If you've been diving deep into interchange when talking with merchant prospects, it's time to take a different tack. That became clear in researching our two-part lead feature on the topic. Transparency is critical for maintaining long-term, healthy relationships, but with the overwhelming number of interchange categories and various rationale for them, it is easy to go too far when explaining them. As Mark Dunn, President of Field Guide Enterprises LLC, said during an interview for this issue's lead, "Explanations of interchange are where sales go to die."
Keeping in mind that what is most important to merchants is the effective cost of card acceptance, we didn't attempt to parse the various interchange categories in the second article of our two-part series on interchange. Rather, we focused on the basic structure of interchange; the importance of correct merchant category codes; why some transactions and businesses are designated high risk; several popular pricing models, for example, tiered pricing, interchange pass-through, interchange plus and interchange plus-plus; and how statement analysis can be used as a sales tool.
There are many sales tools at the disposal of ISOs and merchant level salespeople. Two possibilities brought up by industry experts whose articles are in this issue include helping merchants benefit through cash discount programs and through surcharging, the latter being more complex because it is not legal in all states at this time. Other contributors discuss how to exploit the many advantages small businesses have over larger ones, the difference optimism can make when it comes to the bottom line and the need to tailor payment acceptance in an increasingly global, omnichannel world.
Three major acquisitions made the news recently: Vantiv's planned purchase of Worldpay, ScanSource's intention to gain POS Portal and North American Bancard's completed acquisition of Total Merchant Services. Our other news stories covered analysis from the Fed on payments data, developments in the artificial intelligence realm, malware disguised as app updates, ransomware attacks, Amazon Prime Day and more.
As always, you'll find product and company profiles, as well as updates on key goings on in the payments realm, including executive appointments, partnerships, research, awards and honors, new resources, legal actions, funding rounds, and more.
Please let us know what you find helpful in this issue ‒ and what you'd like us to cover more. Send your thoughts to greensheet@greensheet.com. And do continue to send press releases to press@greensheet.com. 
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