Visa New Upgrades for Small Businesses with Visa Accept and Visa Direct.
Visa has unveiled new smartphone-based payment capabilities. They enable small businesses to accept and make payments digitally without requiring additional payment technology.
The changes are part of two programs, Visa Accept and Visa Direct. They aim at helping small businesses, such as street vendors and online retailers, use their smartphones more effectively. The shift coincides with increasing usage of mobile phones by small businesses in sales and payments and for customer transactions.
With Visa Accept and Visa Direct Smartphones Increasingly Serve as Payment Terminals
Visa Accept enables merchants to utilize a smartphone as a card paying terminal. This allows a small businessman to receive credit card payments via a Visa Debit or prepaid card without the need for an additional point-of-sale terminal.
Customers can tap to pay or pay via a payment link. Furthermore, sellers can receive their payments sooner, enabling them to meet their daily requirements.
The service helps small businesses, which often face cash flow issues, said Visa. One in five of the small businesses interviewed experiences a cash-flow shortfall every day or month, according to Visa’s Global SMB Macro Trends Report. The report also discovered that 99% of surveyed small companies are using at least one digital finance tool.
“Small businesses across Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa simply cannot afford to let payments get in the way,” said Shahebaz Khan, Senior Vice President and Head of Commercial and Money Movement Solutions for Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa at Visa.
Visa offers Visa Accept in more than 25 countries. The service is already live with HNB in Sri Lanka, Banco Agromercantil de Guatemala, SACOMBANK and VPBank in Vietnam. Co-op Bank in Kenya and selected banks in Ghana will roll it out in the coming weeks.
Transfer Payouts to the Same Device as Your Application
Visa is also increasing the ways that businesses can send funds via Visa Direct. The service enables small business owners to receive payouts by phone quicker.
For example, this might involve paying staff, contractors or delivery drivers, issuing refunds, and transferring money to eligible cards, bank accounts or wallets.
By 2027, Visa aims for Visa Accept to be available for millions of merchants worldwide.
