WASHINGTON–The Fed has extended the comment deadline for its “card not present” proposal.
The move follows requests by several groups, including NAFCU, to push the comment deadline later in the year.
The Federal Reserve said stakeholders now have until Aug. 11 to submit comments related to its proposal for requiring debt card issuers to enable, and allow merchants to choose from, at least two unaffiliated networks for card-not-present debit card transactions, such as online purchases.
In a released statement, the Fed said it is providing the extension so that interested persons have more time to analyze the issues at hand and prepare comments.
As CUToday.info reported in May, the Fed said its proposal, which would change its Regulation II (Debit Card Interchange Fees and Routing), was necessary “in light of information indicating that often only one network is enabled for such transactions.
The Current Rules
Under current rules, at least two unaffiliated payment card networks must be enabled on a debit card to process debit card transactions. The Fed stated that when it promulgated the rule, the market had not developed solutions to broadly support multiple networks over which merchants could choose to route card-not-present transactions.
The Fed said its proposal clarifies card-not-present transactions are a “particular type of transaction” for which two unaffiliated payment card networks must be available. The proposed revisions would further clarify the responsibility of the debit card issuer in ensuring that at least two unaffiliated networks have in fact been enabled to comply with the regulation, according to the Fed.
The original comment deadline was in July.