The Green Sheet Online Edition
December 8, 2025 • 25:12:01
Letter from the editor
As the payments industry races ahead with new rails, platforms and possibilities, one question remains: what do merchants really want? In this final installment of our multipart series, we return to that question with fresh perspectives and familiar themes. Across Parts 1 and 2, merchants’ frustrations with rising costs, chargebacks, fragmented systems and uneven support were clear.
What emerges even more sharply here is the cumulative weight of those pressures and the gap between innovation for its own sake and solutions that truly make merchants’ lives easier. The voices in this final chapter reinforce a consistent message: reliability matters as much as speed, simplicity often matters more than novelty, and technology succeeds only when it works seamlessly in the background. Taken together, this series offers a candid look at where the industry is falling short and where it has an opportunity to listen, adapt and lead.
Contributing writers spotlight ways to do just that. They discuss why retail and hospitality merchants face chargebacks for varied reasons and why banks rule against them, and how smarter rebuttals and AI can help; how today’s payments providers can turn the back office into an engine for transparency, control, trust and growth; how poor onboarding and limited data can freeze funds for startups, making proactive transparency and payment strategy essential for survival; and how cards and MIDs, increasingly decoupled from users and merchants, are enabling innovation while creating risks payment professionals must understand.
This issue also highlights recent news coverage: a proposed Visa-Mastercard merchant settlement drawing opposition from merchant groups and lawmakers, who argue that the concessions are temporary and credit card routing reform is necessary; J.D. Power research finding complacency among many bank and card customers about fraud protection, exposing a widening gap between institutions' cybersecurity investments and customer engagement; National Retail Federation research projecting a record Thanksgiving-to-Cyber Monday shopping period; Netevia and Stackably partnering to deliver vertically integrated payments and software platforms for niche markets, reflecting a shift toward unified ecosystems; and a Jack Henry study showing consumer financial confidence remains shaky, with limited financial literacy, fragmented app usage, and digital experience shaping trust and satisfaction.
Also not to be missed are items on recent milestones, research, partnerships, acquisitions and appointments in the payments community; company spotlights; product profiles; and more. To share your news, please email a press release to press@greensheet.com. Questions? Send an email to greensheet@greensheet.com. 
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