Page 190 - The Digital Financial Services (DFS) Ecosystem

ITU-T Focus Group Digital Financial Services
Ecosystem

Figure 4 – Key Elements of eMoney Merchant Acceptance Value Chain

• Merchant Acquisition: The process of finding value creating customers, marketing and selling them
suitable products in order to increase the size of the customer base;
• Merchant On-boarding: Validate merchant identity and underwrite merchant potential for risk;
• Fulfillment & Activation: Set up new customer account, install, activate and maintain the merchant POI
as well as perform associated support activities for acceptance and provide necessary training;
• Processing and Settlement: Provide connectivity to accepted payment types, process transactions and
settle funds;
• Merchant Relationship Management: The activities required to manage, monitor and retain the
relationships with a merchant such as complaint or fraud handling;

8.3 Overview of eMoney Merchant Acceptance Models

By applying the value chain, three models supporting merchant acceptance deployments emerge. First is the
in-house model, characterized by a MMO performing all activities In-house. The second model leverages a
third party, termed here a Merchant Service Provider, to perform activities across the value chain and whose
range of activities determines their value proposition. Finally, the merchant acquirer model, in which a MMO
contracts with a traditional Merchant Acquirer to drive acceptance at the POI (Point of Interaction). Merchant
acceptance is nascent and evolving, driven by both technological innovation and new business models. As
some deployments may be pursuing multiple models, these models may not be mutually exclusive and there
may be new models that emerge as merchant acceptance continues to gain momentum. The models are
highlighted in the table below and are detailed in this section.

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