jimk
Premium
join:2006-04-15
Raleigh, NC
 ·AT&T Southeast
 ·RoadRunner Cable
4 edits | reply to DC DSL
Re: Abso-frickin-lutely Unbelievable
said by DC DSL  :No, it just takes committed funding and resources than most modern businesses refuse to accept the value-benefits of. I'm going to refrain from talking about this situation too much more until we know more about what happened, but you do have a good point. Most of the time, businesses are warned before things go wrong. Sometimes, they decide to take the risk. |
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DC DSL
Stays crunchy even in milk
Premium
join:2000-07-30
Washington, DC
·Covad Communications
·Verizon Online DSL
| said by jimk :I'm going to refrain from talking about this situation too much more until we know more about what happened, but you do have a good point. Most of the time, businesses are warned before things go wrong. Sometimes, they decide to take the risk.
Whatever the specifics about the situation, what is absolutely crystal clear is their procedures and BDC weren't capable of accommodating realtime failover or going hot fast enough to avoid a catastrophic outage. There should be full-scale tests of catastrophic scenarios at least once a year, and follow-up on and verification of any corrective measures recommendations no more than 60 days after a test. They should be testing less-criticial failure scenarios a few times a year. If anything, this makes sure that everyone knows what they're supposed to do, and correct any weaknesses.
Something like this can't be excused or explained away. They're probably going to get spanked pretty hard by the logos...the inability to complete transactions in a timely manner costs the logos and the issuing institutions real money, and bad PR points. They'll probably get wallopped with lawsuits from merchants as well.
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There is no giant fur-bearing trout. |
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Dolgan
Premium
join:2005-10-01
Sun Prairie, WI
·Verizon Online DSL
| Each business needs its own backup plan
It is also unbelievable that businesses do not have their own backup plans. All walk-in businesses should have knucklebusters and carbon reciepts so they can run charges the old fashioned way, and call them in/input the info into the web later. Saved my butt at several restaurants when the phone lines went down, or the powere went out. Furthermore, if their phone lines are not down they can manually call in each credit card transaction...this is not rocket science, and the workarounds are there for each business to utilize if they so desire. The only exception may be web based merchants who would not have access to the 2 workarounds provided. It does suck that this happened, but there are temporary, albeit inconvenient, workarounds. |
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DC DSL
Stays crunchy even in milk
Premium
join:2000-07-30
Washington, DC
·Covad Communications
·Verizon Online DSL
| The logos don't want paper or manual call-in...their beancounters don't want the expense of supplies and staffing that requires. Statistically "significant" or widespread network outages are uncommon, so when contrasted to the cost of supporting manual auth, it's not justifiable in their eyes. Unfortunately, with all the consolidation in financial services over the last few years, while there are fewer points of failure there is far greater likelihood that any single failure could quickly cascade to a national or global scale...as this situation makes quite apparent.
If anything, people should be smart and heed those warnings to keep a stash of cash on hand for emergencies. It doesn't take a natural disaster or terrorist attack to muck things up...a fire or a backhoe could just as easily ruin a lot of people's days.
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There is no giant fur-bearing trout. |
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soitgoes2
Premium
join:2005-01-14
 ·Future Nine Corpor..
| reply to Dolgan
said by Dolgan :All walk-in businesses should have knucklebusters and carbon reciepts so they can run charges the old fashioned way, and call them in/input the info into the web later. ... Furthermore, if their phone lines are not down they can manually call in each credit card transaction...this is not rocket science, and the workarounds are there for each business to utilize if they so desire. The only exception may be web based merchants who would not have access to the 2 workarounds provided. Exactly.
said by DC DSL :The logos don't want paper or manual call-in Mastercard and Visa *require* merchants to have imprinters and card slips to use in case of an outage--be it small scale or large scale. Yes, it creates more work/costs, but they'd rather get that type of transaction than NO transaction. |
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Seph83
Gone Insane
Premium
join:2004-04-29
Blairsville, GA
·Windstream
| My retail company uses First Data for it's authorizations, and when they go down or our Fractional T1 goes down, we ask for the person using the Credit/Debit Card's ID, and verify that it's their card, and then manually override and accept the transaction through the POS. Our servers store the transaction locally, until we are back online, and it sends it in for processing. This way, the customer gets their products, which keeps them happy, it's simple and easy, and if there is a problem with their card, then First Data or their Bank/Credit Company has to deal with it. It's win-win.
Besides, I'll be damned if I'd let someone "rack-slide" my credit or debit card. Yes, lets just give your full credit card info to some store peon so they can max it out for you... I think not...
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"I've always been crazy, but it's kept me from going insane." ~ Waylon Jennings |
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