Merchant Payment Processing and the Future of Money

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Merchant payments using barter, cash, and credit are nothing new. For thousands of years, customers and merchant exchanged goods and services using physical money, tradable goods, and written IOUs. Only in the 20th century did customers gain the ability to “charge it to the card.” Department stores were the <a href="https://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/history-of-credit-cards.php" target="_blank">first to offer</a> in-store credit cards (charge plates, charge cards, etc.) in the early 1900s. By 1950, the first general use credit card appeared in the form of Diners’ Club cards. As debit cards arrived later that century and a massive expansion in consumer payment cards took hold, merchants had to keep up with changes in payment preferences and technology. The era of the payment card was born.