraud losses and liability.

Optimal Payments is a global provider of online payment solutions, trusted by businesses and consumers in over 200 countries and territories to move and manage billions of dollars each year. The Company enables retailers everywhere to internationalize their operations and markets while ensuring their businesses and revenue streams are more secure.